‘Thanksgiving surge’ hits Ohio County

Ohio County had over 200 new cases of COVID-19 reported last week, an increase Judge-Executive David Johnston is attributing to the Thanksgiving holiday.

“It is worse than we could have ever imagined,” Johnston said. “We are calling it basically the Thanksgiving surge.”

Johnston said many people ignored the call from state and local officials who told people they should not gather during the holiday.

“That (request) was proven correct,” he said.

Last week’s numbers, which included a county record of 79 cases reported on Thursday as well as several cases reported at Beaver Dam Nursing and Rehab, resulted in the county hitting triple digits on the Department of Public Health’s daily incidence map. A daily incidence of over 25 places a county in the “red zone” which indicates the rate of cases is “critical.”

The seven-day incidence is calculated by taking the total number of unique cases in each county over the past seven days, divided by seven to get a daily average, divided by the U.S. census bureau county population, and multiplied by 100,000 to get the incidence per 100,000 people.

In the two days of reports for this week, Ohio County has reported 33 new cases with three deaths, all reported Tuesday. There have been a total of 1,209 cases ever in Ohio County with 381 still listed as active as of Tuesday morning’s report. There have been 21 deaths in the county attributed to the virus.

Last week in the Green River District Health Department, consisting of seven counties including

Ohio County, had 1,132 new cases of COVID-19 and 18 deaths. As of Tuesday, the district had 9,665 total number of cases with 2,495 of those still listed as active.

On Sunday, Gov. Andy Beshear announced that the state of Kentucky had surpassed 200,000 total number of cases since the beginning of the pandemic in March. And, while the number of cases reported throughout the state was still high, Beshear said there are indications that the rate of growth may be slowing.

“In other words, our increase from the last couple of weeks is less than what we have been seeing. Certainly, our hope is that we are slowing down this train or moving at least to a new plateau,” Beshear said Sunday.

Monday’s number of new cases was the lowest reported in 10 days statewide with 1,972 newly reported cases.

Beshear believes the decrease in growth could be the result of his newest restrictions put in place last month which closed restaurants to in-person dining, among other restrictions to bars and gyms.

“We believe the new restrictions are working,” he said. “They worked in July. They worked in March. They worked in Kentucky. They worked in Arizona. They worked in Texas. They worked in Florida. They’ve worked in every state in which they’ve been instituted.”

Beshear did indicate that he does not foresee extending the newest restrictions on restaurants, bars and gyms expected to expire Dec. 13, which would return them to the 50% capacity limit.

While state health officials believe the rate of growth appears to be slowing, 114 of Kentucky’s 120 counties remain in the critical red zone on the daily incidence report and the positivity rate was still above nine Monday afternoon. The rest are in the accelerated “orange zone.”

Beshear announced Monday the state is expecting two additional COVID-19 vaccine shipments before the end of the year. In total, the state expects at least 38,000 Pfizer doses and 109,000 Moderna doses this month. The initial vaccines are to be given to long-term care workers and residents as well as those treating COVID-19 patients in Kentucky’s hospitals.

“The end of this virus is out there. We can see it, and we can feel it. But it’s still months away, and until then, we’ve got to do the right things to protect one another, knowing that when we work hard, we save the lives of those around us and ensure we have the health care capacity we need,” said Gov. Beshear.