Our local COVID-19 updates represent the coordinated effort of the agencies that make up the DCCRT
JOINT INFORMATION CENTER PRESS RELEASE - FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE – February 21, 2021
DOUGLAS COUNTY COVID-19 RESPONSE TEAM - DAILY UPDATE
(Douglas County, Ore.) Douglas County COVID-19 Test Results: As of 12:00 pm Today, Sunday, February 21, 2021, there are THIRTEEN (13) people with new positive test results and ONE (1) new presumptive to report since our noon case update yesterday. The total number of cases FIFTEEN (15) Douglas County COVID-19 patients that are being hospitalized, twelve locally and three out-of-the-area. Our Douglas County COVID-19 Response Team, under the direction of the Douglas County Board of Commissioners, continue to devote all resources available to our local COVID response.
Local Contacts and Cases Being Supported in Isolation and Quarantine
Currently, DPHN is supporting 282 cases in isolation, as well as another 599 contacts in quarantine in Douglas County. Isolation is recommended for confirmed and presumptive cases, quarantine is recommended for contacts of confirmed or presumptive cases. Currently, staff is supporting an astounding 881 total contacts and cases in isolation or quarantine. This number represents a snapshot of the significant amount of work being done locally to help control the spread of COVID.
|
Date |
Wednesday, February 17, 2021 |
Thursday, February 18, 2021 |
Friday, February 19, 2021 |
Saturday, February 20, 2021 |
Today, Sunday, February 21, 2021 |
|
Total COVID-19 Cases |
2,254 |
2,282 |
2,302 |
2,321 |
2,335 |
|
People w/ Positive PCR or Antigen Test Results |
2,133 |
2,162 |
2,181 |
2,199 |
2,212 |
|
Presumptive |
121 |
120 |
121 |
122 |
123 |
|
Total Currently Hospitalized |
15 |
14 |
15 |
16 |
15 |
|
Total Currently in Isolation |
264 |
273 |
266 |
269 |
282 |
|
Total COVID-19 Related Deaths |
51 |
51 |
51 |
51 |
51 |
*Our daily update includes the total number of cases in Douglas County, which combines people with positive test results and presumptives, as well as a breakout of those case numbers. There will be times when a presumptive will move to a positive test result, and our total case number will not change because the case has already been counted. On Thursday, February 11, 2021, we removed the vaccination distribution row from our daily COVID chart, and instead we will be providing a vaccine tally once a week on Fridays, of the vaccines received by our local public health, and then deployed to local vaccinators. Please note that our cumulative vaccine numbers do NOT include other vaccination sites like the Roseburg VA, Mercy Medical Center, EMS, Cow Creek Tribe, Pharmacies and local care facilities that have received their vaccines directly from the Federal and State Government.
COVID-19 Vaccine Eligibility**
According to the State of Oregon/OHA’s vaccination eligibility plan, as of today, Sunday, February 21, 2021, residents in the following categories are eligible to make an appointment for the COVID-19 Vaccine:
- Phase 1-A, Groups 1-4: All health care facilities, providers and workers; first responders; EMS, skilled, long term and memory care facilities; correctional facility workers; tribal health programs; VA workers and qualifying Veterans; caregivers of medically fragile individuals who live at home; age-eligible individuals with a medical condition or disability who receive services in their homes.
- Phase 1-B, Group 1: Child care providers, early learning and K-12 educators and staff.
- Phase 1-B, Group 2: Residents 80-years-of-age or older
- Phase 1-B, Group 3: Residents 75-years-of-age or older
NEXT ELIGIBLE GROUP PHASE 1-B, GROUP 4: SENIORS 70 AND OLDER**
According to the State, starting tomorrow, February 22, 2021, the next eligible group of seniors, residents who are ages 70-years-old and older (Phase 1-B, Group 4), can begin to call to schedule an appointment with their local health care provider, local pharmacy or local health care facility, who are signed up as vaccinators in Douglas County. As a reminder, please be patient and gracious with our vaccinators, as they are doing the best they can to schedule appointments based on the supply of COVID-19 vaccine that they have on hand.
ELIGIBLE PHASE 1-A, GROUPS 1-4
Are you in a Phase 1-A eligibility group, but have not got the vaccine yet? For those residents who are included in Phase 1-A, but have not received the COVID vaccine, please send an e-mail to vaccines@DouglasPublicHealthNetwork.org and DPHN will connect you with a local vaccine provider. Please only send a request to get a vaccine to this email if you are Phase 1-A eligible.
