Several of us at the newspaper office subscribe to a daily email from the Oklahoma State Department of Health (OSDH). Each morning we check to see how many new people have tested positive for COVID-19 in the area. Although OSDH updates their website daily, the emails arrive only on weekdays.
Friday morning, we were shocked to see the total number of positive cases in Alva had shot up from the twenties to the eighties. Then we started hearing there were a number of cases at Bill Johnson Correctional Center (BJCC) in Alva. Eventually, I found the Oklahoma Department of Corrections (ODOC) is posting COVID-19 reports on their website from each of their facilities in the state. BJCC was shown with 52 active inmate cases. It’s down to 51 on Tuesday.
Warden Becky Guffy sent us a press release later on Friday stating the ODOC has declared BJCC as a “hot spot” and is sending a Rapid Response team to the prison. (See the release on our website or in the Sunday, Sept. 20, Alva Review-Courier.) More rigorous protocols have been put in place to protect inmates and staff. Inmates who have tested positive are in quarantine.
William S. Key Correctional Center at Ft. Supply has 784 active cases according to the ODOC website Tuesday morning. That’s caused a big jump in Woodward County numbers. While prisons are “closed” populations with inmates confined within their walls, we should remember that the staff members who work there live in our communities.
Changing CDC Guidelines
On Friday, the CDC updated its website, saying it is possible for COVID-19 to spread through small air particles and that somebody who is more than six feet away could be exposed to it. It also emphasized the importance of ventilation. Hardly anyone noticed until CNN reported on it Sunday.
On Monday, the CDC took down the web post and said it was all a big mistake. The Friday post was a “draft version” and “CDC is currently updating its recommendations regarding airborne transmission of SARS-CoV-2.” The CDC said it had mistakenly published guidance that said the coronavirus might linger in the air, maybe for some time.
But the CDC said the publication was premature, not that it was wrong.
If the CDC reinstates the advisory, it could mean shifting to address ventilation systems, a very expensive solution. Mask wearing is a lot cheaper and easier.
Never Do This
It seems like every day brings more bad news, and it’s tempting to tune out all the negative things that keep happening. Monday, it was reported that rabid bats have been found in Lincoln County, Oklahoma. And, of course, flu season is coming.
An interesting section of the AARP Bulletin for September is devoted to lowering the risks associated with flu, the coronavirus and the common cold. I found this checklist especially interesting. It lists six things you should never do again:
• Don’t pass a sink without washing your hands. After just two hours of touching door handles, shopping carts and other public surfaces, your hands have “basically the greatest number of organisms you can hold,” says microbiologist Marc Verhougstraete. Aim to sanitize or wash your hands every hour when out in public.
• Don’t leave home without a pen in your pocket. Most flu viruses can live on nonporous surfaces for a day or two, meaning that the pen the waiter hands you with the check can pass cold and flu germs. Keep your own plastic ballpoint pen with you so you can avoid the communal pen at the bank and restaurant.
• Don’t wake up to an alarm clock. Researchers from the University of California, San Francisco, squirted rhinovirus up people’s noses and monitored their sleep for six days. Those who slept fewer than five hours on average were 4.5 times more likely to become infected than those who slept more than seven hours.
• Don’t drive when you could walk. Researchers comparing inactive people with those who walked briskly nearly every day found that people who rarely walked took twice as many sick days over a three-month period.
• Don’t smoke a cigarette. Just in case you need another reason to quit: Studies show COVID-19 patients with a history of smoking are 91 percent more likely than never-smokers to die or reach critical condition.
• Don’t eat buffet style. Filling your plate from open chafing dishes and using serving utensils that everyone else is touching and breathing over may increase your risk of picking up a virus. Try hard to avoid shared food.
COVID-19 Vaccination
Last Wednesday, Sept. 16, Dr. Robert Redfield, the head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), said even when we get a COVID-19 vaccine, it will not likely be available to the general public until next summer. The CDC has a vaccination program playbook calling for three phases of vaccinations. The first will be for health care personnel likely to be exposed to or treating people with COVID-19, people at increased risk for severe illness including those with underlying medical conditions and people 65 years of age and older, and other essential workers.
Phase two will finish vaccinating essential workers and start reaching the general public but supplies may still be tight. Phase three will reach out to those who have not yet been vaccinated.
Remember that the COVID-19 vaccine program will require the patient to get two shots spread out by about three or four weeks and will need to come from the same drug manufacturer as the first one or the vaccine won’t work.
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