BETHLEHEM, Pa. – Even as coronavirus begins to wane in public consciousness, as the year ends, the state Health Department reports that more than 575 Lehigh Valley residents died of the virus during 2022.
- More than 575 people died of COVID in the Lehigh Valley this year
- Public health officials tracked more than 80,000 cases in Lehigh and Northampton Counties
- The future trajectory of the pandemic is hard to predict
About 300 of those people lived in Northampton County, and 275 in Lehigh County, according to state data.
Public health officials recorded more than 80,000 cases of COVID-19 in the two counties this year.
While much lower than in prior years, the numbers show the pandemic is not over. And where it’s headed is hard to say, according to experts.
Tom McAndrew, a Lehigh University assistant professor who studies forecasting for infectious diseases such as COVID-19, said the virus has proven its unpredictability more than once, and even the likeliest forecasts about it are much more likely not to happen.
“I get asked this question a lot, right? ‘What's going to happen next year?’” McAndrew said. “The most probable thing I can tell you is that I don't know because nobody does.”
Fighting back
It’s not as if Lehigh Valley residents haven’t fought back against COVID-19. But there’s an indication their persistence has waned.
More than three-quarters of Northampton County residents have gotten at least one dose of a coronavirus vaccine, compared with just over 80% of Lehigh County residents, according to state data.
Most of those people already have received a second dose, but only about 13% of each county’s population has received the most current booster, according to the state.
Free COVID-19 vaccinations and tests still are available at pharmacies and clinics throughout the Valley through funding from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. A list of participating sites is available on the HHS website.
Additionally, Northampton County offers free COVID vaccines for uninsured residents two Thursdays a month at Lehigh Valley Hospital’s Hecktown Oaks campus. COVID tests are available for county residents at two Lehigh Valley Health Network clinics.
The county’s previous drive-through testing and vaccination site in Bethlehem Township closed in October.
Making predictions
“The future, and certainly something like the future a year from now, is uncertain,” McAndrew said. “But that doesn't mean that the same rules or actions that you can take to prevent the spread of disease don't apply.”
Reducing contact with other people, wearing masks, getting vaccinated and other now-familiar measures slow the spread. Relaxing those measures as people see the pandemic as over gives the virus more opportunities to spread, he said.
"Studying infectious diseases is studying human behavior.”Tom McAndrew, Lehigh University assistant professor
Every time it replicates, the virus can randomly mutate into a more infectious variant, driving a new wave of disease.
“The study of infectious diseases, and particularly forecasting, is so difficult,” McAndrew said, “because studying infectious diseases is studying human behavior.”
He said COVID is unlikely to ever disappear, but it could eventually become one of humanity’s many endemic infections, perhaps returning seasonally as the flu does.
It’s the closest thing pandemics have to an ending, aside from the official determination from the World Health Organization. In October, its International Health Regulations Emergency Committee Regarding the Coronavirus Disease Pandemic decided COVID-19 still qualifies, for now.
Explaining their decision, members expressed concern about the pandemic’s uncertain trajectory, as the virus continues to mutate and more people see the pandemic as over, changing their behavior accordingly.
