White House: Kansas needs COVID ‘behavioral change and aggressive mitigation policies’

Kansans need to change their behavior and public health officials must implement tougher restrictions to address the coronavirus pandemic, the White House task force recommends.

“Mitigation efforts must increase, including the implementation of key state and local policies with an additional focus on uniform behavioral change including masking, physical distancing, hand hygiene, no indoor gatherings outside of immediate households, and aggressive testing to find the asymptomatic individuals responsible for the majority of infectious spread,” the national task force said in this week’s report to Kansas.

The report from President Donald Trump’s administration, obtained by The Center for Public Integrity, is dated Dec. 6. The White House coronavirus task force lays out the COVID-19 situation in Kansas and recommendations.

Kansas is in the red zone of the report. It has the 12th-highest new case rate in the country, as well as the fifth-highest positive test rate, 19th-highest hospital admission rate and the fifth-highest rate of new deaths.

The COVID-19 vaccines will do little to address the current situation.

“The current vaccine implementation will not substantially reduce viral spread, hospitalizations, or fatalities until the 100 million Americans with comorbidities can be fully immunized, which will take until the late spring,” the report said. “Behavioral change and aggressive mitigation policies are the only widespread prevention tools that we have to address this winter surge.”

The White House task force said there are “encouraging signs” that new cases and hospitalizations have “plateaued.” But that “should be viewed very cautiously” because fewer people were tested. Additionally, nursing home statistics are high.

More than half of nursing homes had at least one staff member test positive in the most recent week of reporting, which was Nov. 23-29. One-third of adult care facilities had a resident test positive and about one-in-five facilities had a resident die during the week of Thanksgiving.

“There are still very high virus levels across the state; activities that were safe in the summer are not safe now,” the task force said, without specifying which activities are no longer safe. “Keep mitigation efforts high.”

Sedgwick County’s health order is less restrictive than what the White House recommends for restaurant and bar capacity. It limits their capacity to 50%. The federal recommendation is 25%.

The task force also recommends closing bars or limiting bar hours. Sedgwick County’s health order has an 11 p.m. curfew for bars and restaurants.

The White House said both measures are effective at reducing transmissions in public spaces.

Several Wichita bars are suing local officials, challenging the curfew, the mass gathering limit and the mask mandate. They allege the health order violates their constitutional rights.

“Ensure compliance with public health orders, including wearing masks,” the task force said.

The county health order, local school districts and the Kansas State High School Activities Association all allow sports to continue with in-person spectators. Several of the school districts, including Wichita and Maize, have sent students home for online-only learning, even though they are allowing in-person athletics with fans in the stands.

Those decisions appear to be the opposite of what the White House recommends: that officials should consider pausing winter sports and other extracurricular school activities.

Teachers and students must wear masks, the task force said. The Sedgwick County Commission rejected an executive order from Gov. Laura Kelly that mandated masks in schools, though local districts may implement their own requirements.

The White House task force report also notes that schooling has been preserved in many European countries, where strong mitigation measures were followed by “clear improvement.” Most of the United States is not using similar measures.

“Despite the severity of this surge and the threat to the hospital systems, many state and local governments are not implementing the same mitigation policies that stemmed the tide of the summer surge; that must happen now,” the task force said.

Kansas needs an “aggressive” increase in testing after “significant reductions in testing” in the past week, the task force said. Most people who are tested are already symptomatic. People who don’t have symptoms are “responsible for the majority of infectious spread.”

“Must increase testing levels to find asymptomatic individuals to remove source of spread.”

The task force said that in areas where cases are on the rise, there should be active testing in K-12 schools for teachers and students. Wichita’s school board approved a testing agreement with Wichita State University last week.

Colleges that still have in-person students must test them before they go home for Christmas, the task force said. There should also be mandatory testing of students every week after the holiday break.

“Universities must have weekly testing plans in place for spring semester, mandatorily testing all students weekly to prevent spread in the community,” the report said. “Universities who tested all students weekly starting the first week of fall semester saw between 75% and 90% fewer cases than those who did not. For the remaining time in current semester, students must be tested weekly prior to returning home for winter break.”

This story was originally published December 10, 2020 at 3:44 PM.