By Randy Arrington
LURAY, Feb. 1 — After seeing a rise in cases for nearly three months, a surge in cases over the past six weeks, and a half dozen deaths in the past 19 days — nearly all of the COVID-19 data for Page County is now trending downward.
Page County reported only five new cases of COVID-19 on Monday and eight on Sunday, a dramatic drop from 41 cases reported Saturday and 34 on Thursday. Despite the 13 cases reported over the past two days, the county has still seen 103 new cases of the virus over the past five days.
It remains unclear if the current decline in coronavirus cases represents a new trend, or a hiccup in the flow of data.
The Virginia Department of Health noted on its website on Friday that, “Surveillance system upgrades occurring on Saturday, January 30, 2021, will affect the data on the COVID-19 Cases & Testing Dashboards on January 31 and February 1, 2021. A decrease in the number of cases and tests reported on January 31, and an increase in the number of cases and tests reported on February 1 is anticipated because of these upgrades.”
However, despite the unpredictable nature of the daily case count, Page County’s seven-day positivity rate has steadily declined since hitting nearly 21 percent on Jan. 21. After sitting within two points of 20-percent positivity for more than a month (since Dec. 19), the county’s rate has dropped six points in the past 10 days.
Page County’s seven-day positivity rate currently stands at 15 percent, according to Daily Locality Metrics data provided on the VDH website. The rate did drop as low as 13.5 percent on Thursday — the lowest rate in the county since Dec. 13.
After leading the region for a month or more, Page’s positivity rate now stands as the second-highest in the Lord Fairfax Health District. Below is a comparison of the seven-day positivity rates among the six jurisdictions within the health district as of Monday:
• 16.1% — City of Winchester;
• 15% — Page County;
• 13.8% — Clarke County;
• 11% — Frederick County;
• 9.2% — Shenandoah County;
• 8.5% — Warren County.
All positivity rates across the health district have declined over the past five days, with the exception of Frederick County (+0.8%) and Shenandoah County (+0.5%).
Page County has reported three new hospitalizations and no pandemic-related deaths over the past five days.
According to ZIP code data provided by VDH, the new cases of COVID-19 reported over the past five days in Page County surfaced in the following areas (ZIP code data totals do not always match the county’s daily reports – see details on the VDH ZIP code page link above):
• 52 cases — Luray area (22835);
• 26 cases — Stanley area (22851);
• 20 cases — Shenandoah area (22849);
• 4 cases — Rilleyville area (22650).
As of Monday morning, the state health department’s vaccine dashboard showed that 3,164 people in Page County have received the first dose of either the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine — about 13 percent of the county’s overall population. The report also shows 246 people in the county have been fully vaccinated to include the “booster” or second dose.
Below is a breakdown of vaccine doses administered and those who have been fully vaccinated (two doses) across the Lord Fairfax Health District as of Monday’s report:
• 7,923 doses administered, 1,259 fully vaccinated — City of Winchester;
• 6,647 doses administered, 1,021 fully vaccinated — Frederick County;
• 6,221 doses administered, 692 fully vaccinated — Shenandoah County;
• 4,071 doses administered, 416 fully vaccinated — Warren County;
• 3,164 doses administered, 246 fully vaccinated — Page County;
• 2,128 doses administered, 218 fully vaccinated — Clarke County.
The Lord Fairfax Health District has reported a total of 833 new cases of COVID-19 in the past five days, along with 14 hospitalizations and eight deaths related to the virus. Monday’s 69 reported cases of COVID-19 marked only the second time since Dec. 31 that the district’s daily case count fell below 100.
Among the eight fatalities, three were reported in both Frederick and Shenandoah counties, while Clarke and Warren counties has one each.
Statewide, 2,861 new cases of COVID-19 were reported on Monday and 2,558 on Sunday — the lowest two-day total in more than a month.
Virginia’s seven-day positivity rate has been declining for 22 days and now sits at 11.7 percent.
Statewide hospitalizations for COVID-19 are at 2,446, according to the Virginia Hospital and Healthcare Association — that’s down 422 from five days ago and represents a fifth-straight day of declines.
Among those patients, 478 are being treated in intensive care units — down 59 over five days. Among those, 304 are currently on ventilators — down 28.
As of Monday morning, 688,561 people in Virginia had been vaccinated with at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine — about 8.4 percent of the state’s overall population. A total of 117,134 people in Virginia have been fully vaccinated.
Currently, an average of 31,563 doses of the vaccine are being administered each day in Virginia — a 21.3-percent increase over the last five days.
The state health department has reported 25 deaths related to the pandemic in the past two days — considerably lower than the 141 reported on Friday and Saturday. In fact, between Tuesday and Saturday, a total of 368 deaths related to the pandemic were reported statewide.
A total of 6,474 people have died from COVID-19 in Virginia since March 14 — 1,654 since Christmas, or 25.5 percent of all pandemic deaths in the state.
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