Austin health officials are making a final plea for people to stay home for Thanksgiving to prevent new COVID-19 cases from spiraling out of control before a vaccine becomes available next month for health care workers and those who are at high risk if they get ill.
The last-ditch effort to encourage people to limit gatherings to only their household members included this warning Wednesday from Austin-Travis County Alternate Health Authority Dr. Jason Pickett: “A test does not buy you a ticket to a gathering.”
Pickett, addressing the media during a virtual gathering on the eve of Thanksgiving, raised concerns about tests that could come back negative and provide a false sense of security while the virus is still in the incubation period.
“So it’s important that people understand the limitations of testing prior to a gathering,” he said.
Wednesday’s warning reinforced last week’s message when health officials moved Travis County to Stage 4 on the local risk-based guidelines. The tightened assessment, following weeks of increases in new cases and hospitalizations, came with a recommendation to avoid all nonessential travel as well as social gatherings with people who do not live within an immediate household.
Pickett cited a study from Ohio State University in which 38% of people surveyed said they planned to gather in groups larger than 10 for Thanksgiving. One-fourth said they did not intend to wear a mask or socially distance.
Early signs suggest many people in Austin are going to be traveling for the holiday.
From a time period spanning from Friday to Monday, airport officials said 41,757 total passengers went through security lines at Austin-Bergstrom. Although it was nowhere near the same four-day period before Thanksgiving in 2019 — when 104,203 passengers went through security checks — health officials expressed concern.
“I definitely expect that in two to three weeks, we will have an even higher number of cases that result from gatherings that occur over the Thanksgiving holidays,” Austin Public Health chief epidemiologist Janet Pichette said.
Pichette said she’s seen a trend of people testing positive who initially believed their symptoms were related to allergies only to learn later that they have COVID-19.
As of Wednesday, 239 patients were in area hospitals getting treatment for the illness, with 81 in intensive care. New cases have been on the rise since early November, a spike that health officials linked to Halloween parties just as they linked a mid-summer rise in cases to July 4 festivities. There were 366 new cases reported locally on Tuesday as Texas reported a daily record statewide with nearly 14,000 new cases.
The increase in cases comes as Texas and the rest of the world moves closer to getting access to a vaccine. Gov. Greg Abbott and state health officials released plans Monday for the distribution of the vaccine when it becomes available, which could be as early as the second week of December. First in line to get it will be health care workers, staffers in long-term facilities, emergency medical service workers, home health care workers and those at greater risk of becoming severely ill if they contract the disease.
Drug makers Pfizer and Moderna have submitted applications to the Food and Drug Administration for emergency use of their vaccines, which proved to be overwhelmingly effective in trial runs.
Austin Public Health Director Stephanie Hayden said she’s hopeful that a second phase of the vaccine will make it to the area in January and be available to a larger population than the first phase.
“We can never anticipate exactly how much we are going to receive,” she said. “But we will be ready to provide the vaccine to our community with our partners.”
Credit: Source link
