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April 7, 2020
Dear Neighbors and Friends:
I hope that you and your loved ones are doing well, staying healthy, and looking out for your neighbors and friends.
The big news today was the Governor’s announcement that she is extending the closure of K-12 schools for the remainder of the school year. She is doing the same for public colleges and universities, which will need to remain distance learning-only for the remainder of Spring quarter. More details on those, today’s numbers, and some useful resources for you below.
TODAY’S CORONAVIRUS AND CORONAVIRUS RESPONSE UPDATE
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Positive Cases: OHA has reported that 58 additional Oregonians tested positive for COVID-19 yesterday, putting the total at 1,239.
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Total Tests: Today’s reported testing numbers reflect an increase of 1,557 test results from yesterday, bringing the total test results so far to 24,564.
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Ratio: Though the overall numbers are increasing, our ratio of positive results still remains right around 5%. That’s much lower than the national average (still over 19%).
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Deaths: I’m sorry to report that five more Oregonians died from the disease yesterday (our largest single-day increase so far), bringing the total number of deaths in Oregon to 38.
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Hospitalized: The number of Oregonians who have been hospitalized with symptoms, and who have also tested positive for the disease, is now at 324. This is a decrease of 5 from yesterday. We are obviously still in the middle of an ongoing effort to correct errors in the previous hospital reporting system.
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Other Hospital Information:
- Available ICU Beds: 302 (a decrease of 1 from yesterday)
- Other Available Beds: 2,175 (a decrease of 45 from yesterday)
- Patients Currently w COVID-19 Symptoms (who may or may not have received a positive test result yet): 440 (a decrease of 24 from yesterday).
- COVID-19 Patients Currently on Ventilators: 69 (a decrease of 13 from yesterday)
- Available Ventilators: 785 (a decrease of 31 from yesterday)
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Today’s National Numbers:
- Total Tests: 2,189,766 (135,304 up from yesterday)
- Positive Tests: 423,164 (up 30,570 from yesterday)
- Hospitalizations: Data not reliable. Apparently, Oregon is not the only state to have had difficulty getting consistent numbers from hospitals. The national tracking project has put this item on “pending” for now.
- Deaths: 12,621 14,495 (up 1,874 from yesterday)
- These national numbers come from the COVID Tracking Project. You can follow their updated numbers for each state and the nation as a whole here.
- Again, the OHA has created a handy COVID-19 Dashboard on its COVID-19 website. Just scroll down and click on OHA COVID-19 Dashboard. They will be gradually adding more features to it, including age, ethnicity, and other information.
- The Governor’s Office has revamped their COVID-19 website, making it much more user-friendly. Check it out here.
Governor Announces End of In-Person School Year, Revised HS Graduation Requirements
Governor Brown announced today what many of us have been expecting: that regular K-12 classes will not be resuming this year. She and Department of Education Director Colt Gill also provided long-awaited information regarding graduation requirements for high school seniors.
In explaining her decision to extend K-12 school closures for the remainder of the school year, the Governor pointed to the need to give families and employees certainty and the ability to plan for the next two months. It’s clear that school classrooms are not a place where social distancing can be practiced. Just as they were the first settings to be closed, they would likely be the last to resume. It makes sense to commit fully to the “Distance Learning for All” programs that individual districts are already creating.
So what does this mean for high school seniors and their ability to graduate? Given that seniors had already completed 98.3% of their time in K-12 when the schools were ordered closed in mid-March, no one wants to see their futures affected by this last 1.7%. Therefore, the Governor announced the following:
- Students who had passing grades at the time of the closure will receive a Pass for the remainder of the year, and thereby full credit for those courses and fulfillment of graduation requirements.
- Districts will work with students who did not have a passing grade in a course in mid-March to get them the extra attention that they need to get their grade up to a passing level. If they can do so by August, they will be considered part of the graduating class of 2020.
- The Essential Skills and Personalized Learning requirements for the diploma will be waived this year.
- It’s too soon to know if districts will be able to hold in-person graduation ceremonies in June. In any case, districts will find ways to celebrate and honor this year’s graduating seniors.
- You can find the details of the full Graduation Pathways 2020 document here.
We also learned that no students already admitted to an Oregon university will have their admission affected by their final grades. As long as they graduate, their college/university admission will be secured.
The Governor also announced that she is extending the existing college and university closures for the remainder of spring term. Classes will remain in Distance Learning mode for the remainder of the year.
Finally, Director Gill emphasized that teachers, counselors, and other high school personnel are reaching or will be reaching out to all seniors in order to find out how they’re doing, help them understand the new guidance, and get a sense of what the senior’s post-graduation plans are. In some cases, though, they are having difficulty locating students.
He asked us to pass on the following request to all students and parents: If you haven’t heard from your school yet, know that they’re trying to reach you. Please reach out to them.
New Weekly Report from OHA
Starting this week, the Oregon Health Authority will be producing a weekly demographic snapshot of the way that the virus is spreading here in Oregon. The snapshot will normally be taken on Sunday and released on Monday. The first snapshot just came out today.
You’ll see that this first report includes information about symptoms (the top two are cough and fever) and risk factors (the top two are having contact with someone confirmed for the virus and having underlying medical conditions). There is also information on gender (most who have tested positive are female) age (pretty much a bell curve), and race/ethnicity (lots of unknowns).
