March 3rd COVID-19 Update

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Michael Dembrow

March 3, 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.

All COVID metrics remain on a decline or stable at a low level today.  Oregon remains the mainland state with the lowest rate of COVID-19 today, which is a great tribute to people’s willingness to take care of themselves and their neighbors.  The one exception to this good news is the higher number of COVID deaths reported today.  They were reported today, but we haven’t yet seen the details about them.  As is generally the case when we get larger death numbers these days, they likely date back in time and aren’t really reflective of where we are today.  Hospitalizations are a better guide of that, and the number of people hospitalized continues to decline.

Vaccinations are back up now.  In fact, Oregon has passed the 1 million mark for total number of vaccines administered here in Oregon.  We’ve already administered nearly 78% of the doses that have come into the state.  To date, 417,214 Oregonians 65 and older have received at least their first dose.  That’s nearly 2/3 of the Oregonians who have been vaccinated so far.

Meanwhile, I’m happy to report that I did receive my confirmation email from Walgreens last night for my upcoming inoculation.  When I signed up for my first and second appointments, they said they’d send me a confirmation email soon.  It took nearly 18 hours for it to arrive, so it got me a little worried.  But it did finally come, which was a relief.  Even the pharmacies, with their tried-and-true consumer-oriented software, are having a hard time dealing with the crush of high demand and inadequate doses coming in.  In this newsletter you’ll find links to stories about increased doses anticipated for Oregon’s pharmacies and mass vaccination sites, including the new single-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine.

Please stay safe, and let me know if you have any questions about information in today’s newsletter.

 

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TODAY’S CORONAVIRUS AND CORONAVIRUS RESPONSE UPDATE

  • New COVID Cases: OHA reports 276 new COVID cases today.  The cumulative number of cases in Oregon since the beginning of the pandemic is 156,287.
  • Variant COVID Cases: OHA reports an additional case of the B.1.1.7 (UK) variant in Oregon.  The total number of this variant is now 11.  Yesterday we had our first reported case of the P.1 (Brazilian) variant.
  • Positive Test Results: OHA reports 601 positive tests today. The cumulative total of positive test results since the beginning of the pandemic is now 225,298.
  • Total Tests: OHA reported an additional 27,038 tests today. Our cumulative total of reported tests is now 3,787,438.
  • Positivity Rate: The test positivity ratio for Oregon is 2.2%. The national ratio today is 4.8%.
  • Hospitalization Information:
    • Patients Currently with Confirmed COVID-19: 140 (9 fewer than yesterday)
    • ICU Patients Confirmed w COVID-19: 31 (2 more than yesterday).
    • Available ICU Beds: 172 (11 more than yesterday)
    • Other Available Beds: 522 (7 fewer than yesterday).
    • Confirmed COVID-19 Patients Currently on Ventilators: 11 (same as yesterday).
    • Available Ventilators: 787 (6 fewer than yesterday).
  • Deaths: I’m sorry to report 27 additional COVID deaths today.  The total number of COVID deaths in Oregon is now 2,252.
  • Vaccinations: As of the end of yesterday, here are the latest numbers:
    • New Immunizations Reported Today: 22,346
    • Total First and Second Doses Administered So Far: 1,019,767
      • 528,276 Pfizer doses
      • 490,744 Moderna doses
    • Total Oregonians vaccinated so far: 648,003
      • 365,939 now fully vaccinated with two doses
    • To date, 1,310,175 doses of vaccine have been delivered to sites across Oregon. (65,670 more than yesterday)
  • Today’s National Numbers:
    • Total Tests: 357,589,303 (up 1,401,364 from yesterday).
    • Total Cases: 28,453,529 (up 66,836 from yesterday).
    • Deaths: 508,665 (up 2,449 from yesterday).
    • These national numbers come from the COVID Tracking Project. You can visit that site HERE https://covidtracking.com/data/national
  • Additional Quick Updates:
    • Here’s an article from The Oregonian with the latest on new pharmacy vaccination sites.l Bi-Mart and Wal-Mart will soon be opening up vaccination appointments.
    • Here’s more on pharmacy vaccines,with a focus on allocations of the new single-dose Johnson & Johnson single-dose vaccines to 101 Safeway-Albertson pharmacies in the state. Overall vaccines being sent to these pharmacies will rise from the present 100 per week to 200 per week starting next week, for a total of 23,000 available doses around the state. (Unlike with the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines, extra doses of the J&J vaccine don’t need to be held back for a second dose.)
    • Business owners who are having trouble making their rent payments will soon be able to apply for the new Commercial Rent Relief Program. Those who qualify can receive rent relief up to $100,000 starting March 8.  This was a program created by the Legislature’s Emergency Board back in January.
    • Axios reports that global emissions are again on the rise, global emissions are again on the rise, a metric that had been on the decline earlier in the pandemic. Ah well . . .
    •  Four Democrats are vying for appointmentto fill the East County seat held by Rep. Diego Hernandez, who resigned his position in advance of potential expulsion by the House.

