{"id":42541,"date":"2024-03-02T13:22:51","date_gmt":"2024-03-02T18:22:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/?p=42541"},"modified":"2024-03-02T13:22:56","modified_gmt":"2024-03-02T18:22:56","slug":"4th-anniversary-the-covid-19-virus-continues-to-change","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/2024\/03\/02\/4th-anniversary-the-covid-19-virus-continues-to-change\/","title":{"rendered":"4th anniversary: the COVID-19 virus continues to change"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">It\u2019s the fourth anniversary of COVID-19 cases in Florida.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">On March 1, 2020, Florida\u2019s first COVID-19 cases were confirmed\u2014both of them were in the Tampa Bay area.<\/p>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-full is-resized\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"300\" height=\"168\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1110px) 100vw, 1110px\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/download-2.jpeg?resize=300%2C168&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-42542\" style=\"width:532px;height:auto\"\/><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">That day, Governor Ron DeSantis declared the situation a public health emergency.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Over the past four years, the CDC&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/covid.cdc.gov\/covid-data-tracker\/#datatracker-home\">reports<\/a>&nbsp;there have been more than 1.1 million deaths related to the virus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cIf we look at some of the peaks in the pandemic, the death rate was 25-30% of the national death rate for the pandemic,\u201d said Dr. Laura Arline, Chief Quality Officer at BayCare.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The latest&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/covid.cdc.gov\/covid-data-tracker\/#datatracker-home\">data<\/a>&nbsp;from the CDC show the death rate is currently around 2.4%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cThe chances if you get COVID of dying from it are much lower than it was earlier in the pandemic,\u201d said Arline.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Test positivity and hospitalizations are also down.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cCompared to where we were four years ago, I mean gosh, we are doing a lot better, a lot better,\u201d said Dr. Doug Ross, Chief Medical Officer for AdventHealth Tampa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Doctors stress that things could change. COVID-19 is still out there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cIt hasn\u2019t gone away, and it\u2019s not going to. It\u2019s going to continue to mutate and stay active,\u201d said Arline.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Right now, the JN.1 variant is making up the majority of new cases.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">People are still getting infected, but the severity of the infections has changed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cWe still see the vast majority of hospitalized patients are still older patients greater than 65 plus,\u201d said Ross.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Health officials said the vaccines have played a big role in changing the course of COVID-19.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cThe vaccine has helped certainly. No question about it. And people have either gotten the vaccine or gotten COVID, or both, and obviously, their immune system has gotten better in terms of handling it,\u201d said Ross.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The CDC even just came out with a new&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.cdc.gov\/media\/releases\/2024\/s-0228-covid.html\">recommendation<\/a>&nbsp;for a spring booster shot.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cOnly in those individuals 65 and older or those who are immunocompromised,\u201d said Arline.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Doctors believe vaccines will continue to be an important part of keeping cases low moving forward.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cFor those who are older or who have underlying health conditions or are immunocompromised, they\u2019re at risk for pretty significant complications from COVID if they aren\u2019t vaccinated,\u201d said Arline.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It\u2019s the fourth anniversary of COVID-19 cases in Florida. On March 1, 2020, Florida\u2019s first COVID-19 cases were confirmed\u2014both of them were in the Tampa Bay area. That day, Governor&hellip; <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":42542,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"0","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","inline_featured_image":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"wpai_generated_summary":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"dois","default_image_id":71799,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false},"categories":[6481],"tags":[7711],"class_list":["post-42541","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-health","tag-4th-anniversary-the-covid-19-virus-continues-to-change"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42541","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=42541"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42541\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":42543,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42541\/revisions\/42543"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/42542"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42541"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=42541"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=42541"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}