We all have heard of the increasing number of new novel coronavirus infections, both within the United States and within some locales within the state of Texas. So, how has this affected Collin County, Texas?
Hospitalizations are a very good indicator of the status of this pandemic, as are the number of fatalities. We will look at Collin County hospitalizations first. Unfortunately, the number of patients with COVID-19 infection within the county hospitals is the highest it has ever been, as of December 7, 2020, at 355 patients. We can compare this to the last peak in county hospitalizations, which occurred on July 21, 2020, at 223 patients. With this, 13% of all hospital beds in the county currently are in use by COVID-19 patients. This current spike may point to spread that occurred around the Thanksgiving weekend.
As mentioned, the second reliable indicator of the status of the pandemic is that of the number of daily fatalities. Thankfully, Collin County has had a relatively low experience with fatalities. However, there have been some “spikes.” These spikes in the daily number of COVID-19 attributed fatalities occurred on September 19, 2020, at 5, October 26, 2020, at 5, October 27, 2020, at 5, November 17, 2020, at 6, and on November 18, 2020, at 8 daily fatalities from COVID-19 infection. Also thankfully, from November 30 through December 6, 2020, there have been no reported fatalities from COVID-19 infection in Collin County.
Outside of hospitalizations and fatalities, the number of daily active COVID-19 infections are also tracked. Within Collin County, there have been spikes in the number of daily active infections. These spikes occurred on April 16, 2020, at 338, on June 10, 2020, at 432, on June 25, 2020, at 1026, on August 24, 2020, at 4638, and on December 6, 2020, at 3675. The most current reported number of daily active infections is from December 7, 2020, at 3609. Clearly, the peak in the number of daily active COVID-19 infections in Collin County occurred on August 24, 2020.
The state positivity rate from testing is currently at about 14%, as of December 7, 2020. This value had been at over 20% in early July and early August of this year. The CDC has been very clear that this number needs to be below 10%, thus indicating a better management of mitigation protocols for a state.
Clearly, more work needs to be done. We should not look to our local, state, and national leaders to solve this problem. The problem is us. We are the ones who choose to wash our hands many times daily for over twenty seconds each time, we are the ones who choose to use hand sanitizers often, we are the ones who choose to wear a mask when social distancing is more difficult over time, we are the ones who decide if we will stay home if we are sick, we are the ones who decide if we will be tested if we suspect we may have the virus, we are the ones who decide if we will self-quarantine if we have been exposed to others with the virus. . . You get where I am going with this.
Yes, this is a pain in the neck. This is tiring. We all want things to be normal. We just cannot start “being normal.” This is for sure a public health problem. We all play a role in “fixing this.” Again, we are not to blame our local, state, and national leaders. We all have known what to do for months. We have got to do this! We just have to. We together can turn this around; I have no doubt we can do this. But, it takes all of us working on it.
We appreciate your interest in this post, written by the sole dentist of this family-owned, patient-centered, value-conscious, highly-awarded, and quality-oriented general dental practice. We invite you to peruse our website.
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