Wood County Emergency Management Agency’s Emergency Operation Center’s Situation Report on COVID-19 Response for June 29.
Executive Summary:
Gov. Mike DeWine talked about the continued increase in the number of cases. Hospitalizations and ICU numbers up. Long-term trends in regard to hospitalizations, which are a lagging indicator. June 21-27 was the first week of increasing COVID hospitalization in the state for over two months. We are starting to go up slightly. There is still adequate overall hospital capacity across Ohio – we haven’t reached a concern threshold of 80%. This can fairly quickly change.
Positivity number – we have increased testing, and we have a ways to go. The increased cases we are seeing are not only because Ohio is testing more. The experts we have consulted do not think it is entirely due to this. We look at the positivity number- of all the tests done in a day and what percentage of those come back positive (4-6% is what we have been averaging). We would assume that as we expanded criteria for testing that the positivity rate would drop, due to testing the asymptomatic. That has not happened, it has not gone up dramatically but it certainly has not dropped. This indicates we are seeing an increase of COVID here.
Hamilton County and Montgomery County (Cincinnati and Dayton) – in a call with the vice president and White House today, they specifically asked about those two counties. They said they will give us some additional help in those communities. At the end of May and early June, Hamilton County was holding steady with an average 30 cases/day/100,000 people. They are now at 100 cases/day/100,000. Due to delayed diagnoses, the numbers may continue to grow in this reporting period. This is not solely because of increased testing. In Hamilton County the number of COVID positive patients has doubled from June 11 to this weekend. Montgomery County has seen some more red flags, with a noticeable increase of cases. Medical visits increasing. ICU and vent usage has doubled since the first week of June. We have an alert on these two places.
Schools – DeWine hopes to announce an update the latter part of this week (Thursday). New plans that will take us into the next phase. A phase to try to keep Ohio open in the second half of 2020.
The Governor also announced today that they will be extending the current health orders through the end of this week, which most notably includes the prohibition of mass gatherings. Mike and Fran DeWine are participating in a virtual roundtable with White House tomorrow. The pandemic has shined a spotlight on a lot of disparities, particularly on those of color and poverty.
Nursing homes – DeWine said his job as governor is to protect the most vulnerable. This includes putting measures in place to keep people safe but also to make sure to protect the things that add value of life. He said he knows this has been gut wrenching for families.
On July 20, nursing homes can do outdoor visitation as long as all of the safety measures are put in place. It is the goal to have people be able to visit their loved ones, but nursing homes do need some time to get ready for this, DeWine said. Ohio is in the process of testing every nursing home then have the staff continue to be tested. Planned pop up testing to continue to improve access to underserved and minority areas. This testing is open to anyone. National Guard is testing every day this week in Cincinnati. These testing sites are listed on the coronavirus.ohio.gov website.
Be careful as you get together. We aren’t sure what the long term medical ramifications of this. Young people are getting really sick. Individual behavior is and should be the way that this gets dealt with. If people follow the restrictions, they should be okay.
Lt. Gov. Jon Husted featured RCF Group of Westchester, 70 employees across Ohio and Kentucky. They spoke on some of the efforts they are taking to keep their employees safe. Return to work plan- it is about wearing a mask, social distancing, and washing your hands. It is about being respectful of others. They have been paying close attention to the governors briefing’s, delivering best practice messages, and leading by example. They wear their masks always, and follow all of these principles.Husted spoke to those in a leadership role, urging that they lead by example to do their part to assist in this fight.
Ohio Confirmed Cases: 47,524
Ohio Probable Cases: 3,522
Ohio Total Confirmed plus Probable: 51,046
Ohio Hospitalizations: 7,746
ICU Admissions: 1,961
Ohio Confirmed COVID Deaths: 2,575
Ohio Probable COVID Deaths: 243
*For daily state hospitalization data please visit: https://coronavirus.ohio.gov/wps/portal/gov/covid-19/dashboards/key-metrics/hospitalizations/key-metrics-on-hospitalizations scroll to the bottom, find the date you are looking for and hover your mouse over that bar.
Wood County Cases (total plus probable): 327
Wood County Hospitalizations: 70
Wood County Long Term Care Cases: 202
Wood County Deaths: 51
County EOC Objectives:
1. Coordinate the county’s response to limit spread of COVID-19; and maintain medical care.
2. Provide timely, clear, and consistent messaging to the public, stakeholders and media on the status of COVID-19 and actions the public can take to keep themselves safe.
3. Determine how county agencies will continue delivery of essential services to Wood County residents while following COVID-19 public health guidelines.