ELIGIBLE PHASE 1-B, GROUP 1
For those residents in Phase 1-B, Group 1: educators, childcare and early education workers, who were eligible as of January 25, 2021, you should have already received two emails about your eligibility from DPHN or Douglas ESD. If you are in that group and still want a vaccine, please send an email to educatorvaccines@DouglasPublicHealthNetwork.org. If you did not receive an e-mail, please contact your employer.
ELIGIBLE PHASE 1-B, GROUP 2 & 3: SENIORS 75 AND OLDER
Are you 75-years-of-age or older? You are eligible for the COVID vaccine. As of Monday, February 15, 2021, residents 75-years-of-age and older became eligible to schedule an appointment to receive the COVID vaccine. Eligible seniors are asked to call and set up an appointment with their health care provider, local pharmacy or local health care facility on our current local vaccinators list. On Friday, February 5, 2021, we published the Douglas County Senior Population COVID Vaccination Plan**, complete with a list of local health care agencies that have signed up vaccinate residents. Click here to review and find out more information about Douglas County's Senior Population Plan. Our plan for Senior COVID Vaccinations in Douglas County is to have eligible seniors get their COVID vaccine where they get their regular health care or flu vaccine. As a reminder, because the COVID vaccines have very specific handling constraints, all providers offering to vaccinate eligible residents will be administering vaccines with a scheduled appointment only. Doctor’s offices, medical facilities, Urgent Care Clinics and Pharmacy’s will not and cannot do walk-in appointments.
**Please note that there are many more seniors who need and want vaccine than there are available doses. Vaccine supply is beyond our control, but we continue to submit requests and strive to get as much vaccine sent to Douglas County as possible. Over a period of 5 weeks, about 30,000 Douglas County seniors will become eligible for the vaccine, but we expect to only receive a small fraction of the doses needed to vaccinate them. Even though a medical facility or office is listed as a vaccinator, does not guarantee they will have vaccine; they are organizations that have signed up to help vaccinate. We ask for your patience as we work with the State and OHA to acquire more vaccines.
TRIBAL HEALTH PROGRAMS
Are you a member of the Cow Creek Band of the Umpqua Tribe of Indians? If you are a member of the Cow Creek Band of the Umpqua Tribe of Indians, please contact them for information on their COVID-19 testing and vaccination programs at (541) 672-9405 or log onto: https://www.cowcreek-nsn.gov/public-health/.
VA WORKERS AND U.S. MILITARY VETERANS
If you are a U.S. Military Veteran, you might be eligible to get vaccinated at the Roseburg VAMC. The Roseburg VA Health Care System is setting up appointments for specific groups of veteran patients to receive the COVID-19 vaccine. To qualify for the current round of COVID-19 vaccinations at the Roseburg VAMC, veterans must be 75 or older, or be homeless, or be a frontline essential worker, hemodialysis or organ transplant patient, or a chemotherapy patient receiving care at a clinic or hospital. Also, note that according to the vaccine criteria established by the Federal Government and the CDC, at this time, spouses of veterans are not included on the list of eligible persons to get a COVID vaccine from the Roseburg VAMC. However, there is one exception that we have found, a Veteran’s Care provider, who is being paid by the VA under the new Family Caregiver Assistance program might be eligible. Anyone interested in applying for that program or to find out about vaccine eligibility needs to contact Roseburg VAMC directly. The Douglas County Veterans Service Office at the county does not have the authority or ability to get vaccines for veterans or their spouses. For more information, call the Roseburg VAMC at (541) 440-1000 or log onto: https://www.va.gov/health-care/covid-19-vaccine/.
UPDATE: COVID-19 Vaccine Availability and Allocation Information
Your Local Public Health Administrators (LPHA), DPHN, the DCCRT, Aviva Health, Douglas ESD and our local health care partners have been working hard to acquire more vaccines and vaccinate those that want the vaccine, that are eligible.
Douglas County Local Public Health has received a total of 6,500 COVID-19 first dose vaccines from the State of Oregon to date, and has deployed all of those to local approved vaccinators throughout the county. Unfortunately, this number is the same as last week, as Oregon’s allotment of COVID-19 vaccines did not arrive the week of February 14 from the Federal Government, because of a distribution delay caused by the severe winter storms that wreaked havoc across the nation over Presidents’ Weekend. We are hopeful that we will receive both our allotment from the State for this last week, as well as our vaccine allotment for this week either Monday or Tuesday this week.
