The approaching omicron variant should prompt a re-examination of some safety strategies to protect against COVID-19, said an infectious disease expert at Butler Health System.

Dr. John Love, infectious disease medical director, said that while data is still being gathered in real time, omicron is definitively more contagious than previous variants.

“Everything is saying this is more contagious. There is no debate at this point,” Love said. “It looks more difficult in a lot of ways.”

Those who are not yet vaccinated should absolutely get vaccinated, and those who have not yet gotten their booster should make it a priority to do so, he said.

Data on omicron indicates that vaccinated individuals are more readily infected with omicron if they have not had a booster. Love said that this may change the process of risk assessment for many.

“Some of the points of safety or of what people thought would keep them protected are not as guaranteed,” he said. “It's a little hard to rest on a single one of them, and say 'Oh, I've had my two doses of vaccine, and I'm good to go, and don't need to worry about anything.' The data that we're getting with omicron suggests that's a very dangerous approach.”

Love said it's hard to know whether omicron has hit Butler County yet, but an increase in cases statewide, especially among people who have two doses of the vaccine, may herald its arrival.“Is it possible that it's already here? Probably. It's going to be hard to know,” he said. “We'll probably see a rise in cases in the community of COVID in general, and at that point, we're probably going to assume it is omicron, because our hospital numbers have (recently) been plateaued and high. When things start changing again, we are going to have to assume it's likely omicron.”Butler Memorial Hospital currently has 51 COVID-19 inpatients, mostly unvaccinated individuals, said Love.“When we start talking about adding to this, that gets really frightening,” he said. “It gets frightening for the people who are going to be here sick with omicron; it's also frightening for everyone else in the community who won't be able to access regular health care. The secondary effect of all of this is the impact on other people's access when they have a heart attack, or stroke or knee replacement, all the routine things we do here.“We don't want to get into a situation where there is no way to do it all.”Omicron is especially alarming, Love said, because it has not responded as well in early lab studies to two out of the three monoclonal antibody treatments, which have been used to combat the delta variant of COVID-19.Love said that the failure of monoclonal antibodies against omicron has only so far been shown in a test tube. However, it is still enough to be concerned about.“We get all the people who say, 'I'm not going to get a vaccine; I'll just get the monoclonal when I'm going to get sick. I had COVID last year; my immunity will protect me,'” Love said. “That's not going to help you anymore.”

As the holiday season approaches, Love said that people should focus on what they can control — getting vaccinated, getting boosted, testing, masking and choosing who and how many people to interact with.“I would say at least wear a face mask in any kind of public, indoor thing,” Love said. “If it's a small indoor thing, a face mask can be difficult to enforce, but for some people I think it's still a reasonable idea, especially if anyone is immunocompromised.”If attending a church service, Love said he would recommend wearing a KN95 mask for a little extra protection.“Cloth masks are really poor for being barriers for this, and I would not rely on a cloth mask for anything at this point,” Love said.As for visiting family or gathering in groups, Love said that people have some control over the people they are going to be around.“There are families only gathering with other vaccinated family members. That gets really difficult; that can be a real bone of contention,” Love said. “No one really wants to introduce that conflict, but the inverse is, 'if someone here ends up being sick, what are the risks of the people here? What harm have we potentially caused?'“A difficult conversation ahead of time, is that easier than the ramifications of the consequences of getting together? I wish I had a silver bullet for how to have those talks.”

The advent of omicron and all that comes with it can feel draining, especially on an already stressed health system, Love said.On Saturday, Butler Health System honored the anniversary of the first vaccine administered under its purview in 2020. Such “lights at the end of the tunnel” aren't as obvious now.“Last winter, when things were really dark, and the first time we had a hospital that was just full of COVID, our staff would take breaks and go downstairs to watch the community come in for their vaccines,” he said. “That sense of hope that this is temporary and that we are going to get through this challenge ... There is still hope, but it is still exhausting.”The exhaustion is compounded by the nearly two-year duration of the pandemic so far.“This feeling of this perpetual wave, that it's going to be one after another, is exhausting, and is tiring because we don't have a really clear benchmark for what will end this once and for all,” Love said. “I wish this were it. I hope this is it. But I'm not going to bet on that.”Combining different layers of protection is a current goal, Love said.“We want to optimize your protection in a lot of different ways, and optimizing your protection is getting you boosted, it's staying away from people who are sick, and (it's) testing before going to family events for the protection of yourself and others,” He said: “If we do them all together, it's an additive effect.”