Here & Now

Noon Wednesday: The Pandemic's Fifth Wave

Murv Seymour:

Welcome to “Noon Wednesday”, I’m Murv Seymour. The push is on across the state to get more people in Wisconsin vaccinated as some parts see spikes in COVID cases. Will Cushman has been reporting with COVID statewide and joins us to talk about some of the good and the bad news and the efforts to get COVID under control. Will, thank you for joining us for this update. Let’s start here. Give us a snapshot how the state is doing as a whole with vaccinations and infections.

Will Cushman:

Vaccinations continue to slime slowly over the last month. As of yesterday about 53% of the state’s residents had received at least one dose of vaccine. That’s a little more than 3 million people. A little less than half the state population suggests. The numbers are creeping up slowly over the last month when compared to new cases of the disease of COVID-19. Cases have really been spiking over the last several weeks. Just yesterday the state health department reported about 1500 new cases. That brings the seven-day average for new cases to 1100 new cases per day. Which is the highest that measure has been since February, early February. So cases are climbing quite rapidly. Multiple parts of the state. Primarily Milwaukee area.

Murv Seymour:

You report more than two dozen counties across the state the vaccination rate is below 50% and below 40% in some places. Should we be alarmed by these numbers?

Will Cushman:

Public health officials seem to be. They are raising the alarm about new cases as are doctors working in COVID wards across the state. They’re reopening in hospitals around the state. Some had closed because the new cases of the disease requiring hospitalization have slowed down so much earlier in the summer. But yeah, with a fairly low percentage of people vaccinated in a lot of Wisconsin communities public health officials, doctors and healthcare workers are quite concerned at the present moment.

Murv Seymour:

You also report there are a handful of counties where the vaccinations meet or exceed the goal of getting 70% of adults vaccinated. What are these counties doing where the others aren’t where the vaccination rates are low?

Will Cushman:

That’s a really, really good question. I think as of yesterday there were eight out of Wisconsin’s 70 counties where 70% or more adults in the county had at least started the process of getting vaccinated. Had received at least one dose. And yeah, it is hard to say. There are counties all over the state includes Dane, Door, a couple of rural counties along Lake Superior shoreline. Bayfield and Ashland county. Milwaukee suburbs and a couple counties around the state. There is not a whole lot you can say, I guess, about the similarities. They are fairly different places with different public health departments so I’m not sure if it’s necessarily a winning strategy to getting those vaccinations up higher. But we know in some places like in door county, a large portion of the population is older, it is made up of fairly large number of retirees. We know that older Wisconsinites like elsewhere around the nation are getting vaccinated at much higher rates. We also know there is a political — people’s willingness to get vaccinated. At least in some areas and we know that places like Dane county that are quite blue and democratic voted heavily for joe Biden those are all kind of factors that have been associated with higher enthusiasm for getting a vaccine. I think it depends as much on the people living in the county as it does on the strategies of the health departments in terms of getting vaccination rates higher.

Murv Seymour:

So because of this delta variant of the virus there have been more pleas from health official officials and others for unvaccinated folks to get to vaccine. How are people throughout the state responding to that?

Will Cushman:

It seems like at least some people are hearing the pleas. We know that a number of healthcare systems in the state have recently mandated vaccination for their workers, that haven’t really been the case until recently when cases were spiking. And coinciding with that it seems that more people in the last week or two have decided to start the vaccination process than were starting it earlier in July. The number of — the average number of doses administered has crept up pretty steadily over the last couple of weeks from 500 — excuse me 5,500 shots per day to about 2,000 shots per day. More people seem to heed the advice that public health officials —

Murv Seymour:

It is worth noting you mentioned Door County a little bit. They have a high vaccination rate among adults but see an increase in cases there recently. Do we know what’s happening with that?

Will Cushman:

That’s a very good question. The same thing is happening places like Dane county with high vaccination rates. What we’re seeing is even in places that fairly high vaccination rates around 70%, a little bit under in door county, there are still quite a few people who are not vaccinated who are getting infected. We also — the evidence is becoming clearer that the delta variant, this very contagious variant spreading quite rapidly across Wisconsin and the united states is likely associated with more breakthrough infections. So people who are fully vaccinated getting infected and that’s what we would term a breakthrough infection. We believe those are a little higher with the delta variant. That’s certainly part of the puzzle as well.

