August 9th COVID-19 Update

Michael Dembrow

August 9, 2020

I hope that you and your loved ones are doing well, staying healthy, and looking out for your neighbors and friends.  

This is another relatively calm day for COVID. We fortunately only lost one of our fellow Oregonians.  The number of positive cases around the state has again gone down, but unfortunately a lower number of tests was reported today.  This may be the result of weekend reporting slowness.  We’ll get more clarity on the numbers tomorrow.

Tomorrow is the first day of the Legislature’s second special session.  You can find out how to follow the proceedings further down in the newsletter, along with a list of the bills currently under consideration.  Again, the focus of this session is on making the necessary changes to the budget in order to deal with serious shortfalls in our state revenues and to make sure that we have the resources needed for COVID response. 

Despite the focus on the budget, I’m very pleased to see that we will be voting on further legislation to address the need for policing reform in this special session.  It’s important that the Legislature finds a way to pass bills that combat racism and keep all our communities safer every time we meet, and then keep working on further bills during the interim.

That’s not to say that I’m not disappointed that we’re not doing more, but we’ll likely have another session in September to do more.

Tomorrow’s newsletter will give you an inside view of the first day of the session.

TODAY’S CORONAVIRUS AND CORONAVIRUS RESPONSE UPDATE

  • Positive Cases: OHA reports that 263 additional Oregonians have tested positive or are presumed positive (see below for definition) for COVID. (OHA does not report positive test results alone over the weekend. I’ll readjust the numbers on Monday.) The cumulative total for those testing positive and presumed positive is 21,272.
  • Total Tests: The number of tests has increased by 3,669. (OHA does not report positive test results alone over the weekend. Today’s increase in total results therefore includes presumed positives in the total results.  I’ll readjust the numbers on Monday.) The cumulative total is now 447,037.
  • Ratio: The percentage of positive tests today is 7.2% of total results. The national percentage today is 7.2%. 
  • Deaths: I’m very sorry to report 1 additional death due to the coronavirus today. You can read more about the person we lost further down in the newsletter.  The total number of COVID deaths in Oregon is now 356.
  • Hospitalized: OHA does not report on hospitalizations over the weekend The cumulative number of those who have been hospitalized with COVID thus remains at 1,758.
  • Presumptive Cases: OHA is 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.
  • Other Hospital Information: OHA DOES NOT REPORT hospitalization information over the weekend, so the numbers below are the same as Friday’s.
    • Patients Currently w COVID-19 Symptoms (who may or may not have received a positive test result yet): 204(26 fewer than yesterday). Of those, 145 have already received a positive test back.
    • Available ICU Beds: 173 (16 more than yesterday).
    • Other Available Beds: 649 (7 more than yesterday).
    • ICU Patients w COVID-19 Symptoms: 51 (7 fewer than yesterday).
    • COVID-19 Patients Currently on Ventilators: 18 (9 fewer than yesterday).
    • Available Ventilators: 779 (5 more than yesterday).
  • Dashboards
  • Today’s National Numbers:
  • PPE:

Preparing for Special Session #2

Most of the bills have now been posted for Monday’s special session of the Legislature.  You can follow them as they are posted on the website for the Joint Committee on the Second Special Session.  I have links and quick explanations of them below.

At this point, they are actually not yet bills.  They are LCs (Legislative Concepts).  Monday morning they will be introduced as either House or Senate bills and assigned numbers.

The prognosis for now continues to be a two-day session.  We’ll convene at 8 am, adopt session rules, introduce the session bills, and then recess.  The work will then shift to two committees: the Joint Committee on Policies, which will take up LC 27, the policing reform bill, and the Joint Committee on the Second Special Session, which will take up all the others.  Those committees will meet remotely from their offices for the public hearing segment.  When it’s time for the committees to vote, they are required to be physically in the same room. 

The bills will then go to the House and Senate floors.  If and when they pass the first chamber, they then go to the second chamber.  There’s an outside chance that this could all be done in one day, but at this point it doesn’t seem likely.

