Is the pandemic over? SC DHEC makes big move to stop reporting daily case counts
South Carolina’s health agency leading the state’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic made a move to stop reporting daily case totals, signaling the next phase of how the agency deals with the disease.
On Tuesday, the Department of Health and Environmental Control started its once a week reporting of COVID-19 cases, hospitalizations, deaths and number of vaccinations.
“Tracking daily case numbers is less useful, especially with the rise of non-reportable at-home tests,” said Dr. Brannon Traxler, DHEC’s public health director. “It’s much more useful to track severe cases, meaning those that unfortunately result in hospitalizations and deaths. That gives us a clearer picture of how the virus is impacting local communities.”
The move shows the pandemic shifting to an endemic phase, when a disease is consistently present but limited to a particular region, making its spread predictable, according to the Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health.
“With case counts on the decline, and vaccines and rapid testing readily available, DHEC and the rest of the nation are beginning to treat COVID-19 as an endemic disease,” said Derrek Asberry, a DHEC spokesman.
DHEC also this month cut the number of available testing sites, starting with counties that have the most private providers. The agency plans to keep its DHEC-run testing sites in counties where it is the lone provider or one of two test providers.
People also can order additional free at-home rapid tests from the federal government through covidtests.gov.
“While it is difficult to speculate the future of the virus, we know if South Carolinians and U.S. citizens do their part by getting vaccinated and boosted, masking up based on community levels, and getting tested when needed, we can continue bringing case rates down to an even lower level and more importantly, reducing the number of hospitalizations and deaths,” Asberry said.
This story was originally published March 16, 2022 at 5:00 AM.
