Covid-19: New cases identified
Redwood Valley woman dies of virus
New cases of Covid-19 have been identified among employees of two more Ukiah restaurants, the Mendocino County Public Health Office reported Friday.
According to county health officials, people who visited Denny’s on Pomery Street in Ukiah between Sunday, Aug. 15, and Thursday, Aug. 19 may have been exposed to the virus. Also, people who visited Taco Bell on North State Street in Ukiah between Wednesday, Aug. 11 and Thursday, Aug. 12, may have been exposed to the virus.
Anyone who visited these businesses on the dates listed who has not been vaccinated against Covid-19 is urged to get tested, and anyone who has been vaccinated but is experiencing symptoms of Covid-19, such as “fever, cough, and shortness of breath, or chills, muscle pain, headache, sore throat, fatigue, congestion, runny nose, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, or new loss of taste or smell.”
Also Friday, county health officials reported that another resident has died from Covid-19, describing the 57th patient to die from the virus as a 66-year-old Redwood Valley woman who was not vaccinated.
In his weekly public update Aug. 20, Mendocino County Public Health Officer Dr. Andy Coren said that the county’s Intensive Care Unit capacity has decreased to only 12.5 percent, and “the hospitals in Willits and Ukiah are severely restricted and now qualify for state transfers if needed.”
Coren added that so far, all three Adventist Health hospitals have been able to move staff and patients around as needed “to make sure (patients) get the highest quality care. But if it’s really impossible to do that, (then because) of the notification that went out (Friday), we will be able to transfer our patients to other hospitals within our region. It’s not the most convenient (for visiting family members), but we want to make sure that the highest quality of care is available, and that’s what this achieves.”
When asked if “nonCovid patients are being moved out of the area for treatment,” Coren said, “If we don’t have services, yes.” Coren said certain elective surgeries are not being performed, but that important procedures such as biopsies are still being performed so that “potentially life-saving treatments” are not delayed.
Along with the cases at local food establishments, Coren said there have been two cases associated with healthcare facilities, and “the first day of school (Thursday) exposed three schools with some active cases,” a total of four cases out of 53 schools, which Coren said he considered a “good thing.”
He said that “most of the schools’ staff has been vaccinated, and there is regular weekly testing for the staff and some students, particularly those involved in contact sports.”
When asked “at what point will stricter protocols be put in place” at schools, Coren said “there were some terrible unintended consequences last year for shutting them down, and we really want to do as much as possible to keep them open this year.”
When asked if “information about school cases will be made public,” Coren said that other students in the class will be notified as close contacts, but that public press releases are not needed because “we know who is in the schools; schools have done a fantastic job (keeping track of students). And there is a consideration of privacy and stigmatization. But if there was a large outbreak, you could expect to be informed.”
When asked if there had been an increase in vaccination rates recently in the county, Coren said “yes, there has been an uptick, though not a huge uptick. We hit our lowest point in July (with weekly average of about 86 vaccinations a day) and it’s slowly increasing now (to an average of about 133 vaccinations a day).”
“So we really need to see more people per day getting vaccinated in the county to avoid going off the cliff in the hospitals, hopefully,” said Bales. “Absolutely,” said Coren, who said that 63 percent of those eligible in Mendocino County are fully vaccinated.