Wisconsin's Top Medical Officer Says COVID Could Become an Endemic This Year

Saturday, February 5th, 2022 -- 11:01 AM

(WMTV/AP) Wisconsin’s top medical officer says COVID-19 could become endemic this year.

Department of Health Services Chief Medical Officer Dr. Ryan Westergaard still warned that case counts could periodically spike but the disease likely will reach a stage in 2022 where numbers remain fairly constant.

The term endemic is used to describe a disease as a regular part of a population, such as the flu. Westergaard added, however, that it is “reasonably likely” to expect that other variants will pop up that would cause that endemic steady-state to spike.

To prevent those situations, he emphasized the importance of not only vaccinations, but vaccinating as many people as possible around the world. “(Like influenza) I think the story is going to be continued to be told, but we are optimistic over the next several weeks that we’ll see cases continue to decline as the Omicron surge subsides,” he continued.

Some medical experts maintain that COVID-19 will never become endemic because the disease will be driven by new variants that can evade vaccinations and infect swaths of unvaccinated people.

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