 

It’s Constituent Coffee Time!

Saturday morning is the first Saturday of the month, so it’s time for another zoom constituent coffee.  This is your chance to get an update on legislative business, challenges, and goals, and enter into a dialogue with me and other constituents. 

Here's the link to register for the Coffee.

Hope to see you there!

 

Latest Weekly Reports Released

The Oregon Health Authority’s COVID-19 Weekly Report, released today, shows increases in daily cases, hospitalizations and deaths from the previous week.  Nevertheless, the numbers are much lower than they were a month ago.

OHA reported 2,652 new daily cases of COVID-19 during the week of Monday, Feb. 22 through Sunday, Feb. 28 — a 17% increase from the previous week.

New COVID-19 related hospitalizations also rose to 164, up from 159 the previous week.

Reported COVID-19 related deaths also increased to 57, up from 17 last week. That represents the lowest total since mid-November.

There were 120,678 tests for COVID-19 for the week of Feb. 21 through Feb. 27, a sharp increase from the previous week. Much of the relative increase was due to abnormally low testing that previous week due to the extreme weather power outages. 

The percentage of positive tests was 3.7%, well below the 5% goal.

Today’s COVID-19 Weekly Outbreak Report shows 56 active COVID-19 outbreaks in senior living communities and congregate living settings, a number that has continued to decline.

 

Looking for Vaccines?

If you’re interested in finding an appointment at one of your local pharmacies, check out the  VaccineFinder Website.  It will take you straight to the pharmacies near you and let you know if they have doses or not.  Having said that, you may find (as I did) that even though they say they have stock, when you go in to book an appointment, you may be told that in fact they don’t have any.  So again, you’ll need to be patient.

Of course, if you’re in the Portland area, you can try the Convention Center site.  Though there were few appointments available this week (largely because they needed to close the facility on Monday and Tuesday for reorganization and moved those with appointments to later in the week), we’re promised a big increase in new slots for next week.  Fortunately, OHA has slowly improved its messages for the new method of invitation-only scheduling.  It’s badly needed.  Check out this flyer.

 

New Bills Introduced

The House and Senate met for floor sessions this week, again mainly to introduce new bills.  The House met on Tuesday and here are the new bills that were introduced there.

The Senate met this morning, and, as predicted, we did have a quorum for today: 5 Republicans were at the Capitol to join all but one Democrats. (One senator had to stay away due to a possible COVID close contact through his son.)   Here are the new bills that were introduced this morning.

In addition to those newly-introduced (i.e., “first-read”) bills, eight bills were “second-read” today.  That means they had passed out of committee and were ready for a floor vote.  Having a bill second-read signals that it will come up for a vote the following floor session.

This week we’re beginning to have two floor sessions a week, only second one scheduled for tomorrow morning.  So, that means tomorrow will be the first day of the session that we’ll actually vote on bills.  Nearly all of those up for a vote tomorrow  (i.e., “third-read”) are routine, non-controversial bills.  I’ll be carrying one that came through the Judiciary Committee related to the Oregon Youth Authority.  As with all the Judiciary Committee bills, Republicans all voted no at the time of the committee vote as a protest against our not holding committee meetings at the Capitol with the public invited in (ignoring the fact that Marion County is still a High Risk county for COVID).  It will be interesting to see how they vote on the floor.

 

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 276. Nearly ¾ of all COVID cases reported today were again outside the Portland Tri-County area.  Here is today’s breakdown by county:

Baker (2)

Benton (3)

Clackamas (20)

Columbia (3)

Coos (24)

Deschutes (10)

Douglas (22)

Grant (2)

Harney (2)

Jackson (47)

Jefferson (5)

Josephine (5)

Klamath (2)

Lane (15)

Linn (4)

Malheur (2)

Marion (28)

Multnomah (26)

Polk (4)

Tillamook (4)

Umatilla (7)

Union (10)

Washington (25)

Yamhill (2)

 

And the Deaths:

We’re still awaiting the details on the 27 deaths reported today.  When we see large numbers like this these days, most of them are likely earlier deaths that were slow to be reported.

 

 

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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 (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.

 

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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: 503-281-0608
mail: 900 Court St NE, S-407, Salem, OR, 97301