Coronavirus updates: State passes 91k cases; public school enrollment drops
Updated at 9 a.m.
The Washington state Department of Health reported Wednesday 545 new confirmed cases of COVID-19 and 12 deaths.
Pierce County reported 68 cases Wednesday and one new death. Pierce County has a total of 178 deaths likely caused by COVID-19 as of Wednesday, according to the Tacoma-Pierce County Health Department.
Statewide totals from the illness caused by the coronavirus are at 91,208 cases and 2,177 deaths, up from 90,663 cases and 2,165 deaths Tuesday. Washington’s population is estimated at about 7.6 million, according to U.S. Census figures from July 2019.
Thirty-three people with confirmed COVID-19 cases were admitted to Washington state hospitals on Sept. 18, the most recent date with complete data. Average daily hospitalizations peaked in early April at 78.
On Sept. 26, the most recent date with complete data, 9,314 specimens were collected statewide, with 3.2% testing positive. The average positive test rate for the seven days prior was 3.5%. More than 1.9 million tests have been conducted in Washington.
The test numbers reflect only polymerase chain reaction tests, which are administered while the virus is presumably still active in the body.
King County continues to have the highest numbers in Washington, with 23,351 cases and 780 deaths. Yakima County is second, with 11,521 cases and 263 deaths. Pierce is third with cases at 8,437.
All counties in Washington have cases. Ten counties have case counts of fewer than 100.
On Wednesday, Washington had a 1,203-per-100,000-people case rate. The national rate is 2,259, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Louisiana has the highest rate in the United States at 3,658. Vermont is lowest at 291.
There had been more than 7.5 million confirmed coronavirus cases and 211,652 deaths from the virus in the United States as of Wednesday afternoon, according to Johns Hopkins University.
The United States has the highest number of reported cases and deaths of any nation. More than 1 million people have died from the disease worldwide. Global cases exceed 35 million.
How long can coronavirus stay infectious on your skin? Much longer than flu, study says
Updated at 9 a.m.
New research out of Japan reveals that the novel coronavirus can survive on human skin for up to nine hours, suggesting that hand washing remains a vital tool in the fight against the pandemic.
The study also shows the coronavirus lasts far longer on human skin and other surfaces compared to the influenza A virus, which causes the seasonal flu. Influenza A survived for just under two hours on skin.
The upside? Both pathogens were killed within 15 seconds upon contact with hand sanitizer, according to the study published Oct. 3 in the journal Clinical Infectious Diseases.
“Taken together, the determined long, 9-hour survival time of SARS-CoV-2 on human skin may increase the risk of viral invasion in the body or its transmission from the skin to other surfaces, with a potential impact in the acceleration of the pandemic,” the researchers from the Kyoto Prefectural University of Medicine in Japan wrote in their study.
“Thus, appropriate hand hygiene using ethanol-based disinfectants leads to the quick viral inactivation and may reduce the high risk of contact infections,” they said.
Past research has shown that the coronavirus can live on copper for up to four hours, cardboard for about one day and plastic and stainless steel for about two to three days, according to an April letter to the editor published in The New England Journal of Medicine.
But studying how long the coronavirus survives on human skin has been excluded from research, mostly because it’s unethical to intentionally slather live virus on someone’s hand.
To get around this, the team from Japan collected three human skin samples from autopsies just one day after death, which the researchers say is OK because skin functions are preserved. They then acquired mucus samples from three individuals to simulate how the virus sticks to surfaces and people via respiratory droplets from coughs and sneezes.
The researchers recorded how long the coronavirus particles remained infectious on skin, in a petri lab dish with mucus, stainless steel, borosilicate glass and polystyrene, a type of plastic.
While the coronavirus survived on human skin for a little over nine hours and influenza A lasted for about two hours, the researchers said the virus’ lifetime was much longer on surfaces. This means “that human skin is less suitable for the survival of viruses.”
Washington state public school enrollment takes big hit from COVID-19, data shows
Updated at 9 a.m.
Fewer students in Washington state enrolled in public schools this fall compared to 2019, mostly due to the COVID-19 pandemic, according to data from the state Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction released on Wednesday.
September 2020 data shows a 2.82% decrease in enrollment — translating to nearly 31,000 students out of nearly 1.1 million total — in Washington’s public K–12 schools compared to September 2019.
About one-third of the total decrease — more than 11,000 students — is attributed to kindergarten-age children either not enrolling or delaying their kindergarten start, OSPI said.
Kindergarten saw the largest decrease in enrollment — 14 percent — from September 2019 to September 2020.
“Across the board, the early grades experienced larger declines in enrollment than the later grades,” OSPI said in its news release.
Washington also saw a nearly 50 percent increase in alternative learning experience (ALE) courses from roughly 30,000 students to 44,000 students compared to September of last year. ALE courses are public education courses where some or all instruction is delivered outside of a regular classroom schedule.
The COVID-19 pandemic is driving the decrease, State Superintendent Chris Reykdal said.
“As our nation continues to fight the spread of COVID-19, states across the country are seeing changes in K–12 enrollment as families make decisions about the safest and most effective learning environments for their children,” Reykdal said in a news release.
Moving homeless into hotels helped limit COVID-19 spread, Washington study finds
Updated at 9 a.m.
Early on in the coronavirus pandemic, some cities in King County decided to move people out of homeless shelters and into hotels.
Researchers with the University of Washington conducted a study with the King County Department of Community and Human Services and determined the initiative helped limit the spread of COVID-19, according to a news release from the university.
“Moving people from large shelters to individual hotel rooms not only succeeded in slowing the spread of COVID-19, but also provided security, privacy and dignity to hundreds of people in our region experiencing homelessness,” King County Executive Dow Constantine said in a statement.
The county leased rooms from hotels in Seattle, Bellevue, Renton and SeaTac in April, the university said. Those staying in the hotels were given private rooms and access to meals on a consistent basis.
The hotels did not allow other guests to stay during the initiative.
The study showed that “fewer clusters and outbreaks of COVID-19” were found “among individuals who stayed in hotels” compared to people who stayed in “large-group shelter settings,” according to the university. Not only did the initiative serve its primary purpose of curbing the spread of COVID-19, it also “improved physical and mental health, and the ability to focus on finding “housing, employment and education.”
Constantine said the study shows that the initiative needs to be expanded in the coming months.
