CDC To Update COVID-19 Cases And Deaths Weekly, Ending Daily Reports

The agency said the change will "reduce the reporting burden on states and jurisdictions, and maximize surveillance resources.”
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The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has announced it will move to report COVID-19 data around cases and deaths on a weekly basis instead of daily, starting later this month.

The agency said the change is intended “to allow for additional reporting flexibility, reduce the reporting burden on states and jurisdictions, and maximize surveillance resources.”

The updated frequency in the reporting of data will go into effect on Oct. 20, and going forward from that date jurisdictions will have to submit their COVID data every Wednesday.

This now means COVID will be surveilled in a similar manner to influenza, for which the CDC typically releases a weekly report.

The CDC also reports COVID vaccination data weekly on Thursdays.

Earlier this week, the agency announced it will no longer be reporting country-by-country COVID travel advisories unless something changes in the travel recommendation for that particular country, such as the emergence of a new variant, according to The Associated Press.

This comes as the Biden administration, including the White House COVID-19 response coordinator Dr. Ashish Jha, has been urging people to get boosted for COVID and get their flu shot this fall.

Dr. Anthony Fauci, President Joe Biden’s chief medical adviser, received his COVID-19 booster shot on Wednesday’s episode of “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert” to spread the message.

Earlier this week, Fauci told The Washington Post’s Dan Diamond in a conversation hosted by the Center for Health Journalism at USC’s Annenberg School the country should not let its guard down when it comes to the pandemic.

“Right now, it looks like we’re going in the right direction. However, we are entering into the winter months, where no matter what the respiratory disease is there’s always a risk of an uptick in respiratory diseases,” Fauci said.

The U.S. is averaging 43,692 cases and 322 deaths per day as of Thursday, according to the CDC. Cases are much lower from a January peak, when the U.S. saw an average of over 800,000 recorded infections per week.

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