‘Delta variant is bad, and it’s real’: Low vaccination rate fuels COVID rise in Wichita
In a development that Sedgwick County officials are calling “concerning,” COVID is back on the rise again, powered by the highly contagious Delta variant and a low vaccination rate locally.
“The Delta variant is the variant we’re seeing most frequently now,” said Tim Kaufman, assistant county manager and the county’s point man on the pandemic. “The people that are showing up in the hospitals now, they’re unvaccinated folks.”
The county’s positive test rate, a key measure of community viral spread, has crept once again above 5% — historically the threshold considered to be too high — although still much lower than the 20% rates the county saw during the peak of the pandemic in November.
The Sedgwick County Health Department’s most recent hospital report, issued June 21, showed a 63% increase in current COVID-19 hospitalizations since June 7.
In those two weeks, Wesley and Ascension Via Christi hospitals went from 27 combined COVID-19 patients to 44. The number of those patients in the ICU increased from 11 to 12.
Amid the increasing numbers, vaccine demand has dropped so much that the county has closed its drive-through and is cutting back hours at the walk-in vaccination station at the former Central Library downtown.
That’s not a good thing, Kaufman said. “If people want to avoid getting the Delta variant or anything else, the best tool they’ve got available to them is the vaccine and it’s free.”
Kaufman said the hospitals have not reported any Delta variant “breakthrough” cases, in which a vaccinated person has gotten sick enough to require hospitalization.
About 229,000 Sedgwick County residents have gotten at least a first dose of vaccine. About 184,000, or 43% of the vaccine-eligible population, have been fully vaccinated with either a second shot of the two-shot Pfizer and Moderna vaccines, or the single-shot vaccine made by Johnson & Johnson. Counting children under 12, who can’t get vaccinated, the overall vaccination rate is slightly less than 36%.
“That (vaccination rate) goes up very slowly anymore, but we will continue to offer vaccines and try to vaccinate everybody possible,” Kaufman said.
What is hurting vaccination rate
Dr. Steve Stites, the chief medical officer at the University of Kansas said he thinks anti-vaccine “paranoia” is hurting the vaccination rate.
“I understand fear and everybody has the right to make that choice on their own, I have a fundamental belief in that,” Stites said Thursday. “But at some point you have to ask yourself, are you really safer not getting vaccinated when over 2 billion doses of vaccine have been administered throughout the world and people have not died from the vaccine?”
Dr. Dana Hawkinson, an infectious disease specialist at The University of Kansas Health System said a surge in cases in the Springfield, Missouri, area is “a preventable tragedy” and that people have a “personal responsibility” to get vaccinated to protect themselves and their community.
The KU doctors strongly urged people to follow public health recommendations during the Fourth of July holiday weekend.
“Delta variant is bad, and it’s real, and it’s bad because it’s so much more easily transmissible,” than the original coronavirus that dominated last year, Stites said. “If you’re not vaccinated, you need to frickin’ have a mask on. And if you don’t have a mask on, you’re throwing the dice in the face of Delta variant.”
Sedgwick County has had 91 Delta variant cases so far, while there have been 283 cases statewide across 38 counties.
Starting July 5, the new hours for vaccination at Segwick County’s walk-in vaccine clinic, 223 S. Main, will be 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Wednesday-Friday and 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturdays.
The county also is operating mobile clinics. For those dates and times, check www.sedgwickcounty.org/covid-19/vaccine/schedule. Vaccination opportunities can also be found using the Vaccines.gov or kansasvaccine.gov websites.
Not the best month
Data from the White House COVID-19 task force and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show indicators of community spread were improving in Sedgwick County earlier in June, but had worsened by the end of the month.
As of June 1, the White House/CDC data showed a 4.7% seven-day positive test rate and 145 new cases in one week, or a rate of 28 per 100,000 people, in Sedgwick County.
About halfway through the month, the June 14 report showed improvement with a 4.5% positive test rate and 133 new cases, or a rate of 26 per 100,000 people.
