As Whatcom COVID cases continue climb, county sees third related death reported in 6 days
Whatcom County saw its third death related to COVID-19 reported in the past six days on Wednesday, Aug. 25, on the Washington State Department of Health’s COVID Data Dashboard, along with 66 more confirmed COVID cases.
The recent string of reported COVID-related deaths, which began Friday, Aug. 20, comes after the county did not see any reported for 23 days.
The death reported Wednesday was for a person who first tested positive for COVID on July 28, according to the state’s epidemiological curves. It was the second death of someone who first tested positive in July. So far, there also have been two in August.
No other information about the person whose death was reported Wednesday, such as age, gender or hometown, was released.
The death was Whatcom’s 112th COVID-related death during the pandemic, which means 0.9% of the county’s 11,819 total cases (confirmed and probable cases combined) have resulted in death. For comparison, the state’s COVID-related death rate is 1.2%.
With the 66 confirmed cases announced Wednesday, Whatcom County has had a total of 11,131 so far during the pandemic. The state also reported an additional 688 probable cases — resulting from a positive antigen test not confirmed by a molecular test — which was an increase of 33 from the last report.
Whatcom’s two-week infection rate continued to grow to 368.0 cases per 100,000 residents according to the state’s most recently completed epidemiological data between Aug. 4 and Aug. 17, the state’s Risk Assessment Dashboard reported. That was up from a rate of 357.5 reported on Tuesday, Aug. 24, and the highest mark the county has seen since it had an infection rate of 379.1 reported Feb. 5.
The latest report on the state dashboard also shows Whatcom County has:
▪ 574 COVID-related hospitalizations during the pandemic — up three from the last report. St. Joseph hospital in Bellingham reported Thursday, Aug. 26, that it was treating 31 COVID patients — unchanged from the last report and six fewer than the pandemic record-high 37 it reported Aug. 17.
▪ 309,338 tests (molecular and antigen combined) performed during the pandemic — up 1,051 from the last report.
▪ 243,597 vaccinations administered during the pandemic — up 545 from the last report. The state reports 63.0% of Whatcom County’s total population has initiated vaccination and 57.4% has completed it.
Additionally, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Data Tracker Thursday listed Whatcom’s level of transmission as “High” — the highest of four categories. All 39 counties in Washington state were listed in the “High” transmission category.
COVID breakthroughs
People who are not fully vaccinated accounted for 92.7% of all COVID-19 cases in the state between Feb. 1 and Aug. 16, according to the state’s COVID-19 Cases, Hospitalizations and Deaths in Persons Who Are Not Fully Vaccinated report released Wednesday.
They also accounted for 94.1% of all COVID-related hospitalizations between Feb. 1 and Aug. 9 and 92.4% of all COVID-related cases from Feb. 1 to July 26, according to the report.
The report did not break down vaccine status data for hospitalizations and deaths to the county level, nor did it update the percentage of cases in vaccinated people at the county level.
According to last week’s report, Whatcom County saw 193 breakthrough COVID-19 cases, which is a confirmed case in a person deemed fully vaccinated. That represented 4.8% of all cases in the county between February and July, according to the report.
The report also said that there were 3,862 Whatcom County cases in people who were not fully vaccinated between February and July, which represents 95.2% of all cases during that period.