You’ll be able to watch all the floor sessions and committee meetings online. You can watch floor sessions here starting at 8 am on Monday and committee hearings here starting at 10 am.  On the committee page you’ll eventually also find explanatory information and testimony on the bills under consideration.

Here are the Legislative Concepts that are currently being considered. As I mentioned yesterday, some may be combined with others, others may be dropped entirely, others will be modified. 

LC 01 DRAFT:  This is the first of the LCs designed to improve the process for becoming eligible for unemployment benefits. Clarifies situations in which workers are able to work part-time while receiving benefits.

LC 03 DRAFT:  This is the second of the LCs designed to clarify the UI process.  This one focuses on educational workers (excluding teachers, researchers, and administrators) who have been laid off during summer months and are being denied benefits.

LC 04 DRAFT: The third of the UI LCs, this one makes it easier for Employment Department personnel who are processing PUA claims to receive Department of Revenue tax information for claimants in a way that protects the confidentiality of that information.  This is intended to speed up the adjudication process for PUA claimants.

LC 05 DRAFT: This one includes a number of budget transfers and technical fixes that are part of the rebalance, some of which were planned but unable to proceed in February as a result of the Republican Walkout.  Authorizes an analysis of the costs and payment responsibility for wildfire suppression.  

LC 10 DRAFT: This is the first of the bonding LCs.  It authorizes university building construction, and includes provisions requiring apprenticeship and participation from women, minorities, and veterans.  Here again is the list of bonding projects.

LC 11 DRAFT:  This is the second of the bonding LCs.

LC 12 DRAFT:  This will be the major budget rebalance bill.  You’ll find the reductions and increases here.

LC 13 DRAFT: This LC makes necessary changes to mining fees that should have been done in February but weren’t, again as a result of the Walkout. It’s needed to fund the work of the Department of Geology and Mining Industries for the second year of the biennium.

LC 21 DRAFT: This LC makes necessary modifications to the Legislature’s new complaint procedure, fixing several problems that have arisen.

LC 22 DRAFT: Addresses reductions needed as a result of reductions in lottery revenue and other funding sources.

LC 23 DRAFT: This will be the “sine die” bill, the bill that will allow us to adjourn when the work is over.

LC 25 DRAFT: This will be the bill transferring $400 million from reserves (the Education Stability Fund) to the General Fund to help rebalance the budget.

LC 27 DRAFT: This LC brings together two of the policing reform bills.  It clarifies the prohibition on use of “chokeholds” and other police actions that cut of breathing or blood circulation (such as the action that caused the death of George Floyd.  It also incorporates what had previously been LC 761 for the Joint Committee on Transparency in Policing and Use of Force Reform, clarifying when use of physical force is acceptable and when it is not.

Looking at Age Metrics

Here again are this week’s statewide case, hospitalization, and death metrics by age.  Here is updated information as of August 7.  The percentages for each category have not really moved at all.  You’ll see again that younger people have come to dominate the category of new cases: three-fourths of new cases are below the age of 50.

Again, a slight majority of hospitalizations are among those above the age of 60.  Deaths remain dominated by those above the age of 70, but we are increasingly seeing deaths among people in their 60s and younger.

a

b

c

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 263.  Here is the breakdown by county for today:

Oregon Health Authority reported 263 new confirmed and presumptive cases of COVID-19 as of 12:01 a.m. today, bringing the state total to 21,272.

Clackamas (15)

Columbia (2)

Deschutes (8)

Douglas (1)

Hood River (7)

Jackson (4)

Jefferson (5)

Josephine (1)

Lane (6)

Lincoln (2)

Linn (4)

Malheur (15)

Marion (28)

Morrow (3)

Multnomah (66)

Polk (1)

Sherman (2)

Umatilla (40)

Wasco (3)

Washington (42)

Yamhill (10)

And the Death

Oregon’s 356th COVID-19 death is a 72-year-old man in Multnomah County who tested positive on August 2 and died on August 6, at Providence St. Vincent Medical Center.

Additional Graphs:

de

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