July 14th COVID-19 Update

July 14, 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.  

On the COVID front, today is another somber day, with OHA reporting seven deaths today.  We have rarely seen a daily count this high, certainly not since April.  One of the deceased lived in Clackamas County; everyone else was from outside the metro area, including two each from Lincoln County, two from Marion County, and one each from Wasco and Malheur.  These are all regions that first saw outbreaks several weeks ago, generally beginning with younger workers, then apparently spreading to older neighbors or family members who succumbed to the worst effects of the disease.  As you’ll see, hospitalization numbers are also increasing.  Let’s hope that these increases will stabilize in the coming days and weeks as a result of the Governor’s orders regarding face coverings and social gatherings.

On a more positive note, you’ll see in the newsletter some important allocations that the Emergency Board was able to make today.  I want to express my appreciation for my legislative colleagues on the Board, who were able to put their differences aside and invest in needed support for thousands of Oregonians who have been hit hard by coronavirus and the needed responses.   

And on an even happier note, if you celebrate it, I want to wish you a happy Bastille Day! (My daughter was born in Paris almost on this day some years ago, so it’s always a special day for us.)  Hope you were able to celebrate with a baguette, a croissant, a slice of quiche, some red wine, or at least some fresh air and a promenade on this beautiful day.  Bonne Fête Nationale! 

TODAY’S CORONAVIRUS AND CORONAVIRUS RESPONSE UPDATE

• Positive Cases: OHA reports that 356 additional Oregonians have tested positive for COVID. The cumulative total for those testing positive is 12,151.
• Total Tests: The number of tests increased by 4,733. The cumulative total is now 304,802.
• Ratio: The percentage of positive tests for the last three days is 7.5% of total tests. The national percentage today is 8.3%. 
• Deaths: I’m sorry to report 7 additional deaths due to the coronavirus.  The total number of deaths in Oregon in now 244.
• Hospitalized: OHA is reporting 20 new COVID hospitalizations. The cumulative number of those who have been hospitalized with COVID is now 1,254.
• 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.  The total number of presumed positives is 654.
• Other Hospital Information:
  • Patients Currently w COVID-19 Symptoms (who may or may not have received a positive test result yet): 235 (11 fewer than yesterday). Of those, 150 have already received a positive test back.
  • Available ICU Beds: 159 (9 fewer than yesterday).
  • Other Available Beds: 683 (17 fewer than yesterday).
  • ICU Patients w COVID-19 Symptoms: 64 (3 fewer than yesterday).
  • COVID-19 Patients Currently on Ventilators: 35 (same as yesterday).
  • Available Ventilators: 779 (10 more than yesterday).
• Dashboards
  • Oregon (OHA)
  • Multnomah, Washington, Clackamas, & Yamhill Counties
• Today’s National Numbers:
  • Total Tests: 41,764,557 (up 761,681 from yesterday).
  • Positive Tests: 3,413,313 (up 62,987 from yesterday).
  • Deaths: 128,740 (up 736 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.
• PPE:
  • In the last 24 hours the Emergency Coordination Center has received 504,000 additional surgical masks. You can track the history of incoming and outgoing PPE shipments here.
• Additional Brief Items:
  • The Joint Task Force on Transparent Policing and Use of Force Reform will start up this week’s meetings tomorrow at 10. You can watch it or access the written materials here.
  • The Employment Department’s research arm has just published a report on job losses and gains over the last few months. It shows that nearly one-third of the jobs lost in March and April have been added back, primarily in health care, retail, and hospitality. Slowest to come back have been jobs in manufacturing, professional and business services, and government. The overall unemployment rate for the state was 11.2% for June, down from 14.3% in May.
  • The Department of Corrections has released new numbers (current as of July 13), showing the rise of infections at Snake River and other facilities. We see that there are now 21 staff and 120 adults in custody at Snake River who have tested positive.  The number for DOC as a whole is now 83 staff and 315 AICs.
  • In the GOOD NEWS Department: As a court hearing was getting underway this afternoon to block the Trump Administration’s rule that would deport international students whose schools went online, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) announced that it was rescinding the rule.

Where Are Today’s New Cases?

