Health official: Here’s what preventing Whatcom economy from opening amid rising COVID cases
Many Whatcom County residents are flouting guidelines meant to limit the spread of the new coronavirus pandemic, endangering lives and crippling the local economy, the county’s top health official told the County Council.
In an online meeting to update elected officials on the status of COVD-19 vaccinations and infections, Health Director Erika Lautenbach said residents who keep socializing with friends and attending parties and large gatherings are spreading the virus at an “unprecedented” pace.
“We are half-assing this as a community and we need to step up, we need to step up for our economy,” Lautenbach said in a meeting Tuesday, Jan. 12.
“We will never be able to reopen our businesses, we will never be able to get back on track, if people continue to gather,” she said.
“This is people who choose to gather,” she said. “We are working with over 100 businesses who have employees who come to work sick and create problems at those businesses. This is people who choose to gather, who are hurting businesses, who are hurting our economy and our ability to reopen.”
Monthly average infections are on schedule to triple in January, Lautenbach said.
COVID-19 cases in January alone could approach the number of cases reported from March through December 2020 — doubling the total pandemic case count, she said.
“This really is nothing like what we’ve seen in terms of magnitude or volume of cases,” Lautenbach told the council.
“Our cases are an anomaly statewide, they’re very concerning. We don’t have a good reason for them,” she said.
Lautenbach said there is no indication that the newer and highly contagious COVID-19 variant is present in Whatcom County, and that there has been super-spreader event or a marked increase in testing to explain the sudden rise in cases.
Some 80% of cases can be traced to social gatherings and parties, where people are infected and then spread the virus among friends, family members and co-workers.
She cited a grim statistic of virus spread among those who ignore the rules of masking and social distancing:
“Given the burden of disease in our community at this point and the rates that we’ve experienced, if you go to a 10-person gathering you have a 12% chance of contracting the virus,” Lautenbach said.
“If you go to a 25-person gathering you have a 28% chance, 1 in 4, of contracting the virus. If you go to a 50-person gathering, you have a 1 in 2 chance, a 48% chance of contracting the virus. And if you go to a 100-plus-person event you have a 72% chance of contracting the virus,” she said.
Hospitalizations are at the highest rate ever, and there is a three- to four-week lag between a surge in new cases and a rise in hospitalizations, Lautenbach said.
Fears are that hospitalizations and deaths could rise soon, she said.
At a Health Department press conference Wednesday, Jan. 13, Lautenbach reinforced her message against unmasked social gatherings.
“No person is an island, we are a community,” Lautenbach said. “We, of course, want to protect people who are at risk of severe illness and death but we have found that there is no way to do that without protecting the rest of us as well.”
No one under age 40 has died from COVID-19 n Whatcom County, Lautenbach said, but the disease has killed people of all ages — even young and healthy people.
“We don’t know the impact that COVID will have on any person. Yes, the risk is lower, for severe illness and death, but it is not without risk. We are balancing all of those challenges and really trying to protect the population as a whole,” she said.
Turning the tide of COVID-19 spread will be easy if Whatcom County residents avoid unmasked social settings and practice good hand hygiene, she said.
“I feel like that if we can ask those things, those simple changes that people can make, that we can protect everyone and we can move forward with reopening businesses and reopening our economy,” she said.
“I know that people are fatigued and they are social creatures and they want to see their friends and family,” she said. “But we can kick this. And frankly, we can kick it quickly if we all take collective action.”
This story was originally published January 13, 2021 at 3:08 PM.
