A Covid wave conjures up patterns of peaks and troughs where a new variant creates a surge of infections for a length of time followed by a decline in new cases. Different countries have their own Covid waves with spikes in new cases followed by an eventual leveling off of infections.
Professor Lisa Maragakis, an infectious disease specialist at Johns Hopkins Medicine, explains why this happens: “Several factors have had an impact on whether new COVID-19 cases are increasing or declining in particular locations. These factors include the effectiveness of vaccines over time, human behavior, infection prevention policies, changes to the coronavirus itself, and the number of people who are vulnerable because they have not developed some immunity, whether from natural infection or through vaccination. For instance, a large spike in U.S. COVID-19 cases occurred over the winter months of 2020–21 when people traveled and gathered for the winter holidays. The arrival of FDA-authorized vaccines in December 2020 helped bring new infection levels back down in many areas through the spring of 2021. Another surge began in July 2021 as the contagious delta variant began to circulate and eventually become dominant. Waning immunity and relaxation of public policies and infection prevention measures also played a role.“
Is another Covid wave coming? Since restrictions were lifted across the United States and people didn’t have to wear masks anymore, the number of Covid 19 cases has increased. A recent article published on April 16, 2022 for Fortune.com said “The U.S. is in a stealth wave of stealth Omicron…It can’t be known for certain because the country doesn’t have the data it should have. That’s not for lack of technology or supply, but for lack of willpower. Americans largely don’t want to get tested for COVID right now. But it sure seems like another COVID wave, and Americans want to ignore it” (Prater).
Social Media Trends as of May 17, 2022
Facebook #covidwave: 1,300 people are posting about this
Instagram #covidwave: 2,792 posts
TikTok #covidwave: 715,000 views
YouTube #covidwave: 282 videos and 177 channels
Google Trends: covid wave first appeared during the week of March 22, 2020 though to be honest America was only just in the grip of the first wave. The level of interest of this search term dipped a bit before spiking again in the spring and summer of 2021 as different variants made their way over here, such as Delta and Omicron. The week of March 13, 2022 saw the “covid wave” search term reach peak popularity as the BA.2 variant became the dominant strain in the United States.
Sources:
Chidori_B. “covid 19 second wave concept, healthcare concept.” Shutterstock.com. Standard License. Royalty-free stock vector ID: 1776123344.
Maragakis, Lisa. “Coronavirus Second Wave, Third Wave and Beyond: What Causes a COVID Surge.” John Hopkins School of Medicine. Hopkins Medicine.org. October 21, 2021. URL: https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/conditions-and-diseases/coronavirus/first-and-second-waves-of-coronavirus.
Prater, Erin. “The COVID wave America doesn’t care about: ‘Everybody is sick of COVID’.” Fortune.com. April 16, 2022. URL: https://fortune.com/2022/04/16/next-covid-wave-probably-here-america-ignoring-everybody-sick-of-covid-delta-omicron-pi-coronavirus-fauci-johns-hopkins-ba1-ba2-variant-voc-voi-wild-type/.