Murv Seymour:

Dane County health officials say they’re over the moon with the high vaccination rates throughout the county. I get the impression the numbers don’t always tell the whole story. How can you have such a high vaccination rates and vaccinations near the UW campus and sun prairie are low. How is that possible?

Will Cushman r:

I think it’s because the rates are so high in some places. There are areas for instance Verona where the vaccination rate is almost 90%. That’s a suburb of Madison. I also talked to the vaccine deputy for public health Dane county, combined health department for Madison and Dane County. She said that the health department is kind of interpreting some of the local vaccination rate with a bit of a jaundiced eye. You mentioned the area around campus. She said they aren’t putting too much stock into that lower what appears to be a lower vaccination rate in that zip code around campus because there are a lot of students that they are expecting will have been vaccinated over the summer and those vaccination records are likely associated with the permanent address, which for a lot of students is still where addresses where they grew up, not necessarily in Dane county or on campus. Then you mentioned some areas east of sun prairie, definitely kind of the rural hinterlands of Dane county have lower vaccination rates and smaller population and actually the vaccination rates there are a bit higher than they are in most rural parts of the state.

Murv Seymour:

I also see that health officials in Dane county have serious concerns about the low number of African-Americans getting the vaccine. Why are the numbers in this ethnic group lagging behind whites and other minorities and what is being done about that?

Will Cushman:

that’s right. A little under 40% of Dane county’s black residents have gotten at least one dose of the vaccine compared to 2/3 of the county’s white residents and I posed that same question to the vaccine deputy of Dane County and she said that they are dealing with some kind of longstanding issues of not a lot of great communication between the local public health department and healthcare providers with members of Madison’s black communities. She said they are continuing to hold local vaccination clinics in predominantly black neighborhoods. Working with black churches to try to spread the word on vaccinations. And she also mentioned that a social media misinformation has been an issue. The health department is having to combat among people across the community. She said that’s definitely an issue as well.

Murv Seymour:

Let’s move forward here and talk about the delta variant. Does it make up a lot of new COVID cases across the state?

Will Cushman:

It does. Last word from state health department it was at least over 80% of new cases were associated with the delta variant.

Murv Seymour:

And I know some vaccinated people out there feel protected against the virus. What does the CDC say about whether or not these folks should let their guard down because they’re now vaccinated?

Will Cushman:

Right. Especially I think I am not surprised a number of people are confused about the super new at this point but the newer CDC guidance that even fully vaccinated people wear facemasks in public enclosed spaces and area with high transmission. Not to say the vaccines are not protective. They are still very protective. In fact, I just got some statistics from the state health department last night about breakthrough infections, hospitalizations, and deaths in the state between January 1st and august 4th of this year. The vast majority of infections in the state are associated with unvaccinated people. I have got the stats right here. About 153,000 cases in Wisconsin between January and august 4th were vaccinated people that compares to 5,000 cases fully vaccinated people so obviously a smaller number there. At the same time there were over 6800 hospitalizations among unvaccinated people versus about 300 hospitalizations for vaccinated people. And then about — excuse me, sorry, almost 1300 deaths between January and august among unvaccinated people compared to 35 deaths for fully vaccinated people. It is a much, much smaller number of people getting infected with coronavirus who are fully vaccinated but then even a smaller number getting severe symptoms and a very small number are dying compared to unvaccinated people. So the vaccines are a powerful protective effect and at the same time the new guidance to mask up in areas of high transmission is just as much if not more to protect unvaccinated people around you if you are fully vaccinated.

Murv Seymour:

Is there any way to forecast what the number will do this fall with more people going back to school, the fall sporting season will begin and all this adds up to more large gatherings? Are there more concerns about public safety heading into fall?