But by the June 28 report, which is the most recent data set available, the seven-day positive test rate was 5.5% and the case rate was 33 per 100,000 people, with 170 new cases in the past week.
Statewide, the positive test rate has climbed while the case rate has dropped over the month. The seven-day positive test rate was 4.2% as of Monday, up from 3.0% on June 1. But the case rate was 23 per 100,000, down from 28 per 100,000.
The Kansas Department of Health and Environment’s Wednesday report showed cumulative of 318,106 cases, 11,105 hospitalizations and 5,156 deaths statewide attributed to COVID-19. In Sedgwick County, there have been 58,027 cases, 1,953 hospitalizations and 791 deaths.
Coronavirus clusters continue to be an issue. As of Wednesday, the KDHE reported 26 active outbreaks across the state. The locations include nine long-term care facilities, five group homes, four private business, two daycares, one camp, one government office, one health care facility, one private event, one public event and one sports cluster.
The active clusters have directly led to four deaths, with two from nursing homes and two from group living facilities.
The KDHE publicly identified six of the 26 locations. The two group living facilities on the list were the Sedgwick County Adult Residential Work Release in Wichita and Youngblood Youth Homes in Topeka. The two long-term care facilities on the list were Amani Home Plus in Wichita and Topeka Presbyterian Manor. The two businesses on the list were Genesis Health Clubs in Salina and Gracie Jiu-Jitsu Barrie in Overland Park.
Rising variants in U.S. and Kansas
Gov. Laura Kelly and Dr. Lee Norman, the KDHE secretary, have encouraged all Kansans to get vaccinated to protect against the rapidly-spreading Delta variant.
“The Delta variant is rapidly spreading in neighboring states, and the best way to protect yourself, your community, and finally get our state back to normal is by getting vaccinated,” Kelly said Monday in a statement. “Kansas is moving in the right direction, but we can’t let our guard down now. Visit www.kansasvaccine.gov today to find a vaccination site near you.”
The CDC has reported that the Delta variant is 60% more transmissible than the Alpha variant, which was previously the dominant strain. The governor’s office reported that “the new variant appears to be spreading most quickly in communities that have the lowest vaccination rates.”
“The rapid increase of the Delta variant throughout the U.S. and in Kansas is of great concern to us,” Norman said in the news release. “Vaccination continues to be the best defense in combating variants.”
The KDHE reported 1,756 total variant cases had been identified as of Wednesday.
Sedgwick County has the most confirmed variant cases with 757, but has also had more specimens sequenced than any other county in the state. While Sedgwick County specimens account for about 29% of all those tested from Kansas, the county has had about 43% of the state’s variant cases.
The Alpha variant, which was first identified in the United Kingdom, had been the most concerning strain for public health officials in the state this spring. The Gamma variant, which was first identified in Brazil, had long been the second-worst strain.
The Delta variant, which was first identified in India, has become more dominant. The most recent KDHE data shows that the Delta variant accounted for about 75% of all specimens collected during the week of June 20.
State, county fall short of Biden’s vaccine goal
Both Kansas and Sedgwick County will fall short of President Joe Biden’s goal of having 70% of adults vaccinated with at least one shot by July 4. Public health experts have estimated 70-85% of the entire population will need to be fully vaccinated to reach herd immunity.
Federal reports show that as of Monday in Sedgwick County, 55% of adults have gotten least one shot. Statewide, the figure is 62%.
Across Kansas, there have been 1.4 million initial doses administered and 1.2 million people have been fully vaccinated. For the state entire population, the first-dose vaccination rate is 49% while the fully vaccinated rate is 42%.
Vaccination clinics continue to see a drop-off in patients.
The number of people initiating vaccination in Kansas for the last week of data was the second-worst since at least late January. The 14,335 Kansans who got a first dose in the seven-day period that ended Monday was better than the week of Memorial Day, but otherwise continued the downward trend.
This story was originally published July 1, 2021 at 2:58 PM.