It is also important to understand that in addition to the first dose vaccines that we receive from the State of Oregon, we also receive our allotment of second doses of the vaccine, which are paired with the first dose for each resident, and are not counted in our cumulative total of vaccines that we have received, because they are the match doses for the first dose. Please note that our local cumulative vaccine numbers do NOT include other vaccination sites like the Roseburg VA, Mercy Medical Center, EMS, Cow Creek Tribe, Pharmacies and local care facilities that have received their vaccines directly from the Federal and State Government or their partners.
LIMITED VACCINE AVAILABILITY
As we mentioned before, there is an unfortunate delay with our COVID-19 Vaccine distribution this last week due to the severe winter weather across the nation. There continues to be a limited supply of vaccines being sent to Oregon from the Federal government, and we are hopeful that more vaccines will be sent to Douglas County soon. Our biggest struggle remains the fact that even though we continue to request more vaccines, Douglas County has received a disproportionate supply of vaccines compared with the rest of the State. We continue to send requests to the State to rectify this issue, so we can vaccinate the ever growing list of eligible residents in our county.
Local Vaccine Scheduling
Your Douglas County Public Health Administrator continues to follow the U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Oregon Health Authority’s (OHA) eligibility guidelines, and are ONLY scheduling appointments for residents that are listed on OHA’s list of currently eligible groups at this time. As a reminder, Douglas County, DPHN or your Doctor’s Office did not set the guidelines for who is eligible to get the vaccine. For more information, on how the U.S. Center for Disease Control (CDC) and Oregon Health Authority (OHA) set up their COVID vaccine guidelines, please contact them directly. As a reminder, eligibility dates and vaccine availability are always subject to change, and eligibility does not mean availability. Please, if you are not in an eligible vaccine group right now, we ask that you continue to be patient, and wait to call, email or try to set up an appointment until after your age or eligibility group becomes eligible.
What if I am not on the OHA eligible list right now?
As we have mentioned several times before, if you are not a part of one of OHA’s listed eligible vaccine groups, then you are not eligible to get or sign up for the vaccine yet. We ask that you please be patient and wait until you are eligible to contact your doctor, health care provider, DPHN, Douglas County, local hospitals and our hotline. Again, just because you will be in an upcoming eligibility group does not mean we have vaccines available for you, or that we know when we might receive vaccines for your group.
How Do I Get My Second Dose of the COVID Vaccine?
For those residents who have already received their first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine, here are a few answers to questions about your second and final dose.
- At the present moment, we are told that those who get vaccinated can expect a second dose about 4-6 weeks after the first dose. Currently, the State/OHA and the Federal Government are considerably behind on sending the second dose of the vaccine out.
- You should have received a vaccination card when you received your first dose that details the brand of vaccine, its lot number, and the date the vaccine was given. This card is for your records only, and is not official proof that you have received the vaccine. Proof of your vaccination rests with the State Alert System, which is accessible by medical facilities.
- You should get your second dose from the same provider or organization from which you received your first. However, the physical address where you receive the second dose may change.
- You will be notified by the provider or organization that gave you your first dose about where and when you’ll receive your second dose.
- I got a first vaccine out of the area, can I get my second vaccine in Douglas County? The second vaccine dose is “paired” to the first dose, and your second dose will be sent to wherever you got your first dose. So, except in rare circumstances, you will need to return to where you got your first dose.
- If you have questions, please contact the provider or organization where you received your first dose.
DPHN: Updated Quarantine Flyer for Schools
DPHN has updated their helpful COVID quarantine flyer to provide specific information for school cohorts about what to do if your child, a staff member or educator has been exposed to a positive COVID case while at school or during after school activities.
If you have additional questions about COVID-19, quarantining or vaccinations, residents can call our local COVID hotline at (541) 464-6550. You can also tune in to watch Dr. Bob Dannenhoffer, our Douglas County Public Health Officer during his Facebook Live shows on the DPHN Facebook page every Tuesday and Friday nights. The show is hosted by DPHN on the DPHN Facebook page. Or you can check out DPHN’s Top Three COVID Vaccine Questions of the Day on their website that answer questions to the latest questions we have received. Click here to link to the DPHN website.
Please Keep You and Your Family Safe
We are not able to predict when we will receive more vaccines, or when State guidelines might change or when we can start to resume some sort of normality in our lives, but, we can continue encourage everyone, for the sake of our local businesses, services and residents, to gauge your risk level, and make the best choice in order protect yourself and those around you from contracting or spreading the coronavirus. We have provided education on the widely proven COVID-19 safety measures, and encourage you to limit your contact with others not from your household, stay home if you are sick, and wear face coverings where recommended. Click here, for a graphic on how to protect you and your family from the spread of COVID-19. We know how important family, businesses and faith are to you, so we ask that you consider all options available in order to eliminate and minimize the spread of the COVID-19 virus in our communities to help protect the ones you love, the businesses you love and the places you love to go.