Will Cushman:

I think there are especially with the start of the school year. We know no children younger than 12 are vaccinated because they aren’t eligible for vaccination. And we’re seeing a number of school districts across the state announcing that they are going to require masks for all students, faculty and staff regardless of their vaccination status, which is a recommendation of the state health department right now. Surely a large number of school districts may have no mask requirement or some sort of hybrid mask requirement. And so yeah, I think definitely the beginning of school has public health officials a little anxious about new cases and then as you said, I think we’re getting to the point where large public gatherings are just happening again whether or not they are necessarily prudent. Summer fest is still on in the beginning of September in Milwaukee. Some officials announced they’ll require proof of vaccination or recent negative COVID test to gain entrance to summer fest grounds. So that is one thing that they are working to do to try to reduce the risk that large public gathering poses. Yeah, it is definitely of concern going forward.

Murv Seymour:

You mentioned summer fest. Let’s talk Milwaukee. Health officials say they see an extreme surge in COVID cases there. Help us understand why the situation gets this extreme label?

Will Cushman:

Yeah, it is because cases are just rising so quickly in Milwaukee county and in Milwaukee in particular. They’ve been rising much faster there than they have in any other part of the state for the last several weeks. Milwaukee county has a vaccination rate around 50%. Pretty close to the statewide vaccination rate. So it definitely seems to be on the leading edge of new cases and also hospitalizations. Hospitalizations are starting to spike in Milwaukee and surrounding area as well. It may be portending what might come in other parts of the state in the next several weeks.

Murv Seymour:

Can they connect the surge at all to the Bucks celebration with all the folks coming out to celebrate the championship?

Will Cushman:

Yeah, there are actually several hundred cases of COVID were confirmed via contact tracing to the associated with the celebrations in the district or in the vicinity of the Bucks arena and are believed to be associated with those really large gatherings and celebrations.

Murv Seymour:

Do we know, will, whether they’re doing anything at all to slow the cases in Milwaukee because of this extreme surge?

Will Cushman:

Well, I think there like everywhere public health officials and doctors, etc., are really pushing vaccinations trying to get as many people who haven’t been vaccinated yet, which is still quite a large number of people, to take a step to start the vaccination process. I think that’s number one. Number two is really strongly urging and recommending people wear masks again in public settings regardless of your vaccination status. And then really recommending that people kind of reconsider attending large public gatherings or reconsider potential travel, other potentially risky behaviors that could spread the virus.

Murv Seymour:

This feels like we’re slipping back towards square one with the danger of this virus. What do you think about that?

Will Cushman:

Yeah. I am smiling because it feels — I think like a lot of people I feel chagrined at the moment. A month or two it felt like we were seeing light at the end of the tunnel with the pandemic and now like it feels like deja vu like last fall how quickly cases are increasing again. The difference is so many people are vaccinated now. A lot still have to be vaccinated. A little more than half of Wisconsinites are vaccinated against COVID-19 now and so that in and of itself has a really strong protective effect, not just for you as an individual but for the entire community. There are clearly still a lot of people who are unvaccinated and don’t necessarily have immunity through prior infection who are vulnerable to the disease. And there are definitely vaccinated individuals also who are vulnerable when they are compromised or what not. There is definitely still quite a risk especially to hospitals. Hospitals are seeing a lot more COVID patients and some are recommending or choosing to maybe push back procedures or thinking about — thinking deeply about care models going forward over the next several weeks and months because of the definite strain that all these hospitalizations are having on their infrastructures and workers. That’s something that is definitely of concern. But for average vaccinated person in Wisconsin, I would say — I personally am fully vaccinated and I feel less anxious about the pandemic right now in this moment even given the still a very serious issue for the community, but I feel less personal risk than I did last fall when I wasn’t vaccinated at all.

Murv Seymour:

We’ll have to leave it there. Will Cushman, thank you for the update and excellent reporting on the COVID crisis across the state.

Will Cushman:

You’re very welcome. Thanks a lot.

Murv Seymour:

For more on “Here & Now” and visit PBS Wisconsin. Thank you for joining us this “Noon Wednesday.” I’m Murv Seymour, have a great day, everybody.