 | Here is your Mayor's update, some COVID-19 information, some other useful information! Please forward as widely as you would like.
I want to hear from you, contact me anytime. If you're reading this because it was forwarded to you, or you saw it on Facebook and would like to receive it yourself, email me here to subscribe. | The Snohomish Health District report from Friday shows:
A case rate of 89.4 per 100,000 in the 14-day period from July 9 to 23, up from 70.8 per 100,000 from July 2 to 16.
Snohomish County is seeing a slight increase in hospitalizations (see graph below). The daily census of Snohomish County residents in the hospital for COVID-19 has increased to more than 30 recently, up from a low of 19 two weeks ago.
Cases continue to rise among younger age groups. From July 12 to 25, more than 40% of new cases were among people under the age of 30.
About 12% of new cases were over the age of 60. However, the absolute number of cases over 60 years of age reported in the past two weeks (104) is up 25% from last week’s report (83) and up 136% from the prior week’s report (44). This suggests that the current wave of COVID-19 activity is finding its way into older age groups and could lead to a sustained increase in hospitalizations in the coming weeks. | From the State Department of Health: Test positivity in eastern Washington has been slowly decreasing; however at 14.6% it remains very high and is over three times as high as in western Washington (4.2%). The recent concentration of new cases in young adults has continued to spread into younger and older age groups. Case numbers continue to trend upward in many counties, while King County has remained flat near its historical peak. Pierce County cases have continued to increase and hit a new peak since our last report. Yakima’s rates have continued to decline since early June, but Okanogan now has the most cases per capita in Washington. Here is new state guidance for overnight summer camps. | Give blood today (and Thursday) at Rosehill Community Center! Sign up required, here's the link. | More than 50,000 people in Washington have been diagnosed with COVID-19. And between 30 and 50 percent of them caught it from someone who didn’t have any symptoms at all.
How does it feel to have COVID-19 without symptoms?
Having COVID-19 and having no symptoms means you look and feel and act just like you normally do.
• You cannot tell by looking at or interacting with someone whether they might be contagious and able to give you COVID-19.
• You might be contagious and able to give COVID-19 to your loved ones and not even know. More people are getting diagnosed with COVID-19 each day than ever before. The number of people in the hospital is increasing again, too. Even when we feel great, we all need to take these precautions not to catch or spread COVID-19. Avoid indoor gatherings Getting together indoors with friends and family outside your immediate household is one of the riskiest things we can do right now. Indoor birthday, anniversary, and retirement parties; book clubs; having friends over for dinner. If you are indoors, you are putting yourself and your friends at risk for catching COVID-19. Stay six feet away from others while outdoors Outdoors is a bit safer — if there is plenty of space between you and other people. If you will be gathering with others, keep at least six feet between you and others, wash your hands often, and put your cloth face covering on if there is any chance you might momentarily get closer than six feet. Be great mask ambassadors. (Mask-bassadors?) Cloth face coverings greatly reduce how far the droplets in our breath can travel, and this protects everyone. Cloth face coverings are required in any indoor setting outside your home and in any outdoor setting where you can’t maintain six feet of distance from non-household members. Help us make covering our faces feel more normal!
• Wear your cloth face covering. The more people see others covering their face, the more comfortable they may feel wearing their own face covering.
• Be friendly to others, from six feet away, whether they are wearing their cloth face covering or not. A few people are unable to wear a mask for medical reasons. By being friendly and wearing your own face covering, you may help them feel safer.
• Share #MaskUpWA and #MaskUpMukilteo images and messages on your social media. | The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP) has just released a new analysis on the estimated 12 million people who are at risk of missing out on their Economic Impact Payments (EIP) because they haven’t filed with the IRS.
The analysis reports that 185,000 of those people are Washington State residents. With $1,200 payments for adults and $500 for children, that equals an estimated $179,000,000 in potential payments.
Eligible individuals have until Oct. 15 to file with the IRS to receive their EIP. The CBPP is providing the Department of Social and Health Services (DSHS) resources to help with outreach to those individuals that may be eligible for EIP but have not yet filed with the IRS. You can learn more with this pdf. | Paycheck Protection Loans are extended through August 8 (for new applications), and a wider range of businesses qualify (Small Business Administration release here). Economic Injury Disaster Loans (EIDLs) are designed to provide economic relief to small businesses confronting a temporary loss in revenue. Borrowed EIDL funds may be used to cover a variety of operational and capital expenses made challenging by the pandemic. EIDL terms propose a modest 3.75% interest rate for small businesses and a 2.75% rate for nonprofits with a 30-year maturity and automatic one-year deferment period before monthly payments must begin. These flexible and low-interest loans are available to a variety of eligible small businesses. The Washington State Department of Labor & Industries is again extending the deadline for employers who are finding it difficult to pay their workers’ compensation premiums during the coronavirus outbreak.
