Seven more COVID-19 cases in Whatcom reported Friday by state health department
Seven more Whatcom County residents have tested positive for COVID-19, the Washington Health Department reported on Friday, June 19.
The county now has 474 confirmed cases and continues to have 39 deaths during the pandemic — meaning 8.2% of people diagnosed with the new coronavirus in Whatcom have died — according to state department of health data as of 11:59 p.m. Thursday, June 18.
The state also reports the county continues to have 53 hospitalizations and has conducted 14,683 tests, with 3.2% returning positive results.
The most recent data from the state’s Risk Assessment Dashboard is from Thursday and shows Whatcom County missing two of five Phase 2 metrics goals:
▪ Whatcom is making the target rate of fewer than 25 new cases per 100,000 residents every 14 days with a rate of 24.9.
▪ Whatcom is missing the target rate of more than 50 individuals tested for each new confirmed case the past week with a rate of 42.4.
▪ Whatcom is missing the target of less than 2% of individuals testing positive for COVID-19 during the past week with a rate of 2.4%.
The state noted that it will not update hospital bed capacity numbers on the Risk Assessment Dashboard until Tuesday, June 23, posting on the website that “a change in the way the beds are being counted now requires hospitals to fill out forms in a new way. New language from the CDC is prompting this change.”
▪ Whatcom was making the target of less than 80% of all licensed hospital beds being occupied before the state change.
▪ Whatcom is making the target of less than 10% of all licensed hospital beds being occupied by COVID-19 patients before the state change.
St. Joseph hospital reported to The Bellingham Herald Friday that it has one patient who has tested positive and no patients who are suspected to have COVID-19.
U.S. and Washington state
More than 8.6 million cases of COVID-19 have been confirmed worldwide, with more than 459,437 deaths as of Friday evening, according to Johns Hopkins University. The United States has 2,219,976 confirmed cases — the most reported cases of any nation — and at least 119,097 related deaths.
Overall, the Washington State Department of Health Friday evening reported 27,601 cases (an increase of 409), 1,255 deaths (an increase of 10) and 4,003 coronavirus-related hospitalizations (an increase of 44). Approximately 4.5% of all confirmed cases in the state have resulted in death, while 6.1% of the 455,941 tests administered have come back positive for COVID-19.
Phased reopening
Whatcom County was approved Friday, June 5, to move to Phase 2 under new benchmarks announced May 29, by Gov. Jay Inslee. Whatcom will need to wait until at least June 26 before it can apply to move to Phase 3.
On Friday, Washington State Secretary of Health John Wiesman approved King County to move to Phase 2 and Island, Lewis, and Mason counties to move to Phase 3.
Whatcom was one of 19 counties in Phase 2 on Friday. Three counties remain in Phase 1, two counties are in a modified version of Phase 1 and 15 counties have advanced to Phase 3, according to the state Department of Health.
Phase 2 enables retail firms to resume in-store purchases, restaurants to reopen with 50% capacity and table sizes no larger than 5, and the re-start of new construction, real estate, hair and nail salons, and barbers.
Phase 3 allows restaurants/taverns to reopen at 75% capacity with table sizes no larger than 10, as well as bar areas in restaurants/taverns at 25% capacity, movie theaters at 50% capacity, and libraries and museums.
