Early April, 50 COVID-19 cases were tied to Pierce County care sites. Now, it’s 200+
The Tacoma-Pierce County Health Department on Monday afternoon introduced a new chart to their data page tracking COVID-19 cases.
It lists confirmed cases among staff and patients at care facilities in the county, and the department said it would update the chart each Wednesday. The cases are already reflected in the overall case count updated each day.
In a blog post Monday, Nigel Turner, director of the department’s Communicable Disease division wrote: “During the pandemic, we must balance information transparency with our duty to protect confidential patient health information. To strike this balance, we will publish a table identifying the number of positive test results in long-term facilities with 30 or more beds and 10 or more positive test results (patients and staff). We added this table today and will update this table each Wednesday along with other weekly updates.”
In the post, he also noted that, “About 52 percent of our positive cases are ages 50 or older among a group that makes up 36 percent of the county’s population.”
The department added facility name, address and number of positive cases to its census tract map also on the website.
In explaining the chart, the department notes, “A staff person could work at multiple facilities and be counted as a case at each facility.”
The new chart also has an “Other” category that “includes facilities with less than 10 cases or less than 30 beds. It also includes homeless shelters, domestic violence shelters and rehabilitation centers.”
Outbreaks at care facilities in Pierce County have been a concern with the health department following the state’s initial COVID-19 outbreak tied to Life Care Center of Kirkland.
In early April the health department released guidance for care facilities regarding personal protective equipment and care measures. Part of an early supply of tests received by the county ultimately was assigned to long-term care facilities with outbreaks. At that time, about 9 percent, or 51, of the county’s total cases were then tied to long-term care facilities.
The new listings for Monday show five individual facilities and the “other” catch-all category reporting 252 of Pierce County’s 1,349 cases, or more than 18 percent of Monday’s total.
The sites, geographic location and number of cases involving staff, patients listed Monday include:
▪ Heartwood Extended Health Care, Tacoma: 68
▪ Alpha Cottages (Gibraltar Assisted Living), Central Pierce County: 37
▪ Avamere Puget Sound Transitional Care, Tacoma: 34
▪ Pioneer Place Memory Haven, Central Pierce County: 16
▪ The Cottages at Edgewood, Edgewood/Fife/Milton: 13
▪ Other facilities, multiple areas: 84
This story was originally published April 28, 2020 at 5:05 AM.
