Too many new Butte County cases to verify

OROVILLE » Butte County Public Health was unable to update its COVID-19 dashboard on Monday to reflect the most recently reported cases, saying the number of cases reported over the weekend was “too large” to verify by Monday afternoon.

During a typical week, the county health department updates its dashboard once each day between Monday and Friday to reflect the latest case numbers, including active cases, hospitalizations and deaths. Monday reports include the cases received during weekend days since Friday’s update, and as a result, the number of cases is usually higher than on other days.

In recent weeks, that Monday figure has exceeded 100 cases or more. For the most recent weekend, the number of cases reported for Butte County through the California Reportable Disease Information Exchange system, also known as Cal REDIE, contains “several hundred” new cases that need to be verified, Butte County Public Health said in a press release. The number of cases will require extra time to verify before they are reported publicly.

“Over the weekend, BCPH pulls COVID case data from Cal REDIE and goes through the laborious process of verifying cases and initiating case investigation before adding them to Monday’s dashboard update,” the release stated. “This is necessary to avoid counting cases that may appear in the report as duplicates, belonging to another county or confirming cases from other sources.”

Butte County Public Health said it is working to add additional staff to address the increase in cases.

The county health department assigns case investigation and contact tracing for probable and verified cases. But due to the increase in cases, with each of the past four weeks exceeding the number of cases from the previous week, those efforts are being prioritized. That means certain individuals may not be contacted by Butte County Public Health they test positive for the virus or are determined to be a close contact of someone else who tested positive.

Butte County Public Health said it will focus contact tracing on older adults, health care workers, people who have high risk of complications and high-risk facilities. It also coordinates the management of outbreaks that occur at congregate living facilities and schools.