Under L&I’s extension, employers who are participating in the Employer Assistance Program have until Nov. 2 to pay their workers’ compensation premiums for the second quarter (April-May-June). Without the extension, the full payments would have been due on July 31. (Press Release here) | King County Public Health is doing antibody study. They want to try to understand how many people have been infected with COVID-19 in King County. Other questions include: Who is more likely to be infected and how severe are their symptoms? And are there common risk factors we can identify among people who became infected so we can reduce risk? Public health officials are hunting for answers to these questions and more with a new study (more information here). The Seattle Times interviewed UW Medical Dr. Vicky Fang about antibody testing. Half of Washington state students live in counties where health experts warn against reopening school buildings (Seattle Times). Boeing had a pretty bad second quarter, their news release is available here. Our local Herald reporter, Andrea Brown, has a super fun profile story this week that you should check out. | With the attention on COVID impacts to baseball, here's some coverage of what's going well with the locked down NBA (Washington Post). As California coronavirus cases spike, contact tracing stalled by fear and embarrassment (NBC News). Pandemic underscores how public parks shape public health: Washington Post. Just the map in the article is striking to me- I take even my neighborhood parks for granted too often! The Wall Street Journal tackles whether we should be cleaning our phones to combat coronavirus. Their answer is a maybe, but also that are phones are covered in germs. (Experts the journalist talked to said "thoroughly clean your hands; don’t touch your face; don’t worry about your phone." Powerful first person story from an Arizonan School Superintendent, faced with deciding how to go back to school safely. It is a reminder of the risks and what's at stake (Washington Post). | Snohomish County Tomorrow is seeking volunteers to serve as a citizen representative to the Steering Committee. Snohomish County Tomorrow (SCT) is a cooperative and collaborative public inter-jurisdictional forum consisting of representatives from the county and nineteen of the cities as well as the Tulalip Tribes. SCT’s goal for Snohomish County, the cities and tribes in Snohomish County is to partner and work together for the betterment of all citizens in Snohomish County and the region. To apply, click on this link and note that you are applying for the SCT Steering Committee. | You can tour the Evergreen Arboretum and Gardens virtually. Go to www.evergreenarboretum.com and click on the Virtual Tour tab. View dozens of photos of the sculpture garden, rock garden, Japanese maple grove, conifer garden, small urban tree walk and more. Or tour the gardens by appointment in groups no larger than five. Plan you tour one month in advance and make an appointment by calling 425-257-8597 or emailing contactus@evergreenarboretum.com. Join Seattle Shakespeare for a Shakespeare-themed scavenger hunt! Information here. It started in early July, but you can jump in for the final week now. The Snohomish County Fruit Society is hosting a presentation on “Blueberries” at 7 p.m. Sept. 10 via Zoom. Lisa DeVetter will give tips on growing blueberries in your own back yard. DeVetter is an assistant professor of small fruits in the Horticulture Department at the Washington State University, specializing in raspberries, blueberries and strawberries. More at snohomishcfs.wordpress.com. According to this story by Reuters and the Good News Network, a girls’ robotics team in the Afghan city of Herat invented an inexpensive new ventilator model that will help the thousands of Covid-19 patients in their homeland, where there is a lack of the machines in hospitals. They designed an open-source, mobile ventilator that costs as little as $700—compared to the $20,000 needed to purchase a traditional model. | All reopening guidelines can be found here. Some have changed recently- especially the restaurant, bars and wedding ones. Locally, Everett's Getting to Safe Guide is a great resource. | Lighthouse Park, Edgewater Beach and 92nd Street Park reopened on May 5. Bathrooms are open only at Lighthouse Park 7am-7pm. Playgrounds remain closed until either Phase 3 or when we have full staffing and ability to clean daily. Trails and sidewalks continue to be open for your physical activity! Please respect physical distance of six feet. All City Facilities closure: City operations will continue via primarily phone, email and online. The public is encouraged to call (425) 263-8000 for assistance with City services or visit our website at www.mukilteowa.gov. Government services are not slated to reopen until Phase 3 of the new reopening plan, which is mid-June at the earliest. For more information on city facilities, see this link. | Current case count is 96 confirmed or probable COVID-19 cases identified in Mukilteo (1 new case, to updated around 2pm today), and 75 individuals who are recovered. County case counts are available at this link, updated each weekday at 2pm City counts will be updated weekly starting today. | | |
