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February 20, 2021
Friends and Neighbors,
I hope that you and your loved ones are doing well, staying healthy, and looking out for your neighbors and friends in these difficult times.
As you’ll see in tonight’s newsletter, the COVID situation in Oregon remains stable, and projections show that our daily case counts will continue to decline in the future if current conditions hold.
Our vaccine administration rate is now nearly at 85%, meaning that we have already used nearly 85% of the vaccines we’ve received. It’s more than double where we were just a month ago. That’s good news in terms of demonstrating our ability to get people inoculated. Now we need more doses to come to Oregon.
Please stay safe, and let me know if you have any questions about information in today’s newsletter.
TODAY’S CORONAVIRUS AND CORONAVIRUS RESPONSE UPDATE
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New COVID Cases: OHA reports 536 new COVID cases today. This count is a combination of positive test results and those who are presumed positive. The cumulative number of cases in Oregon since the beginning of the pandemic is 152,711.
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Variant COVID Cases: OHA continues to report a total of 4 Oregonians who have tested positive for the B.117. (UK) variant and none of the other variants. We haven’t seen any new cases in the last few weeks. (However, although Oregon’s testing for the variants is more extensive than in most states, testing for variants remains limited.)
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Positive Test Results: OHA reports 365 positive tests today. (Individuals may have had multiple tests come back positive, and each is now counted separately.) The cumulative total of positive test results since the beginning of the pandemic is now 199,746.
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Total Tests: OHA reported an additional 10,728 tests today. Our cumulative total of reported tests is now 3,476,515.
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Positivity Rate: Today’s test positivity ratio for Oregon is 3.4%. The national ratio today is 5.6%.
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Hospitalization Information: During the weekend OHA only reports on the first two items:
- Patients Currently with Confirmed COVID-19: 163 (13 fewer than yesterday)
- ICU Patients Confirmed w COVID-19: 51 (2 more than yesterday).
- Available ICU Beds: 167 (same as yesterday)
- Other Available Beds: 561 (20 fewer than yesterday).
- Confirmed COVID-19 Patients Currently on Ventilators: 23 (4 fewer than yesterday).
- Available Ventilators: 799 (5 fewer than yesterday).
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Deaths: I’m sorry to report 5 newly-reported COVID deaths today. The total number of COVID deaths in Oregon is now 2,154.
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Vaccinations: As of the end of yesterday, here are the latest numbers:
- New Immunizations Reported Today: 25,602
- 20,646 administered yesterday
- 4,956 administered previously and report received yesterday
- Total First and Second Doses Administered So Far: 781,202
- 415,817 Pfizer doses
- 364,689 Moderna doses
- Total Oregonians vaccinated so far: 527,818
- 248,129 now fully vaccinated with two doses
- To date, 924,575 doses of vaccine have been delivered to sites across Oregon.
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Today’s National Numbers:
- Total Tests: 343,134,625 (up 1,274,526 from yesterday).
- Total Cases: 27,821,175 (up 71,951 from yesterday).
- Deaths: 487,774 (up 2,477 from yesterday).
- These national numbers come from the COVID Tracking Project. You can visit that site HERE https://covidtracking.com/data/national
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Additional Quick Updates:
- According to the latest Outbreak Report, current active workplace outbreaks were in correctional facilities. The seven largest outbreaks in Oregon were in state, local, or federal correctional institutions.
- Yesterday the Legislature’s Legislative Counsel Committee authorized the hiring of an outside legal firm to prepare a case before the Oregon Supreme Court to deal with the problem of the Census running late, which makes it impossible for us to proceed with redistricting. OPB’s Dirk Vanderhart has a good story about it.
- Speaking of Dirk, in yesterday’s newsletter I had intended to link to a story he did on reports on a judge throwing out a suit brought by several Republican lawmakers against the Governor over COVID emergency safety restrictions. Unfortunately, I messed up on the link. Here it is.
Disease Model Update: Continued Improvement
OHA has just released thelatest COVID projections report, based on input from the Institute for Disease Modeling in Seattle. Their analysis is updated every three weeks.
The update reflects the ongoing reduction in cases that began last month and has stabilized at this lower level since then. It also reflects the lower hospitalization and death rates that have followed.
Based on the data seen up to February 3, the modelers believe that the “Re” (Effective Reproduction Number, the number of secondary cases generated by a single case) in Oregon was approximately 0.88. (more precisely somewhere between 0.65 and 1.12, with a best estimate of 0.88). This means that we can expect the number of new cases to continue to decline.
