‘Razor blade throat’ Covid variant cases increase across US

Cases of COVID-19 are rising once again across the country.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said as of July 15, cases were either growing or likely growing in 26 states and the District of Columbia:

Growing:

• Pennsylvania
• Ohio
• Virginia
• North Carolina
• Kentucky
• Illinois
• Iowa
• Arkansas
• Texas
• Hawaii

Likely Growing:

• Maine
• New York
• Massachusetts
• Delaware
• Maryland
• South Carolina
• Georgia
• Tennessee
• Mississippi
• Oklahoma
• California
• Alaska
• Wisconsin
• Indiana
• Michigan
• New Jersey
• Washington, D.C.

Only one state, Montana, is considered likely declining, with the remaining 23 states either not changing or not estimated, according to the latest data available.

CBS News reported that it is the highest number of emergency room visits that are Covid-related since March, but it is not out of the ordinary when it comes to the typical summer spikes.

“We now know that there’s a winter spike and then there’s a summer spike,” Dr. Jon LaPook, CBS News chief medical correspondent, said. “And every year, I just looked last night, the number of deaths, the number of hospitalizations, is gradually going down each season. So that’s the good news.”

The current dominant variant is N.B.1.8.1, accounts for 43% of new Covid cases, the CDC said. It is a descendant of the omicron variant and is a version broken off of the XVD.1.5.1 strain, NBC News reported.

It has been called “Nimbus” and produces a “razor blade sore throat” as a symptom.

The “razor blade sore throat” was a common symptom when the variant cropped up in China, WebMD reported and has been found in cases worldwide.

But doctors said that the throat isn’t actually the virus.

“Symptoms of the sore throat are not from the virus itself, Chin-Hong, a professor at the University of California, San Francisco, told WebMD. ”They are from the inflammatory reaction to the virus."

As WebMD explained, when the virus gets to the ACE2 receptors in the throat area, it is your immune system, prepped by either vaccines or past infections, that kicks into gear to battle the virus, and causes inflammation, fluid buildup, redness and swelling.

You can lessen the pain by using anti-inflammatory drugs, numbing sprays or lozenges, menthol lozenges and warm or cold liquids.

Along with the sore throat, other symptoms include cough, fever and fatigue, Weill Cornell Medicine said.

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