Hospitalizations in the Austin-Travis County area beginning to plateau

Despite the decline, Walkes added that now is not the time for the community to relax efforts to prevent further spread of the virus.

“The important thing for us to remember is that we've been in this spot before where we've been on the decline and anticipating a quiet hiatus afterwards,” Walkes said. “What has happened when we start seeing these declines is that people start to relax their mitigation efforts, and there's a shying away from really getting out there and getting boosted and getting vaccinated.”

APH officials continue to point to boosters as an important tool for combatting the virus and the omicron variant, which accounts for 98% of community spread in the Travis County area. As of Jan. 25, APH had administered 2,525 booster doses in January.