HERE WE GO AGAIN....
America is taking an open book test and has even been given the answer key, but no one wants to use the book or the key.
I can't believe we're doing this again. Screw it, let's go the take home messages:
1/ This graph is my own tracking of pediatric COVID cases in Denton County since before the start of the school year based on data released on weekdays by the Denton County Public Health department. Anything over 56 new cases per day in the under 19 population is highly indicative of extensive community spread.
2/ The test positive rate for Denton County had rapidly increased just in the last several days to 24.7%. That means 1 out of every 4 COVID tests done in a physician's office or testing site is positive for COVID. This does not take into account home testing kits which are not reported to DCPH. Any test positive rate over 10% means that COVID is outpacing the testing infrastructure and we are not doing enough testing to catch all positives and test their close contacts.
3/ Omicron is much more highly contagious than Delta or any previous variant. Be wary of what "milder" means from a community standpoint. A more contagious virus that's milder is more dangerous to our medical resources than a less contagious virus that's more severe. Let's say I have a theoretical variant that has a 2% hospitalization rate. 100 people infected, 2 end up in the hospital. Now let's get a mutated variant that has 1% hospitalization rate but infects 10 times more people. 100 people infected leads to 1000 thousand people and 1% of 1000 is now 10 people in the hospital.
4/ Yes, you can get Omicron if vaccinated and even if boosted. But your chances of significant symptoms, long COVID, hospitalization and death are significantly less than if unvaccinated. The unvaccinated are still accounting for the vast majority of hospitalizations and deaths with the Omicron variant.
5/ Numbers are rapidly increasing at a rate that makes the Delta variant look like a slouch. AND SCHOOL HAS NOT EVEN STARTED YET. These are just the pediatric numbers. Each infected student is someone who can pass COVID to someone else. A friend, a classmate, a teacher, a family member, a neighbor. I cannot envision the Lewisville ISD school board having the moral fortitude to enact a universal mask mandate in the next few days to slow the coming storm that is already straining health care resources.
BE SURE TO KEEP THAT IN MIND IN THE NEXT SCHOOL BOARD ELECTIONS. Who gambled with the lives of students and their families? Remember that.
6/ We have about 20% less health care staff to deal with this surge than with the Alpha surge a year ago. Physicians, nurses, and rest of the health care team remaining are burned out and exhausted.
7/ About 60% of Denton County is fully vaccinated. That leaves about 361,000 people just in our county who are vulnerable. If only 1% if them end up in the hospital from Omicron infection, that's 3600 people we don't have the hospital bed space and health care staff to treat.