In late December the Re rate was above 1.0, and we were seeing new cases rising. Since the beginning of 2021, the Re rate has stayed below 1.0.
We can see this playing out in case counts during this period. The 7-day rolling average of diagnosed cases saw a temporary post-holiday increase in cases (with day-to-fluctuations due to holiday testing disruptions), followed by a rapid decline in mid-January and a steady decline over the last few weeks. The 7-day rolling average of hospitalizations (less affected by fluctuations in testing) has been steadily decreasing since its late-November peak. Most recently, hospitalizations have continued to decrease between February 9 and February 17.
The modelers do caution us to remember, though, that these are statewide estimates—transmission rates have varied by county, race, ethnicity, and age.
The report includes a number of graphs and discussion of assumptions and methodology that I invite you to check out. Looking forward, it provides us with two possible scenarios for what we can expect over the next month.
Scenario 1: Transmission Continues As Is:
If we continue as we are now (with an Re of 0.88), by February 24-March 9th the projected number of new diagnosed cases will fall to 107 per 100,000 people for the state as a whole. (This rate translates to a daily average of 320 new diagnosed cases (currently 400-500. New severe cases (i.e., those requiring hospitalization) would fall to 10 per day by March 9.
Note: Our current situation reflects the “As-Is Scenario” from the last projection fairly closely.
Scenario 2: Transmission Increases
This scenario assumes that we will see a return to increased transmission by 30%, to an Re of around 1.1. If that were to occur (presumably due to a relaxation of restrictions or individuals letting down their guard), new diagnosed cases will increase to 170 per 100,000 people by March 9, an average of 510 new diagnosed cases per day. New severe cases will be around 17 per day by March 9.
What might cause the number of cases to rise again?
- If people adhere less to prevention recommendations.
- If a variant, more infectious strain of COVID were to circulate more widely.
- If the lowering of some counties’ risk levels, which creates more opportunities for potential exposure in a variety of settings, leads transmission to rise again.
On the other hand, the projections don’t directly take into account the potential effect of increasing vaccinations.
Even so, if you look back at earlier projections, you’ll see just how much more optimistic the picture now is, even in the scenario that envisions an increase in transmission.
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 reported is 536. More than two-thirds of today’s reported cases are again from outside the Portland Tri-County region. Here is the breakdown of cases by county today:
Note from OHA: Umatilla County has a higher than anticipated case count due to approximately 1,400 backlogged test results received on Feb. 19. These test results were from June 2020 through Jan. 2021. Cases were investigated and interviewed locally at the time of their positive test but were not electronically reported to OHA.
Baker (4)
Benton (5)
Clackamas (26)
Clatsop (2)
Columbia (10)
Coos (14)
Crook (5)
Curry (7)
Deschutes (15)
Douglas (20)
Hood River (2)
Jackson (38)
Jefferson (4)
Josephine (18)
Klamath (5)
Lake (5)
Lane (41)
Lincoln (1)
Linn (6)
Malheur (5)
Marion (55)
Morrow (6)
Multnomah (69)
Polk (15)
Tillamook (1)
Umatilla (72)
Union (1)
Wallowa (1)
Washington (66)
Yamhill (17)
And the Deaths:
Oregon’s 2,150th COVID-19 death is an 86-year-old man in Jackson County who tested positive on Jan. 23 and died on Feb. 7 at his residence.
Oregon’s 2,151st COVID-19 death is a 69-year-old man in Linn County who tested positive on Feb. 18 and died on Feb. 18.
Oregon’s 2,152nd COVID-19 death is a 66-year-old woman in Marion County who tested positive on Dec. 23 and died on Jan. 29 at Providence St. Vincent Medical Center.
Oregon’s 2,153rd COVID-19 death is a 70-year-old man in Multnomah County who tested positive on Feb. 17 and died on Feb. 18 at Legacy Good Samaritan Medical Center.
Oregon’s 2,154th COVID-19 death is a 90-year-old man in Washington County who tested positive on Dec. 22 and died on Feb. 7 at Providence St. Vincent Medical Center.
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 (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,
 Senator Michael Dembrow
District 23
email: Sen.MichaelDembrow@oregonlegislature.gov
web: www.senatordembrow.com
phone: 503-281-0608
mail: 900 Court St NE, S-407, Salem, OR, 97301
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