Resources for Mental/Behavioral Health During the Pandemic
Legislators received a briefing the other day by Steve Allen, the head of OHA Behavioral Health, on steps being taken to address the needs of those with mental illness during the crisis. Needless to say, these needs are many. Social distancing, and the potential sense of loneliness and separation that it engenders, is particularly hard on people with depression. It is exacerbated by the high level of uncertainty that we all feel about the length and extent of this crisis and our vulnerability to it.
Although social distancing requirements make it impossible for most in-person therapy to take place, OHA has been able to remove a number of roadblocks (regulatory and compensation) to clients being able to access their providers via telemedicine. The full range of behavioral health services are now accessible via telehealth.
Fortunately, we have not seen an overall increase in suicides. In fact, though the reason is unknown, we are seeing a decline in suicide incidents coming to emergency rooms. We’re also seeing a decrease in psychiatric hospitalizations right now. That could be good news, but it raises concerns that people are foregoing help that they really need out of fear of catching the COVID-19 disease.
The agency’s biggest concern right now is with the group homes where many people with mental illness live. There is concern that caregivers don’t have the PPE needed to keep themselves and residents safe. There is also concern that facilities are not admitting people who need them out of fear that they may be carriers. That hurts both the potential residents and the facilities themselves, as the loss of revenues is making them difficult to sustain.
None of these problems, of course, are unique to Oregon, and there are non-profits out there to help with this work. One of the largest and most important is NAMI-Oregon, the Oregon branch of the National Alliance on Mental Illness.
The NAMI Oregon Helpline remains operational. Callers receive live assistance from 9 am to 5 pm weekdays. Telephone numbers are 503-230-8009 or 800-343-6264. Or email at namioregon@namior.org.
They also now have 20 weekly online support groups available. This includes groups for individuals living with mental illness; family members and friends with a loved one living with mental illness; and parents/caregivers raising school-age children with behavioral health issues. They can connect Helpline callers to a peer-led support group that meets their needs.
NAMI has also produced a really great Covid-19 Resource and Information Guide in PDF format that covers maintaining wellness, navigating health care, and other questions that their helplines are receiving. It addresses the following situations:
- I’m having a lot of anxiety because of the coronavirus. Please help.
- I’m quarantined or working from home – lonely and isolated even further – what can I do?
- I don’t have health insurance or a regular doctor – how can I get care?
- What if I’m quarantined and can’t get my medication? Will there be a shortage?
- My business is suffering as a result of the Coronavirus. What assistance programs are available to help?
- Are people who have a mental illness at a greater risk of contracting COVID-19?
- Is there a vaccine or cure for COVID-19?
- I lost a loved one to Coronavirus. Where can I find support?
- I’m a smoker. Am I more likely to catch COVID-19? What should I do?
- How does homelessness increase risk of contracting COVID-19?
- My loved one is incarcerated, are they at increased risk for exposure to COVID-19?
- I’m the aging parent of an adult child living with a serious mental illness. I want to be sure they are taken care of.
- Are there any online support resources for people with substance use disorders?
You can download the guide here.
How Is the Emergency Affecting Student Loan Repayment?
Although outright loan forgiveness was unfortunately deleted from the final CARES Act, section 3513 does include provisions to help those with federal student loans manage their debt during the crisis. Attorney-General Ellen Rosenblum turned us on to a great resource from the Student Borrower Protection Center and the American Federation of Teachers.
Anyone with student loans should check it out here.
A Message from State Parks
Legislators just received a message from Lisa Sumption, the Director of State Parks. If you’re like me, you may be desperately hoping that Lisa’s message is a green light to get back to enjoying our beautiful state parks. But no, I’m afraid the message is the reverse. Please do heed her request.
I am writing to you today seeking your assistance in getting a message out to Oregonians. We know that folks are getting stir crazy and the nice weather is not going to help us keep everyone home to assist in our effort to save lives. We have done such great work thus far on staying home to save lives. We would hate for folks to catch a little spring fever and start flooding our local, state and federal parks and exposing themselves, others and our staff to the virus. Many communities have expressed concerns and frustrations with folks traveling from the valley into their rural communities placing constraints on their resources and potentially bringing the virus to their communities that do not yet have known cases. Hopefully we are close to the finish line and we do not want to rush to it to quickly and make all of our great efforts all for not. Please join me in sharing the message below within your communities to get the word out statewide. Feel free to share with other local elected officials and travel/tourism partners.
We know the weather is beautiful outside, but our parks and recreation spaces all remain closed under the governor’s executive order. Please do not create a danger to public health. Stay Home/Save Lives.
We miss our visitors and look forward to welcoming Oregonians back as soon as it is safe for us to do so. Thanks for your consideration and support thru this unprecedented time.
AND FINALLY,
Here again are some resources that you will find useful:
If the above links are not providing you with answers to your questions or directing you to the help that you need, please consider me and my office to be a resource. We’ll do our best to assist you or steer you in the right direction.
Best,
 Senator Michael Dembrow
District 23
email: Sen.MichaelDembrow@oregonlegislature.gov
web: www.senatordembrow.com
phone: 503-986-1723
mail: 900 Court St NE, S-407, Salem, OR, 97301
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