The BA.2 Covid-19 subvariant is keeping the pressure on the North East's hospitals, with the numbers of patients on the wards beginning to creep up once again.
Though far fewer people are in hospital with Covid-19 than during the height of the Omicron wave in January, each of the main five hospital trusts in the region still has a substantial number of patients on the wards who have tested positive for the virus.
In Newcastle's Freeman and Royal Victoria Infirmary, there were 68 positive patients on the wards on March 15, which is the last date for which figures are publicly available. By comparison, for several days in mid-February there were just 25 people on the wards who had tested positive.
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However even given the recent spike in cases, the number of Covid-positive patients remains less than half what it was on January 16, when there were 159 people with a positive test. That said, even at the time, NHS bosses said "around half" of cases were "incidental" meaning that people had Covid-19 but that it was not the primary reason they were in hospital.
Last week the city's Director of Public Health Prof Eugene Milne said was hard to pinpoint but likely down to three factors - the impact of the "even more infective" BA.2 sub-variant, waning immunity among those who had their booster vaccine earliest, and the removal of Covid-19 restrictions in most public spaces.
One cause for optimism remains in the very low number of patients requiring ventilation. In Newcastle that figure has fallen to zero, and it is low across the board in our region.
In Northumbria Healthcare 's hospitals, including the Northumbria Specialist Emergency Care Hospital in Cramlington and district hospitals in North Tyneside, Hexham and Ashington, there were 70 Covid-positive patients on March 15 - with just one on a ventilator. While, like in Newcastle, this is an uptick compared to a February low - on February 28 there were just 49 people in hospital with Covid - it is substantially lower than the 162 seen on January 16.
The picture was similar in South Tyneside and Sunderland where numbers have risen slightly. On the same date, March 15, there were 92 Covid-positive patients in hospital at the Trust - that's 18 more than the 74 on the wards in mid February - but still substantially lower than the 200 who were in beds on January 18. Six of those are on mechanical ventilator beds.
Meanwhile there were 56 patients with a Covid diagnosis in County Durham and Darlington that's up on a low of 30 seen just a week ago, but again just two people currently in hospital require a ventilator. And Gateshead , though one of the region's smallest Trusts, has also seen a significant bump due to the Omicron sub-variant. There are now 32 patients in the QE with Covid - that's doubled in less than a week.
There were just 16 patients in hospital on March 9, but despite the rise there are still zero patients requiring a ventilator according to the latest figures. This comes as case rates in the community rise sharply in local areas - as of March 13
Speaking to the Newcastle City Futures Board last week, Prof Milne said there was "some indication that the numbers may be levelling off".
However a day later he added: "Having said that, in the last few days we've seen some new cases come through - and hospital bed numbers are slightly up. Though that's still without pressure on mechanical ventilators." He said that pressure on hospital intensive care units and the general mortality level was still low, and it was those factors he would be watching to judge if the public ought to be seriously worried once more.