If we put together the positive test results and new “presumptive” cases reported today, the overall number of new cases is 380. The majority are again from outside the Portland Tri-County region.  Here is the breakdown by county for today:

Benton (3)

Clackamas (21)

Clatsop (1)

Columbia (3)

Coos (1)

Crook (1)

Deschutes (9)

Douglas (2)

Hood River (3)

Jackson (7)

Jefferson (2)

Josephine (6)

Klamath (2)

Lane (8)

Linn (2)

Malheur (35)

Marion (46)

Morrow (7)

Multnomah (76)

Polk (1)

Tillamook (3)

Umatilla (76)

Union (3)

Wallowa (1)

Washington (53)

Yamhill (6)

And the Deaths

Oregon’s 238^th COVID-19 death is an 86-year-old woman in Marion County who tested positive on June 3 and died on July 12, in her residence.

Oregon’s 239^th COVID-19 death is a 77-year-old man in Clackamas County who tested positive on May 5 and died on July 2, at OHSU Hospital.

Oregon’s 240^th COVID-19 death is an 81-year-old woman in Wasco County who tested positive on June 27 and died on July 8.

Oregon’s 241^st COVID-19 death is a 91-year-old man in Lincoln County who tested positive on June 29 and died on July 10, in his residence.

Oregon’s 242^nd COVID-19 death is a 77-year-old woman in Marion County who tested positive on June 24 and died on July 13, in her residence.

Oregon’s 243^rd COVID-19 death is a 70-year-old man in Malheur County who tested positive on June 26 and died on July 11, at St. Luke’s Medical Center in Boise, Idaho.

Oregon’s 244^th COVID-19 death is a 95-year-old woman in Lincoln County who tested positive on June 29 and died on July 13. Her place of death is being confirmed.

E-Board Allocates Over $200 Million

This morning the Legislature’s Emergency Board approved proposals totaling more than $200 million, nearly all of which providing help to individuals and businesses in the face of the pandemic.  Nearly all of the allocation came from the state’s share of federal CARES Act dollars. The first exception was the allocation to improve election security in our county elections offices; those dollars came from a different federal allocation, the Help America Vote Act (HAVA).

The second is the allocation to help repair water infrastructure on the Warm Springs Reservation; this is coming from the Emergency Fund itself.  This emergency allocation was needed because lottery bonding that the Legislature had already approved could not go forward because of the severe downturn in lottery revenues during the closure of bars and taverns earlier in the pandemic.

With this final allocation, the Emergency Fund is down to $10 million, a very low number for Oregon, given that we’re just starting fire season.  As a result, we can expect a substantial transfer from the General Fund to the Emergency Fund during the next special session anticipated in the next few weeks.

If you’d like to watch the archived hearing, you can do so here.

Here are the allocations that were approved this morning:

• $25.6 million in emergency assistance for small businesses facing financial shortfalls due to the COVID-19 pandemic. This supports businesses with no more than 25 employees that have not received support under the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) or other provisions of the federal CARES Act.
• $50 million to support music, culture, and community venues and organizations that have been closed, cancelled or postponed due to the pandemic.
• $62 million to the Oregon Cares Fund for Black Relief and Resiliency to provide economic relief to Black individuals and businesses. National and state data show that the Black community is one of the communities experiencing a disproportionate share of negative economic and health effects due to COVID-19.  Here is a response to this decision from the Legislature’s “BIPOC Caucus” (Black, Indigenous, People of Color).
• $30 million to the COVID-19 Leave Fund for workers who contract or have been exposed to the virus but do not qualify for traditional sick leave.
• $35 million to fund $500 Emergency Relief Checks to Oregonians who are still waiting for unemployment benefits.
• $3.58 million in general funds for emergency water infrastructure to the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs as the tribe faces an ongoing water crisis.

Additional Graphs:

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:

• Multnomah County has a status report on reopening.
• You can view the reopening status of all 36 counties here.
• Here is the OHA’s coronavirus page, with links to a number of resources. 
• Oregon's Office of Emergency Management now has a website for information about COVID-19.
• You can sign up here for regular coronavirus updates from OHA.
• Multnomah County has an excellent website with lots of really important advice and guidance.
• Here’s one from the Governor’s Office.
• The Employment Department has put together a webpage with Q&A’s on a number of employment issues related to COVID-19 (e.g., eligibility for Unemployment Insurance benefits).
• The Oregon Education Department has a new site for COVID-19 updates.
• The Department of Corrections has a COVID tracking website.

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