4. Prevent, identify, mitigate, and respond to COVID19 hotspots within the county.
EMA:
State EMA- Over the past 24 hours, the Ohio Department of Health reported 854 (50,309) total new cases, 57 (7,681) hospitalizations, and 30 (1,946) ICU Admissions; All key metrics except reported deaths were above 21-day averages. Three (2,807) deaths were reported by ODH. ODH continues to monitor 17 previously identified hot spots across three clinical zones. There is currently no State EOC mission directly supporting these locations. The next PPE push will occur on June 29. The Expo Center warehouse is at 10% capacity. If the number of deliveries continue at the same pace, the warehouse will be at full capacity on July 9.
The Ohio School Safety Center and Ohio Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services are co-hosting virtual Question Persuade Refer (QPR) suicide prevention training for Ohio’s schools and first responders on July 14 and Aug. 6. Sign up now to reserve your spot. More info at https://bit.ly/3784Wv7
The Wood County EMA has a few cloth masks left for local government entities. Please contact us if you have a need. These will be given on a first come first served basis.
Please contact us if:
– If you have PPE to donate, if you have any PPE needs or have any questions.
– If you know citizens looking to purchase masks, please connect them with our office and we can give them the contact information of local mask sellers.
Public Health:
There are 47,524 confirmed COVID-19 cases in Ohio. There are 367 cases (total confirmed plus probable) presently in Wood County, 70 of those are or have been hospitalized, 202 in long term care, 51 deaths.
Wood County Health Commissioner Ben Batey has accepted an offer to become the Chief Health Officer of Bowling Green State University. Batey intends to continue working to protect and improve public health in Wood County through a proposed partnership between BGSU and Wood County Health Department.
Are you struggling with stress as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic and need emotional support? Call the COVID CareLine toll-free at 1-800-720-9616. After 8 p.m., calls will be forwarded to the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline.
Case follow-up and contact tracing – Confirmed and probable cases are reported to the health department. Several health department staff are involved in contacting cases and their close contacts to ensure isolation and quarantine guidelines are followed. In addition, a UT professor has enlisted a pool of trained nursing and other students to help the health department with interviews of cases and their close contacts.
Testing – testing locations and other local information, as well as links to ODH and CDC resources, can be found at Coronavirus.WoodCountyHealth.org
Healthcare:
For agency resource requests, please contact us at: woodcountyema@co.wood.oh.us. Please note that long term care facilities will soon be expected to pursue PPE through their regionally assigned hospital (Wood County Hospital). This is a new process and additional communication on this should be coming soon.
Wood County Hospital: COVID-19 testing registration will take place over the phone and collection will take place outdoors when possible to limit potential virus exposure.
Wood County Historical Museum:
The museum will be open starting July 6. Open for self-guided tours Monday – Friday 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. and on weekends from 1-4 p.m. In addition to the museum, three buildings will be open at the site: the Lunatic Asylum, Pestilence House, and Ice House. The asylum and pestilence house exhibits are also available online at woodcountyhistory.org . There is also an outdoor porch exhibit that will rotate throughout the summer.
Visitors are expected to wear a face mask or covering while inside the Museum.
Please be mindful to keep a six-foot distance from other visitors. The 30,000 square-foot building provides ample room for social distancing.
Hand-sanitizer stations are available throughout the museum.
BGSU:
Now publishing a situation report once/week.
Fall semester classes will now start on Wednesday, Aug. 26. To best plan and to lessen the impact COVID-19 may have on our campuses, in-person classes will end on Wednesday, Nov. 25. The last week of classes will be Nov. 30-Dec. 4, 2020, and will be conducted remotely. Final exam week will be Dec. 7-11, 2020, and will also be conducted remotely. In addition, to provide maximized flexibility, we have also canceled Winter Session in 2021. Based upon current planning, classes for spring semester will now begin on Jan. 11, 2021, and end on April 30, 2021.
Local:
The Grand Rapids Applebutter Festival is canceled this year.
Administrative Information: Any information and contributions your agency has for this report is valuable to maintain a common operating picture and situational awareness for the county as a whole. Please reach out to our office via phone or email (email preferred) to share information.
EOC Hours of Operation: 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.
We do not answer phones during the governor’s press conference. Please feel free to send an email during those times or leave a message and we will get back to you when we are able to.
Requesting support: Call Wood County EMA at 419-354-9269 or email
woodcountyema@co.wood.oh.us
ODH Call line: 1-833-4-ASK-ODH (1-833-427-5634)
www.coronavirus.ohio.gov
An abbreviated version of this report can be found at: http://woodcountyema.org/covid-19/ .
