Surge in COVID cases overwhelming Whatcom public health officials
Whatcom County’s Health Department is overwhelmed by the recent surge in COVID-19 cases and is falling behind in contact tracing of infected people amid the new coronavirus pandemic.
Further, local medical clinics and the Health Department aren’t testing people quickly enough to let their patients know if they have COVID-19 in time to take precautions against infecting others.
“As you all know, we’ve had a rough few days in terms of cases. I think we’re at 49 cases in the last four days,” and the numbers likely will rise because of a lag in reporting to the state of positive cases found by private clinics and other health-care providers, Health Director Erika Lautenbach told the County Council in a presentation Tuesday afternoon, June 23.
Whatcom County is not meeting COVID-19 case count benchmarks and will not apply this week to move into Phase 3 of Gov. Jay Inslee’s reopening plan, according to a county health department news release Tuesday.
County Council member Rud Browne asked Lautenbach what she needs to be able to test 300 people per day, the number of people that Skagit County is testing daily.
Browne said it’s possible that the county EMS Council could supply volunteers or other help.
Lautenbach didn’t say how many people Whatcom County sites are testing daily, but she said that some patients are going to Skagit County for tests because they’re being told that local appointments aren’t available for up to two weeks.
That’s too late to help anyone, Browne said.
“We don’t have the staff or resources to solve this problem for the entire community,” Lautenbach said. “We don’t have an issue with the labs or capacity or test kits. It’s really just the time it’s taking to get people tested. That’s what’s lacking right now — the time slots and the availability.”
Lautenbach said that most new cases have been linked to people age 30 and younger in Ferndale, Blaine and Lynden.
“Because a lot of these cases aren’t getting really sick, they’re having more mild symptoms that they may think is a cold or something else — or not even having symptoms — they’re going to work, they’re going to more parties, they’re going to their parents’ house on the weekend, they’re out and about quite a bit.
“And so that’s why we’ve seen the just sort of explosion over the past four days,” she said. “Our concern is of course that a lot of these young people will infect their parents and grandparents that may have much more severe illness than they‘re experiencing.”
Some people who tested positive have had as many as 50 close contacts.
Specially trained staff called contact tracers must interview everyone who’s been in proximity to an infected person, a process called contact tracing.
She said the Health Department is training volunteers to conduct contact tracing, a process she has compared to detective work that requires empathy and the ability to gain people’s trust.
“Keeping track of all the various exposures has been really challenging,” Lautenbach said. “We actually have called in the state to help us to do the case and contact info because the volume is more than we can handle.”
This story was originally published June 24, 2020 at 1:10 PM.
