Americans on the move despite concerns about the spread of coronavirus

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Fri, 2021-03-26 09:47 — mike kraft

Signs of life amid signs of concern in the second year of the coronavirus pandemic U.S. officials warn that now is not the time to relax precautions as variants spread. Joel Achenbach, Ryan Slattery, Kayla Ruble, Caren Chesler Washington Post

The coronavirus pandemic isn’t over, but its psychological grip on the United States has weakened. Pandemic fatigue, warmer weather and a surge in vaccinations have led to a spring fever palpable across much of the country.

Last weekend, more than 1.5 million Americans jumped on a plane on Sunday alone, a new high for the pandemic and triple the figure from the same period in 2020 during the initial wave of infections and shutdowns, figures from the Transportation Security Administration show.

Cellphone mobility data analyzed by The Washington Post show movement steadily increasing everywhere except in large cities, where office buildings remain empty. In the Deep South states of Alabama, Georgia and Mississippi, and in the northern tier of the Mountain West, mobility is already higher than before the pandemic.

The pandemic is in its second year, and it won’t last forever. But even as people are on the move, so is the virus.

There is increasing evidence of a spring bump, if not yet anything as significant as a surge. Positive trends in coronavirus infections went flat in mid-March and have since ticked upward nationally, with daily infections now hovering near 58,000. Thirty-two states have had an increase in their average for daily infections, according to a Post analysis of state health department data.

In Michigan, infections have risen 109 percent in recent weeks. Minnesota has registered a 55 percent increase, and West Virginia 53 percent.

The most promising recent trend was the decline in hospitalizations. But the decline has slowed and shows signs of flattening. And although the seven-day average for deaths is much lower than it was a month ago, dropping to about 1,000 daily, the decline in those numbers has also slowed.

Vaccinations have made the United States better positioned to avoid the kind of calamitous spring surge in infections seen in Europe, where the pace of vaccination has been slower and many countries, including France, Italy and Germany, have been forced to impose new shutdowns. But officials here say Europe is a warning sign of what could happen in America if people stop taking precautions while highly transmissible coronavirus variants spread rapidly.

A more transmissible and dangerous coronavirus variant first seen in the United Kingdom is already dominant in some states and could become so nationally in coming weeks, according to new data suggesting that the mutant variant is outcompeting other virus strains. The B.1.1.7 variant may already account for 20 to 30 percent of new infections, according to the CDC. Data from the testing company Helix suggests that it could be higher already, about 40 percent, in states that rely on Helix’s tests.

It is probably already dominant in Florida and will become so in Connecticut, Illinois, New Jersey and New York any day now, Nathan Grubaugh, an epidemiologist at the Yale School of Public Health, said this week. ...

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