Pierce County now ranks No. 3 statewide in cumulative COVID-19 cases
Pierce County’s recent surge in coronavirus cases has pushed the county above Snohomish in total confirmed cases, according to data posted on the state’s coronavirus case tracker.
That gives Pierce County the third-highest cumulative case total in the state, after King (16,941) and Yakima (10,412) counties.
The state lists Snohomish County with 5,582 cumulative confirmed cases and Pierce County with 5,874.
On the counties’ individual COVID-19 tracking sites, Snohomish lists 5,630 cumulative confirmed cases as of Aug. 12. Pierce County listed 5,780.
Totals listed by some counties have consistently been different from the state’s dashboard listing through the pandemic.
Pierce County does its own investigations, and its numbers routinely differ from the state’s tally.
In its report for the two-week period ending Aug. 8, Snohomish County reported 87.3 case rate per 100,000. Pierce County reported 124.5 per 100,000 as of Wednesday.
Both counties believe they are past their most recent peaks with new cases.
In a recent interview with The News Tribune, Dr. Anthony Chen, director of the Tacoma-Pierce County Health Department, explored reasons why Pierce County’s experience with the virus had been different from King and Snohomish.
“I think that we were fortunate in some things. Earlier, we did not have as large of numbers as King County or Snohomish, we had the opportunity to learn from them,” Chen said.
“Unfortunately, now our case rates are high. So here’s a case where while they really got burned early on, we are getting hit harder in some ways.”
He noted that in the county overall, “Our health is not that great. We have higher rates of chronic disease. We have high rates of poverty.
“If you’re up in King County, there are tons of people who are software engineers — you could email them and reach out to them through social media, whatever. And they’ll get it. Here, we’ve got people who don’t have broadband. So, there are challenges here, but I think Pierce County has been able to accomplish a lot of good things,” Chen said.
“We’re just trying to find the right avenues and channels, and we hope that we can get the right social networks that will help.”
