JOHN DAY — An uptick of COVID-19 cases in Grant County the past two weeks has yet to peak, according to the county’s top health administrator.

The county saw 46 new cases of the disease in the week ending July 17 and another 36 for the week ending July 10.

On Wednesday, July 13, the Oregon Health Authority reported 11 new cases in the county. According to the state’s database, Grant County’s seven-day average was eight cases per day.

Kimberly Lindsay, Grant County’s public health administrator, said that the predominant strain is the omicron subvariant BA.5.

According to the Oregon Health Authority, the BA.4 and BA.5 omicron subvariants are currently the chief COVID-19 variants state- and nationwide, leading to an increase in COVID-19 hospitalizations. As of July 13, nearly 90% of all hospital beds are occupied in region seven, which Grant County shares with Deschutes, Harney, Klamath, Jefferson, Lake and Wheeler counties.

Statewide, Oregon Health Authority’s database reported that as of July 13, 458 COVID-19-positive patients are being hospitalized and 63 are in ICU.

Lindsay said the county’s latest COVID surge has yet to peak and it is hard to predict how concerned people should be. Nonetheless, she said the trajectory so far looks similar to the late winter surge the county experienced in January and February of this year.

“At that time,” Lindsay said, “everyone in Grant County who needed hospital-level care was able to receive it.”

However, she said, some places did have difficulty in finding beds.

“At this time,” she said, “we are OK.”

So far, Lindsay said, the omicron subvariant BA.5 is not causing a more severe form of infection. However, she said, researchers are still gathering data. She added it is relatively early.

Add to that, she said, many in Grant County have not had a booster shot, which leaves the subvariant with a lot of room to move around.

She said she encourages people to remember that severe sickness does not often develop immediately.

“Just because we are not seeing many hospitalizations means nothing,” she said. “Typically, our hospitalization rates increase just after the peak in new COVID cases begins to drop.”

Lindsay said the Grant County Health Department is encouraging people who have not received the booster to get it. She said people with the initial Pfizer and Moderna series only or the single-dose Johnson & Johnson shot have more protection against death from COVID but little protection against reinfection.

“The booster is very helpful in warding off reinfection,” Lindsay said.

Since the start of the pandemic, the state’s health authority reports that as of July 13, Grant County’s had 1,901 positive cases. The virus has claimed 22 lives in the county.

As of July 13, 830,000 people in Oregon have tested positive for the coronavirus since the beginning of the pandemic in March of 2020, according to the state’s database. The virus has claimed the lives of 7,884 Oregonians. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported that, as of July 15, 88.9 million people nationwide have tested positive for COVID-19 and just over 1 million have died from the disease.