King County opens mass vaccination site at Kent ShoWare Center in February (King County)
As COVID-19 cases continue to decline over the holidays, King County health officials warn that the emergence of a variant and incompetent behavior could quickly send us all back.
COVID MyNorthwest Updates
Dr. Jeff Duchin with Public Health – Seattle & King County says the county has seen a drop in the number of cases in the past few weeks, but the seven-day rate is still over 200 per 100,000. This is seven times the amount in June and three to four times the amount we saw in September.
“About two people died every day last week, down from 8-9 a day in December,” Duchin said.
He pointed out that areas in South King County have high case rates compared to other areas in the county. Kent, Auburn, Federal Way, followed by Burien, Tukwila and Sea-Tac have a rate about three times higher than that of central Seattle. Hospitalization and death rates are also three to four times higher in these areas.
Fewer people are looking for tests while on holiday, but Duchin says testing is an important tool in preventing the spread of COVID to others.
Alternative
As for the variant, Duchin says that studies in other countries suggest that it doubles every week. He said the small numbers of cases of the variant may go unnoticed for a while, but the numbers can become large very quickly.
“I feel like we’re in the eye of a hurricane, and I want to remind everyone that we should expect the strain to spread here,” Duchin said. “And that will make our outbreak much harder to control.”
He said that we must remember that as we increase our activities, the possibility of the virus spreading. He recommended that we use the same strategies we heard: mask yourself, wash your hands, stretch and increase the ventilation inside. But we need to improve our coherence.
“The bottom line is that these variants are a game changer,” Duchin said. “They’re faster and more dangerous.”
Weekend warning
Duchin congratulated the Seattle Seahawks on being the NFL team for not reporting any positive cases of COVID before warning NFL fans to be careful this weekend as they watch the Super Bowl.
“Ventilation is important,” Duchin said. “The best advice in the Super Bowl is, please, don’t gather inside with non-household members or everyone risks getting on the injured COVID-19 list. If you are watching with others, be sure to open the windows and increase ventilation and wear masks. Eat outside. It is always safer outside than inside. And remember, just eating and talking puts the virus in the air … Up to half of COVID-19 infection is spread from people who look and feel good. I don’t know that they have COVID-19 and they don’t seem to have any symptoms. ”
Duchin said that if the ventilation is poor, the virus can accumulate in the room like cigarette smoke. Singing, talking loudly and shouting could add even more virus to the room.
“Try to limit loud applause, especially for Tampa Bay,” Duchin said.
Vaccine statistics
Duchin said the vaccine allocation in King County remains stable, but not enough. Washington receives only less than a third of what health care providers ask for. He received only 107.00 first doses this week and there is an increased demand for the second dose.
In hindsight, Duchin explained that this week, King County received just over 43,000 doses and half of them were allocated to the first doses. At the end of January, 300 health care providers were enrolled in vaccination programs. This week, only 25% of these providers received a dose allocation.
King County has administered nearly 300,000 doses of COVID-19 vaccine since Thursday, according to Duchin. Of these, 232,000 people (13% of the King County population) received the first dose and 60,000 people were completely vaccinated with both doses. Of these, approximately two-thirds of eligible county health care workers in Phase 1A received at least one dose of vaccine.
Duchin said he administered at least one dose of the vaccine to nearly 40 percent of King County’s population, who are 75 years of age or older, adding that the age group is 200 to 600 times more likely to be at risk of comparative death. with those aged between 18 and 29 years. . They vaccinated more than a third of those aged 65 to 74 with at least one dose. This age group has at least 90 times a higher risk of death than young people aged 18 to 29 years.
Regarding the breakdown of race and ethnicity, Duchin said that those who received a dose of COVID vaccine are 10% who identify as white, 8% who identify as Asian, 5% who identify as black and 4% who identify as black. identify as Hispanic.
“The impact of this outbreak is disproportionately difficult for people of color,” Duchin said.
Kind County updates a demographic scoreboard to study the evolution.
The appointments at the two mass vaccination sites that the county opened on February 1 in Kent and Auburn are reserved until February, according to Duchin. The county also runs eight mobile units for vaccinating high-risk populations, in partnership with regional fire departments. They hope to receive two more mobile units soon.
Keep up with Dr. Duchin’s latest update on COVID-19 in King County.