HARRISBURG, Pa. — COVID-19 cases in Pennsylvania have fallen dramatically compared to numbers at the beginning of the year.
In February, Pennsylvania saw an average of 3,199 cases per day. In March, cases fell to an average of 767 cases per day.
"In our area we went from about 30,000 cases a day down to as low as about 500," affirmed Dr. John Goldman, an infectious disease expert at UPMC. "We're now back to about 1,000 a day."
Goldman attributes a recent small uptick in cases to a decrease in masking and the newest omicron variant. However, he says this is no cause for concern.
In the peak of the winter, UPMC had 285 hospitalized patients across its entire hospital system. Now, it only has 11.
"We initially thought that we could achieve herd immunity, and COVID-19 would go away," Goldman said.
While we're seeing Philadelphia bring back the indoor mask mandate as cases rise in that region, the Pennsylvania Department of Health (DOH) says it isn't considering a statewide mandate.
In response to the White House's decision to cut funding for a free COVID-19 testing program, the DOH also says it doesn't believe this is the cause of low case counts.
DOH press secretary Mark O'Neill released a statement saying, in part, "...testing remains easily accessible with plenty of locations for people to receive free testing across the commonwealth, including free access to testing for the uninsured. Meanwhile, the department is still receiving plenty of test results with an average of 25,000 test results per day."
Goldman suspects we'll have a COVID-19 season every year starting in the fall/winter, but he says it'll get less severe and we'll continue to see lower hospitalizations.