The latest surge in COVID-19 infections in Columbus and the surrounding area has driven the monthly death toll from the virus to its highest level in a year.
At least 54 people in the area — including 16 in Bartholomew County — died from the virus during the first 27 days of January, the highest monthly total since January 2021, when 68 deaths were recorded, according to the latest figures from the Indiana Department of Health.
The area, which includes Bartholomew, Brown, Decatur, Jackson, Jennings and Shelby counties, has recorded a total of 746 deaths from COVID-19 since spring 2020.
So far, January 2022 has been the fourth deadliest month of the pandemic in Bartholomew County, with the county recording one death, on average, every 40 hours.
This past month also was the second deadliest on record in Jennings County, with 14 of the county’s overall total of 87 confirmed coronavirus deaths occurring since New Year’s Day.
And this month’s death toll could continue to rise, as it often takes a few days for state health officials to verify and update COVID-19 deaths on its public dashboard.
Columbus Regional Health officials, who had to contend with a record 70 COVID-19 hospitalizations in mid-January, have characterized the pandemic as “an unrelenting tragedy of continued death.”
“People are still dying from this every day,” CRH spokeswoman Kelsey DeClue said in a previous interview.
The increase in local deaths mirrors trends seen across the United States, as the highly contagious omicron variant continues to sweep across the country.
The variant has driven the daily American death toll higher than during last fall’s delta wave, with deaths likely to keep rising for days or even weeks, The Associated Press reported.
The seven-day rolling average for daily new COVID-19 deaths in the U.S. has been climbing since mid-November, reaching 2,267 on Thursday and surpassing a September peak of 2,100 when delta was the dominant variant.
Now omicron is estimated to account for nearly all the virus circulating in the nation, according to wire reports. And even though it causes less severe disease for most people, the fact that it is more transmissible means more people are falling ill and dying.
Omicron has been “a totally different animal,” said Bartholomew County Health Officer Dr. Brian Niedbalski.
“This strain of the virus is extremely contagious,” Niedbalski said. “The sheer number of cases we saw, and continue to experience, was staggering. While younger, healthier people typically had mild to moderate cold symptoms, others fared worse. It stands to reason that with the higher number of cases, you could expect several of those cases to end in a poor outcome.”
At the same time, the number of Bartholomew County residents receiving their first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine reached an all-time low last week, with just 170 people getting their first shot, state records show.
Roughly 29,600 eligible Bartholomew County residents had yet get vaccinated as of Monday morning. Just 29% of the county’s total population has received a booster shot.
Local health officials are continuing to plead with people to get vaccinated against COVID-19.
CRH officials have said that booster rates in Bartholomew County “aren’t exactly where we would want them” — and “that’s an understatement.”
