May 23rd COVID-19 Update

Michael Dembrow

May 23, 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.

In today’s newsletter you’ll see today’s COVID numbers (fortunately, another day without a COVID death in Oregon), the latest on testing, and a look at the infection and death rates for individual counties, along with several other news items.

Enjoy your loved ones and the weekend!

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TODAY’S CORONAVIRUS AND CORONAVIRUS RESPONSE UPDATE

***NOTE: OHA has changed the time it closes reporting for the data from 8 am to 12:01 am, so today’s numbers reflect a 16-hour period rather than a 24-hour period.  Today’s numbers are likely lower, and tomorrow’s numbers will likely be higher as a result.

  • Positive Cases: OHA has reported that 29 additional Oregonians tested positive for COVID-19 yesterday, putting the total at 3,799.
  • Total Tests: The total number of tests in Oregon now stands at 110,118.  That’s an increase of 2,373 tests.
  • Ratio: The percentage of positive results for today is 1.6%. Today’s national percentage is 5.8%.  See below for a graph showing Oregon’s daily percentage changes over the last 14 days.
  • Deaths: I’m happy to report 0 additional deaths due to the coronavirus.  The total number of deaths in Oregon remains at 147.
  • Hospitalized: The number of Oregonians who have been hospitalized with symptoms, and who have also tested positive for the disease, increased by 3, and is now at 740.
  • Presumptive Cases: OHA is now including “presumptive COVID-19 cases” in its daily reports, consistent with recently amended guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. A presumptive case is someone who does not yet have a positive PCR test result but is showing symptoms and has had close contact with a confirmed case. If they later test positive by PCR, those will be recategorized as confirmed cases.  Today the number of new presumptive cases is 7, and the total of presumptive cases is now at 89.
  • Other Hospital Information:
    • Patients Currently w COVID-19 Symptoms (who may or may not have received a positive test result yet): 102 (44 fewer than yesterday). Of those, 47 have already received a positive test back.
    • Available ICU Beds: 180 (5 fewer than yesterday).
    • Other Available Beds: 1719 (55 more than yesterday).
    • ICU Patients w COVID-19 Symptoms (who may or may not have received a positive test result yet): 41 (6 fewer than yesterday).
    • COVID-19 Patients Currently on Ventilators: 15 (1 fewer than yesterday).
    • Available Ventilators: 783 (2 fewer than yesterday).
  • Dashboards:
  • Today’s National Numbers:
  • PPE:
  • Other Brief Updates:
    • The Oregon Supreme Court has set a deadline of June 2 for briefs to be submitted in the case of the Baker County judge who ruled against the Governor’s pandemic emergency orders. The judge is also being given until Tuesday at 5 to drop his injunction or show why he shouldn’t.  You can read the Supreme Court’s order here and read more about what this all means here. This means that the orders remain in effect at least until the Court receives the briefs and then rules.
    • As the driver of a Chevy Bolt, I haven’t gotten to enjoy the pleasure of pumping my own gas thanks to the temporary suspension of the prohibition on self-service during the pandemic. In any case, that opportunity is now gone. The State Fire Marshall just announced that the temporary order is now over.  Ah well . . .
    • Agricultural workers have been among those most at risk to catching the virus. The Governor has therefore directed approximately 1 million KN95 masks and 5,000 gallons of hand sanitizer for farmworkers and agricultural producers. This critical PPE is available at no cost to the agricultural community to mitigate the spread of COVID-19.  You can read the details of distribution next week at the Department of Agriculture’s COVID website.  This project is a collaboration between Oregon Department of Agriculture, Oregon State University Extension, Oregon Emergency Management, Oregon National Guard, and county partners.
    • Legislators heard from the Employment Department on Thursday that they will soon begin a program to automatically contact applicants for Pandemic Unemployment Assistance (the new program for the self-employed and those whose earnings or hours have not made them eligible for traditional UI), to let them know that their claims have been received and will be processed within the next two weeks. They’re calling this new program the “PUA Email and Auto-Dialer Campaign.”  Believe me, it’s badly needed.  And it appears to be starting—I’ve already heard from a couple of constituents that they’d received the message. 
    • More on the new campaign: Do watch out for a phone call from this number: 503-947-1544.  If you miss the call, don’t call back—it’s an outgoing line only.  If you have been filing for PUA and haven’t received anything in the next few days and you’re a constituent of mine, please contact us. 
    • In the midst of different industries and activities beginning to open up, most of us are unsure about the wisdom of doing different types of activities. Should I be wearing a mask outdoors?  Should I go to a restaurant?  When will it be safe to fly?  Aimee Green of the Oregonian has come up with a useful survey of the latest thinking, much of it coming from two of Oregon’s preeminent academic public health professionals, Doctors Richard Corsi of PSU and Chunhuei Chi of OSU.  You can read the article here.

Weekly Testing Update

OHA sent us their weekly testing update this afternoon.  You’ll see that diagnostic testing capacity continues to rise, and in fact close to 16,000 tests were performed in Oregon last week. 

Oregon received its fourth shipment of testing swabs, universal transport media for specimen collection kits, and other testing supplies and reagents from the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) this week. These ongoing supplies will be available for counties and Tribes to request through their Emergency Managers.

In addition, we are starting to see different hospitals begin to do serology (antibody) testing this week.  As I’ve mentioned, however, OHA remains skeptical about widespread use of serology testing at this time.  Just today legislators received a copy of an email advisory that went out to local and tribal public health agencies regarding antibody testing.  You can read it here.

What’s Going On In the Counties?

Each Saturday I’m tracking how individual counties are doing now that most are beginning Phase One and we are seeing a number of relaxations statewide as well. The key metric that OHA will be watching is the percentage of positive test results: that’s an important way for us to see if the infection rate is increasing as a result of reopening. As you’ll see, nearly every county is still moving in the right direction.

Remember, though, that we’re not going to see the effects of reopening right away.  That’s why a county must remain in Phase One for at least three weeks before being authorized to move to Phase Two.

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Counties in boldface are those not yet authorized for Phase One.

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Additional Graphs:

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Want to See Past Newsletters?

If there was COVID-related information in a past newsletter that you want to go back to, but find you’ve deleted it, you can always go to my legislative website (www.senatordembrow.com), click on “News and Information,” and you’ll find them all there.  Also, if someone forwarded you this newsletter and you’d like to get it directly, you can sign up for it there.

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,

dembrow signature

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