State Health Officer Dr. Joe Kanter said when you look at COVID hospitalizations in the state it appears as if they peaked in mid-August but since a major hurricane has hit the state, he fears things could change.
“We’ve had about a 40% reduction since that time. I think the challenge here is given the disruption that the storm presented us, there’s no guarantee that we continue on this downward trajectory,” said Kanter.
On Friday 1,755 people were hospitalized with COVID-19, down more than 40% since the governor issued his latest statewide mask mandate, and the positivity rate has dropped from 14.1% to 11.3%, which is also encouraging.
Kanter said while he’s grateful for the downward trend in COVID hospitalizations he also understands it could be short-lived given the fact that many families were recently forced to shelter with others outside of their immediate household due to Ida.
“Whether that’s in a shelter environment, in an evacuation environment, or even if a family is staying with their neighbor who happens to have power or happens to have a generator,” said Kanter.
Kanter said the message he wants to send is while the numbers are encouraging, we must remain vigilant with COVID mitigation practices to continue to make progress.
“And that means to continue to mask, continue to distance, and ultimately if you’ve not yet chosen to get vaccinated to do that now. We want to continue the progress we’re on and certainly protect against the possibility of future increases,” said Kanter.
New statewide COVID numbers are released weekdays at noon.
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