As research unfolds on Omicron, patience is critical, says Baker

PHOTO/STATE HOUSE NEWS SERVICE Mass. Gov. Charlie Baker

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By State House News Service

As scientists and policymakers around the world work to figure out exactly what kind of a threat the latest COVID-19 mutant poses, Gov. Charlie Baker said Monday that his administration is trying to make it easier for residents to bolster their protection against the coronavirus by getting a booster shot.

The Omicron variant has not yet been detected in the United States, but it barged into the picture Friday when the World Health Organization declared it a "variant of concern," setting off questions about this strain's transmissibility and potential to evade the protections afforded by vaccines. President Joe Biden imposed travel restrictions from African countries and said Monday that he expects confirmation of the variant in the U.S. "sooner or later."

The WHO said "it is not yet clear" whether Omicron is more easily spread between people or whether infection with the Omicron variant causes more or less severe disease. The organization said it is "working with technical partners to understand the potential impact of this variant on our existing countermeasures, including vaccines."

"I continue to believe the best thing people can do to protect themselves from any of these variants is get vaccinated if you're not and get a booster if you're eligible," Baker said early Monday afternoon on GBH Radio's "Boston Public Radio" program. He added, "I understand the concern, but I think people need to recognize and understand that people are chasing this pretty hard. You've got folks all over the globe who are chasing data and information and it'll probably take a few days to figure out what we don't know. But again, the best thing you can do is the stuff we've been preaching and practicing here in Massachusetts for a while."

Baker, who is scheduled to get his own booster shot this week, said about 1 million people in Massachusetts have already gotten a booster shot and that the state is currently administering about 55,000 vaccine doses -- first shots, second shots and boosters -- on average each day, compared to about 80,000 shots per day in the spring. With "far more demand" for boosters than a few weeks ago, the governor said his team is working on ways to get more shots into arms.

"I think the good news is we had tons of open appointments to get boosters two weeks ago. There's been a lot of increase -- which is good, I mean, I'm happy to have increases -- and we're going to talk to our folks about whether we can come up with additional ones," he said.

Co-host Margery Eagan told Baker about the calls they took before he joined the show Monday from people saying they were having a hard time finding an open booster shot appointment, and Baker said he had heard much of the same from people he's spoken to.

"When I go look at Vaxfinder at Mass.gov, I can always find appointments. Now, they may not be in the place somebody wants to go to get one, and it may be a week or 10 days out or two weeks out before they can get one," the governor said. "But given the fact that we have far more demand now than we had a couple of weeks ago, we're gonna see if we can increase our capacity to do more."

Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris got an Oval Office briefing Monday morning from the White House COVID-19 Response Team with the latest developments related to the Omicron variant and Dr. Anthony Fauci joined Biden as he gave a public update from the Roosevelt Room.

"Dr. Fauci believes that the current vaccines provide at least some protection against the new variant and the boosters strengthen that protection significantly. We do not yet believe that additional measures will be needed. But, so that we are prepared if needed, my team is already working with officials at Pfizer, Moderna and Johnson & Johnson to develop contingency plans for vaccines or boosters if needed," Biden said.

Biden said that he is planning on Thursday to release a "detailed strategy outlining how we're going to fight COVID this winter, not with shutdowns or lockdowns, but with more widespread vaccination, boosters, testing and more."

Rapid Test Availability
The testing front is one on which Baker would like to see the federal government become more active, especially around the affordability and accessibility of rapid or in-home COVID-19 tests, something he said that he has raised "on a number of calls with the White House for months."

"Part of it had to do with the fact that the U.S. treated rapid tests as a medical device and not as a public health measure, and put them through a much more complicated and difficult process than they needed to," Baker said. He added, "In most parts of Western Europe, you can buy these for a buck on the street corner. And we have not reached the point in this country where we have that kind of supply available. I mean, we have to fight for the supply we get currently to run our nursing home, test-and-stay program in schools, our congregate care programs, and our programs for inmates and correctional officers."

The governor said people he talks to in Europe "don't understand the rapid test issue" here in the United States. Reuters reported last month that more than 50 million rapid COVID-19 tests are manufactured in the United States each month but that a surge in demand from employers was driving up prices and making the tests harder to come by.

"I do feel like we have a lot of catching up to do there and the message we get is that we are going to get there," Baker said, referring to assurances from the federal government that additional rapid tests will soon be on the market. "I hope we get there soon because there is tremendous value in rapid tests that work as both a preventive device and a public health device and as a work and employment device."

If Omicron is shown to be a more difficult variant to contain, it could threaten the state's pandemic recovery efforts. In the last month, the daily average of new COVID-19 cases in Massachusetts is up about 70 percent, the state's positive test rate has just about doubled and the average number of hospitalized COVID-19 patients is up 36 percent.

Last year, when vaccines were not available, COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations exploded after Thanksgiving -- with the number of virus patients in hospitals jumping more than 135 percent from 986 patients on Thanksgiving to 2,323 patients on New Year's Eve. This year, about 85 percent of the state's population is at least partially vaccinated against the virus.