San Diego Union-Tribune (Sunday)
SOME KEEP TRAVEL PLANS DESPITE CDC PLEA
Health officials worry Thanksgiving travelers packing virus with them
San Diego County reported yet another single-day record of COVID-19 cases Saturday, with 1,478 new infections and six new deaths.
Despite the uptick and a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warning, about 30,000 people will fly in and out of San Diego International Airport each day during Thanksgiving week, according to the San Diego County Regional Airport Authority.
Local public health experts worry travelers will bring the coronavirus with them.
“It’s going to be crazy,” said Dr. Davey Smith, chief of infectious diseases at UC San Diego.
The number of hospitalized COVID-19 patients in the county has climbed to 456, nearly double the figure from a month ago. That’s already strained local hospitals, with 90 percent of staffed beds at Sharp Chula Vista Medical Center occupied as of Friday, about half by COVID-19 patients. The situation could worsen in the weeks after Thanksgiving, as it can take up to two weeks for someone exposed to
virus to later test positive and begin showing symptoms.
“Two weeks after Thanksgiving is going to be really crushing, and that leads right into Christmas,” Smith said. “I just don’t see a lot of good silver lining around the winter and the holidays.”
A recent message from the CDC was meant to avoid a holiday surge.
“Travel may increase your chance of getting and spreading COVID-19,” said the agency on its website. “Postponing travel and staying home is the best way to protect yourself and others this year.”
But with no hard restrictions on travel, it’s up to individuals to decide to honor this warning.
“I think it’s a personal choice,” said Sabrina Lopiccolo, spokesperson for the Airport Authority. “But if you are making that choice and do need to travel, then we want to make sure that you’re doing so in a safe manner.”
Travelers clad in masks and armed with hand sanitizer flowed through the airport Saturday — though in significantly fewer numbers than usual. Typically, about 80,000 people a day f ly in and out of the airport during Thanksgiving week.
Ofelia Hulsizer flew into San Diego from Reno, Nev., to spend the week with her siblings and mother eating and rooting for the University of Nevada, Reno’s football team. She says she’ll celebrate Thanksgiving with about 10 family members at her brother’s house, like usual.
“I got my COVID test before I came out, about a week ago,” Hulsizer said. “Negative.”
Not everyone was planning the traditional big gathering.
Linda (who preferred not to share her last name) planned to fly to Idaho, where she will help her nearly 80-year-old mother around the house. It’ll be her first flight in eight months, and she loaded her travel bag with hand sanitizer for the occasion. Once in Idaho, she’ll stay in a motel and only go to her mother’s home to stock the pantry and help clean.
“We’re not going to have a dinner. There’s no family get-together. It will not be like a holiday,” she said. “I know it’s risky. I’m willing to accept that. I just hope all goes well for everyone who’s traveling.”
Both Hulsizer and Linda decided to get a COVID-19 test before traveling.
They weren’t the only ones with that idea.
About 100 people formed a snaking line at a walk-up COVID-19 testing site in Linda Vista at the former USD Electronics Recycling Testing Center.
Maddy Upjohn had gotthe ten tested at the site in late October; it took about a halfhour. She returned Saturday, hoping that a negative test result would mean she could safely visit her parents in San Francisco for Thanksgiving. This time, the wait was nearly two hours.
“I brought a book,” she said, adding that she finished at least a few chapters while waiting in line.
There’s just one problem with using testing to make travel decisions, says UCSD public health expert Chip Schooley: A negative COVID-19 test doesn’t guarantee that you’re not infected, or that you won’t be exposed in the near future.
That’s because it takes time for the virus to grow to levels that a test can detect. Not understanding this could give people the false impression that it’s OK to abandon basic public health precautions, such as social distancing and avoiding indoor gatherings.
“While it decreases the likelihood of being infected, it’s important for people to understand that it doesn’t tell you that you won’t be shedding virus two hours from now or two days from now,” Schooley told the Union-tribune Thursday. That’s disappointing news during a time of year that centers around family gatherings and human connection. And Smith gets that.
“I want to go see my parents. I want to go back to normal. I want to take one small break,” Smith said. “That’s the reason we have holidays in general: to take a break.”
But he’s concerned that holiday travel will lead to more hospitalizations and deaths at a time when doctors still don’t have surefire treatments for COVID-19 patients and researchers remain months away from having a widely available vaccine — though recent reports by Pfizer and Moderna show their vaccines could be 95 percent effective.
“It is going to get better,” Smith said. “We see the light at the end of the tunnel, but we”ve got to make it through winter.”