Local COVID-19 Testing and Facebook Live
Douglas County COVID-19 Drive-Thru Testing Clinics
Due to widely available COVID-19 testing opportunities in Douglas County, your local public health authority and DPHN have decided to step-back our drive-through testing clinics to one day a week for the time being. If needs increase, we are prepared to increase testing to 2-3 times a week again. As we have reported before, we were one of the first counties in the state to do a drive-through COVID-19 testing clinic, and we have done 2-3 clinics a week since March 2020 in Roseburg, as well as drive-through testing clinics in Reedsport. DPHN has also been part of increasing the availability and types of testing at multiple sites and locations across the county, also leading the state in rapid testing availability. The next drive-through testing clinic will be Friday, February 26, 2021, in Roseburg. As a reminder, if you are having symptoms of COVID-19 including cough, fever, shortness of breath, muscle aches and pains, diarrhea, sore throat or decreased sense of smell and taste, talk to your health care provider about being tested for COVID-19. Patients without a Primary Care Provider that are looking for a COVID-19 test can contact the Sutherlin Aviva Health Clinic at (541) 459-3788.
Facebook Live with Dr. Bob
Join us Tuesday, February 23, 2021 at 6:00 pm for the next Facebook Live with Dr. Bob Dannenhoffer, the Douglas County Public Health Officer. The show is hosted by DPHN on the DPHN Facebook page. Please submit your questions during the live show or you can email questions to: Facebookquestions@douglaspublichealthnetwork.org. Dr. Bob and the DPHN team will do their best to respond to as many questions as they can during the live shows.
State and Federal COVID-19 Info
Again, it is important to note that we are not the ones setting the guidelines for vaccine eligibility or availability. We are following the current priority group guidelines and criteria set by the U.S. Center for Disease Control (CDC) and Oregon Health Authority (OHA). Go online or contact the CDC or OHA directly for more information. OHA posts it’s COVID updates and reports at www.healthoregon.org/coronavirus.
Please do not call 911, Douglas County Sheriff’s Office or Douglas County Offices to report compliance issues with the State of Oregon, OHA or Governor’s orders. The Governor has directed the State offices for Oregon Occupational Safety and Health (OSHA) and the Oregon Liquor Control Commission (OLCC) to be the enforcement agencies responsible for ensuring restaurants, bars, and other businesses comply with the current State COVID guidelines. If you have concerns, questions or wish to report compliance issues contact these state agencies directly: OSHA: (800) 922-2689 or OSHA website or OLCC (503) 872-5000 or OLCC website
Local COVID-19 Resources
Your Douglas County Board of Commissioners, Douglas County Public Health Officer, Dr. Robert Dannenhoffer, DPHN and the DCCRT have been working hard to cooperatively provide accurate and timely information to Douglas County residents since March 8, 2020.
Local Online Access to Updates: Stay up to date with accurate and local COVID-19 information in Douglas County on the Douglas County Government website or DCGOV Facebook page or the DPHN website or DPHN Facebook page.
Free Local e-Newsletter Subscription: You can also sign up for the Douglas County e-Newsletter that publishes and sends out the daily update to our subscription base for free. You can sign up for the Douglas County e-Newsletter at www.co.douglas.or.us. Your Douglas County Board of Commissioners, Douglas County Public Health Officer, Dr. Robert Dannenhoffer, DPHN and the DCCRT have been working hard to cooperatively provide accurate and timely information to Douglas County residents since March 8, 2020.
Douglas County COVID-19 Hotline (541) 464-6550: Your Douglas County Board of Commissioners and DPHN continue to offer a local resource hotline for Douglas County residents for COVID-19. The hotline provides answer to frequently asked questions, basic information and referrals to resources and services. The Hotline is staffed from 8:00 am to 5: pm, 7 days a week.
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Contact Tamara Howell, Public Information Officer, Douglas County COVID-19 Response Team, (541) 670-2804 cell (541) 957-4896 tjhowell@co.douglas.or.us
Contact Vanessa Becker, Public Information Officer, Douglas Public Health Network, (541) 817-6552 cell (541) 440-3571 vanessa@douglaspublichealthnetwork.org