Yesterday afternoon, the North Carolina Coronavirus Taskforce held a briefing to update North Carolinians on the progress of the state's efforts to combat the COVID-19 pandemic.
The governor provided updated numbers and the Secretary of NCDHHS provided an update on the County Alert System and urged North Carolinians to continue to practice pandemic hygiene. The governor introduced a couple of faith leaders to speak of their experience during the pandemic and to urge people to play it safe during the holidays and avoid large gatherings and celebrating the holidays with family members who are not in their bubble. The governor then took questions from the press. Full details are in the video and a transcript that is being added to the article as time allows.
Video of Briefing
Transcript
(Visual aids added by Macon Media)
[This is a work in progress, there will be errors due to the voice recognition software not recognizing certain words and they are being corrected as they are discovered. Please keep checking by to see what has been added (and what has been corrected after having slipped by my first and second passes). --Bobby]
Governor Roy Cooper:
Well, good afternoon everybody and thank you for joining today's COVID-19 update in North Carolina.
As of today, we have had 488,902 total cases. 5,255 new cases reported today. 3,001 people in our hospitals with COVID-19, and sadly, there are 6,291 people who have died. Our thoughts are with those who have lost loved ones who are fighting this cruel, violent virus. And we know their hearts are heavy during this holiday season.
Today, an update to our county alert map reinforces what we already know covered. 19 is spreading rapidly through our state. As of today, 65 counties air designated as red, which means critical community spread 27 counties air labeled orange, which means substantial community spread. This is alarming. 92 of our 100 counties are designated as red or orange.
In the last week, we saw a daily case record of 8,444 with the percent of test positive coming back at more than 10%. This virus continues to spread quickly. Don't get numb to these numbers. They have plateau owed a bit over the last few weeks, but they are too high. We have strong safety protocols in place right now, and we have to keep following them.
I want to thank local governments and law enforcement who are helping to enforce them. Our communities are safer for it, and your efforts will save lives. I also want to recognize those communities who have seen law enforcement officers shot and killed in the line of duty in these past several weeks. It is senseless and appalling violence can never be tolerated, including against law enforcement. And our hearts are with you and those families' calls to those families or some of the hardest calls that I make and my prayers are with them and those entire communities.
So last week marked the first distribution of the Pfizer vaccine to 53 of our hospitals. This week will continue distributing the Pfizer vaccine and began distributing the Madonna vaccine as well, which is slated to go to 59 hospitals and 97 local health department sites. The federal government tells us how many doses to expect each week, and then the state decides where to send them.
We expect about 60,000 doses of Pfizer vaccine this week and 176,000 of the Moderna vaccine. I've witnessed firsthand some of our frontline healthcare workers receiving the first doses of the vaccine. And Dr Cohen and I were told yesterday at Duke Health that the most common side effect of the vaccine they were seeing is joy, joy that is a good kind of contagious. I was so glad to see this because our frontline healthcare workers have had a tough time dealing with this painful, lonely, slow death and destruction caused by this virus.
Until this vaccine gets enough people immunized, we owe it to those health care workers to double down on our prevention efforts like wearing a mask. When you think about their heroic efforts spending all day on their feet in full protective gear, rushing from one ill-covered patient to the other, it doesn't feel so hard to simply wear a mask at the grocery store or when we're with people we don't live with. Come on, guys, we can do this.
Finally, I wanna warn about scams that we're seeing related to the vaccine. Don't fall for crooks calling or emailing you and offering a place on a vaccine waiting list. There is no such thing. They're either trying to steal your money, your identity or both. The state has an action plan to distribute the vaccine effectively, and it does not involve calling you and asking for your personal information or your money.
Now I'd like to recognize Dr Mandy Cohen, our secretary of health and human services, for an update on where we are in North Carolina.
Dr. Mandy K. Cohen, MD, MPH
Secretary NC Department of Health and Human Services: Good afternoon. Thank you, Governor.
We are at a moment in this pandemic of incredible highs and unfortunate painful lows. As the governor mentioned, he and I had the privilege of watching as our frontline healthcare workers who have been caring for COVID patients receive some of the first vaccines in the state, and you could see the relief on their faces when they rolled up their sleeves. It is gratifying to see these heroes who are courageously showing up every day to care for others get cared for themselves. We witnessed the promise of better days ahead. Unfortunately, those days are not yet here, and the lows of this past week have been painful.
The number of North Carolinians who have died from this pandemic surpassed 6000. Record numbers of people in our state are becoming sick enough to need to be in the hospital, and record numbers are in our intensive care units. And as you'll see from the data from our COVID-19 County Alert system, all but eight counties are red or orange.
Let's walk through that report right now as a reminder of the COVID-19 County Alert System uses a combination of three metrics to categorize counties.
• Case rates per 100,000 people over 14 days,
• Percent of tests that are positive, and
• A composite hospital impact score.
Using these metrics, we categorize counties into three color tears to describe the level of viral spread and healthcare impact. Red represents critical orange. Substantial yellow Significant.
This slide shows an updated county alert map. We now have 65 counties in the red at critical levels of viral spread. In our last report just two weeks ago, 48 counties were in the red.
In addition, there are another 27 counties that are now orange, with substantial levels of viral spread. That means over 90% of counties in North Carolina are red and orange, with the remaining eight in yellow, still having significant viral spread.
If you are in a red or orange county, you should limit going out to essential activities and avoid people that you don't live with.
On this slide, you can see how quickly things can escalate. That first map at the top is from just one month ago. There was a lot more yellow then, and remember, yellow still means significant viral spread, as you can see from the map on the bottom are state is now mostly red.
As I said at the outset, it's a time of mixed emotions. I remain very worried, and at the same time I'm full of hope. Hope, because we have vaccines that are 95% effective in preventing COVE in 19. They were built on years of work to develop vaccines for similar viruses.
More than 70,000 people volunteered to be in clinical trials that ultimately showed These vaccines are safe and work.
And as of early this morning, more than 24,000 healthcare workers caring for COVID-19 patients have received the first dose of the vaccine.
That data is now available on our COVID-19 dashboard.
[ Source: https://covid19.ncdhhs.gov/dashboard/vaccinations]
[Editor's Note: According to [this press release], from Angel Medical Center, they vaccinated 117 medical personnel Tuesday. The data in the dashboard may be delayed up to 72 hours. It is only (at the time of writing) showing 2 vaccinations in Macon County]
You can see how many people have been vaccinated statewide and by county of residents, as well as demographic information such as age, gender, race, and ethnicity supplies.
The vaccine is very limited for now. It will take many, many months to vaccinate everyone who wants it. Until then, I don't want to lose any more North Carolinians to this pandemic.
Together, we can keep people from getting sick, save lives and make sure our hospitals can care for people, whether it's for a heart attack or a car accident or for COVID-19, keep wearing a mask, waiting apart, and washing your hands frequently.
As you think about the upcoming Christmas and New Year's holidays, please avoid traveling and gathering. If you absolutely must get tested ahead of time. Where a mask all the time. Keep it small and keep it outdoors.
I'm grateful to the faith leaders here with us today who are doing all they can to protect their communities and finding new ways to join together in prayer and fellowship. Today, my reason is hope.
Whatever your reason, get behind the mask. Thank you, Governor.
[More to be added, please check by later this afternoon --Bobby]
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Published at 3:15am on Wednesday, December 23, 2020
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