White House report warns of Georgia’s high rate of new coronavirus infections
ATLANTA — The latest report from President Donald Trump’s coronavirus task force shows Georgia had the second-highest rate of new coronavirus infections in the nation over the past week, and continues to urge state leaders to impose a mask mandate and other restrictions to stem the spread of COVID-19.
Gov. Brian Kemp’s office countered Tuesday by pointing to recent statistics that showed signs of improvement, and said it was considering deploying Georgia National Guard “mobile strike teams” to nursing homes, religious institutions, schools and colleges to better contain the disease.
The report notes that Georgia has made modest gains containing the number of new cases and in the number of infections linked with nursing homes, though it again warns that those improvements are “fragile” without more aggressive actions.
It marks an incremental improvement from a week ago, when Georgia had the highest rate of new cases of the coronavirus.
Like previous reports, it recommends a statewide mask mandate in most Georgia counties and urges Kemp to close bars in counties with rising rates of positive cases. First obtained by WABE News and the Center for Public Integrity, it also encourages new efforts to protect nursing homes.
In a statement, Kemp spokeswoman Candice Broce pointed to recent statistics that show a roughly 23% drop in new cases per 100,000 people. And she said Georgia is making other “notable declines” in the number of cases, hospitalizations and positivity rates.
To increase testing capacity, she said Kemp is considering re-deploying “mobile strike teams” to areas struggling with a surge of cases. That could include dispatching troops to schools and colleges in Georgia’s university system, which has had several recent outbreaks as students return to schools.
“This strategy has worked well to address hotspots — such as Albany and the surrounding community and the Gwinnett County area — and offers the right kind of flexibility should we need to quickly move between outbreaks.”
RECENT OUTBREAKS
The governor has recently lashed out at news coverage of the pandemic, triggered by an Atlanta Journal-Constitution report of last week’s White House task force report, which has long raised concerns about Georgia’s strategy to fight the disease.
Kemp accused the AJC of playing “pandemic politics” and sparking panic, and said the news media “only focuses on the bad numbers — they never focus on the good numbers.”
He and his aides highlighted metrics that have showed a recent decrease in the rolling average in new cases over the past seven days and a roughly 20% decline in the hospitalization rate since the most recent peak at the end of July.
Georgia reported weekover-week case increases in nine out of 10 weeks from early May through mid-July, peaking the week of July 12, according to an AJC analysis of state data.
Cases have declined in each of the past five full weeks. But the current seven-day rolling average of cases, which was 2,485 on Monday, is still nearly four times the rate reported on June 1, and nearly every county in Georgia is considered to have substantial spread, by state Department of Public Health guidelines.
The AJC report on the task force’s Aug. 16 recommendations noted several indications of modest improvements in recent weeks, including the decline in hospitalizations. It also included White House recommendations that Georgia officials take “continued, expanded and stronger mitigation efforts, including in all open schools.”
More than 256,000 Georgians have contracted COVID-19 and more than 5,100 have died from the disease, according to the latest state public health data.
The latest White House report, dated Sunday, continues to urge Georgia to take many of the same steps it previously recommended, including reducing indoor restaurant seating to 25% capacity in the highest-risk counties, and to limit gatherings to 10 or fewer people. Georgia’s current limit is 50 people.
“Cases seem to be coming from within households,” the report said. “It is essential that all citizens are limiting gatherings and protecting the members of their households with co-morbidities.”
The report further urges the state to increase testing, particularly in nursing homes, schools and colleges.
“Nursing homes are a reflection of ongoing high levels of community spread. Ensure social distancing and universal face mask use,” it read. “Immediately conduct infection control surveys in all nursing homes with 3 or more cases per week over the last 3 weeks.”
In a news conference last week, Kemp said demand for testing has fallen with declines in community spread. But state and federal officials have extended a testing “mega-site” near the Atlanta airport through Sept. 11. It had been slated to close Wednesday.
School systems and universities across Georgia have reported outbreaks since the start of in-person instruction. Often those outbreaks are associated with off-campus activities.
The White House recommends universities with sophisticated lab equipment for viral RNA detection use it to expand surveillance testing in schools and colleges.
“Any university with an outbreak must have a plan to test all students and protect the surrounding community from university outbreaks,” the report said.
As the rate of new case counts have declined, particularly in the metro Atlanta, about two dozen Georgia counties have been removed from the White House task force’s red zone. These include Fulton, Cherokee, Cobb, DeKalb and Gwinnett in metro Atlanta.
Still, 82 Georgia counties remain in the White House red zone, down from 109 the week earlier. Counties in the yellow zone are far from out of the woods.