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As flu season approaches, Public Health urges COVID precautions
The Hanford Sentinel - 9/22/2021
Sep. 22—New COVID cases may be leveling off somewhat, but health officials are worried that further strain may be inbound with flu season around the corner.
According to Darcy Pickens, assistant director for the Kings County Department of Public Health, there 503 new cases reported, a slight drop from the previous two weeks. However, that comes with news of six new deaths, according to the Kings County COVID website.
At the most recent Kings County Board of Supervisors meeting on Tuesday, Pickens said that 7.1% of staffed ICU beds were available at Adventist Health as of Sunday. As of Monday, Adventist had 64 patients in med-surg and 12 in the ICU. Of those, 44 were Kings County residents. Since July 1, unvaccinated persons have accounted for 90% of admissions. Just 10% of those hospitalized have been vaccinated.
Meanwhile, pediatric cases seem to be slowing.
"In this past week, cases among the 0-11 age group have continued to increase slightly, though right now, it looks like we may not be seeing the more dramatic increase that we saw in recent weeks," Pickens said. "That remains to be seen, but that appears to be the trend at this point."
However, during the meeting, Pickens also cautioned about the encroaching flu season, which tends to add more patients to the hospitals during the winter months. This could be a potential problem for hospital staff. Pickens cautioned the use of the same sanitation and social distancing measures used to prevent the spread of COVID-19 in order to combat cases of the flu.
"In addition to COVID-19 vaccines, we will see flu shots becoming more widely available over the next few weeks and encourage everyone to get a flu shot as soon as you are able to this year," she said.
Pickens added that testing remains high, though numbers are leveling off somewhat with 2,700 cases conducted last week.
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