Weekly COVID-19 Summary 29JUNE20: New cases surging-per State Health Officer, due to folks doing “silly things”

STATEWIDE MISSISSIPPI

•  Mississippi had 4280 new COVID-19 cases and 81 new deaths this week, for a total of 26,567,cases and 1059,deaths since reporting began on March 11, 2020. These reports represent increases of 19.2% and 8.3% respectively. This compares to 12.6% and 9.3% last week. The trend in new cases is up significantly from last week; deaths are down slightly.
• Mississippi’s rate of 356 deaths per million of population puts it in the 12th place in the US, same as last week.
• Hospitalized Patients:
  • Mississippi hospitals averaged 516 hospitalized patients with COVID-19 during the week. This is a substantial increase over the 481 and 459 over the two prior weeks. Hospitalizations trending up for three consecutive weeks.
  •  COVID-19 patients requiring ICU care averaged 154 patients, down from 158 daily last week’s and 160 patients two weeks ago. Trending is downward for ICU admissions statewide. However, the state has “pockets” where hospitals are having trouble providing enough resources in their area.
  • Ventilators were required for a daily average of  91 patients, compared to 100 patients during both the previous two weeks.
• Long Term Care (LTC) facilities:
  • As of 6-28,  84 LTC facilities statewide reported active coronavirus outbreaks, compared to 76 facilities for the week prior.
  • LTC facilities accounted for 9.7% of total cases statewide (2574 of 26,567).
  • LTC facilities accounted for 48.7% of total deaths statewide (516 of 1059).
  • New cases in LTC facilities were 4.4% of the state’s total (187 of 4280).
  • New deaths in LTC facilities were 34.6% of the state’s total (28 of 81).
  • Except for the number of facilities with active cases, all of the statewide LTC facility trends are down from last week, which continues a trend of several weeks.

NORTHEAST MISSISSIPPI (NEMS)

• As of 6/28, NEMS had at total of 527 new cases, for a total of 2766, up 23.5% from last week. This is the second week of increasing percentages of new cases.
•  NEMS had a total of 7 new deaths, for a total of 117, up 8.3% – essentialy stable from last week.
•  NEMS Long Term Care (LTC) facilities:
  • In NEMS 14 LTC facilities in 7 Counties have active outbreaks of COVID-19, this is compares to the previous week’s 12 facilities in 9 counties.
  • In NEMS, LTC facilities accounted for 12.5% of total cases (345 of 2766) and 58.1% of total deaths (68 of 117).  Total cases are down 2% and deaths are essentially stable.
  • In NEMS, LTC Facilities accounted for 2.1% of new cases (11 of 527) and 57.1% of new deaths (4 of 7 ). Both of these percentages are substantially lower than last week’s.
  • in NEMS, Clay and Tippah counties have had no cases of COVID-19 in LTC facilities.
  • There have been no deaths of residents in LTC facilities in Alcorn, Benton, Clay, Marshall, Tippah and Tishomingo counties.

The Take-Away For This Week

Total statewide new cases and deaths trended upward this week at rates higher than the previous week. As most people already know, Mississippi had a very bad week for new cases between June 22 and 29, with 1092 new cases reported on a single day. Five of the past 7 days each saw substantially highers numbers of new cases than of any days prior to this reporting period.

Mississippi and other southern states have been singled out for comment because of their surging numbers and their early re-opening dates.

MS holds the 12 most lethal position in deaths per million of population (356) as of the writing of this report. To put this into context, the only near-by state with higher figures is Louisiana at 690 deaths per million. Tennessee, Arkansas, and Alabama have only 87, 88 and 189 deaths per million, respectively.

State Health Officer, Dr. Thomas Dobbs reports that several commuities’ hospitals are becoming stressed due to COVID-19 admissions requiring ICU and/or ventilator services. Resources can be shuffled from spots that have spares for now, but if the statewide surge continues, this will leave some areas with inadequate resources.

Accordng to Dr. Dobbs, too many Mississippians are “doing silly things.” “Wearing masks,” he says, “is just the right thing to do.” When asked about mandating precautionary masks, he voiced doubt that that would be effective due to the general resistance being seen in our state. Some communities are considering whether to enact their own stiffer regulations. An executive order from the mayor put mandatory mask regulations in place in Tupelo this past week. However, any community will be hard-pressed to enforce the rules unless the general population “buys in” in greater numbers that arre currently evident.

In Northeast Mississippi (NEMS), the rate of new infections is growing faster than the state as a whole. New cases rose 23.5% in NEMS, compared to 19.2% for the state as a whole. LTC facilities account for only about 2% of the NEMS increase, as compared to a statewide percentage of 4.4% for LTC facilities. Looks like NEMS folks may be doing even more “silly things” than the state in general.

Take care of yourself; if you are able, give a hand to someone who needs assistance.

*All state data is from MS State Department of Health and is as of 6 PM on the day prior to reporting. Deaths per million figures from WorldOMeter as of day of posting.

Mississippi’s rate of transmission is increasing: http://newalbanyunionco.com/611-cases-transmission-rate-rising/