Highest Coronavirus Transmission Rate in Oregon? Marion County

Marion County Highest documented infection rate Although the state has obtained COVID-19, authorities have stated that there is no type of detail needed to identify why the area is a hotspot.

Health officials have stated that they cannot point to important events or single agencies that look like factories at COVID-19.

Experts say Testing throughout Oregon remains limited, It is difficult to know exactly how widespread the virus is, or whether the actual number of cases in the county has fluctuated as suggested by the data.

Melissa Handel, director of translational data science at Oregon State University, states that US testing standards are “changing rapidly and not changing in a consistent way.”

As of Friday morning, Marion County reported that 178 people tested positive for COVID-19 and 49 needed hospitalization. In other words, 53 out of 100,000 residents are tested positive for the virus. Oregon has the next highest rate in Washington County, with 39 cases per 100,000.

Inspection rates vary greatly from county to county, and Marion County has a high percentage of residents inspected. But it does not fully explain the difference.

Maudnomah County is reported to have a lower number of people affected by COVID-19, has more residents, and tests at a higher rate than Marion County. Other large counties in high Oregon Test rates including Jackson And Rin.

Dr. Dawn Mortner, senior health advisor to the Oregon Health Authority, said: “It’s really difficult to build a trend from the number of people we have.”

Handel is studying COVID-19 data worldwide and is one of a team of scientists and health professionals who operate Flatten the Curve, a website that provides scientifically validated information on the spread of viruses. Department. She is also coordinating a national effort to share data on COVID-19 patients.

She said health officials could better understand and stop the spread of the disease where and where they could track contact with infected people. The virus is not spread evenly among people. Often, in many other cases, it is associated with a “super spreader event” where many people gather.

For example, a person who tested their active participation in Church service despite being contagious could not only identify close relationships like household members, but also identify everyone else in their service Tested.

This is far from what most of the United States does, including Oregon. According to the Oregon Health Department’s state health agency guidelines, “resources should focus on identifying household contacts in COVID-19 cases” living or working in long-term care facilities High-priority individuals like those who are essential, essential workers, and people at higher risk of serious illness.

Testing may not be performed, even if someone is in close contact with the identified case, unless the current guidelines show symptoms.

In contrast to this, Handel, unlike the successful approach taken in Singapore, sought to identify and quickly test those in close contact with identified patients.

Dr. Christopher Sirino, a health officer in Marion County, said he could not explain more cases here or identify specific reasons or events.

He said the county identified several disease clusters, often with multiple people in the affected households. But there are no other factors or places that stand out.

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He said it was difficult to track the spread of respiratory disease. Due to the outbreak of foodborne illness, it is relatively easy to track down a single restaurant or bring-in, but few people can tell where a cold has been caught.

“It is very difficult to identify the source of the information. Who was the one who transmitted the group?” Sirino said.

Local health authorities and health authorities do not disclose information about where people with COVID-19 work or where they may have come into contact with the public; instead, individual employers Has decided whether to share.

In some Salem cases where people with COVID-19 worked in government agencies, the information was publicly shared only after the employees involved contacted Salem Reporters or other local media.

According to county spokeswoman Jenna Wyatt, Marion County has eight staff members examining local patients, contacting contacts, and three more trained. Because of the ongoing outbreak, we prioritize identifying and checking in close contacts instead of more detailed analysis that could reveal larger patterns.

Wyatt did not disclose the number of clusters identified by county officials, or the general type of location, such as work or church, for patient privacy. When asked for the number of local cases that had contacted another confirmed case, she said that the county did not have sufficient staff to analyze the data it is currently collecting.

According to Cirino, many reported cases have occurred in people who are more likely to have been infected before the widespread social isolation order came into effect. The optimistic growth in the number of infected people in Marion County will begin to level off and will fall as soon as people stay at home.

-Salem Reporter, Rachel Alexander