Apache, Navajo Counties Show Value of High Immunization Rates | Apache County
After weeks of surges, the recent COVID-19 surge appears to be slowing – especially in the heavily vaccinated parts of the Apache and Navajo districts.
However, public health experts fear that the new, far more contagious Delta strain has spread rapidly among children – unlike the strains responsible for the last major peak in January.
According to federal data from the Centers for Disease Control, Navajo County has experienced a 50% daily average increase in cases over the past two weeks. That’s bad – but better than the trend a week or two ago. The increases are concentrated in the southern district, where only about a third of the people are vaccinated. The reserves have much higher vaccination rates. Overall, 57% of Navajo County’s residents are fully vaccinated.
Apache County has even better news to report. The number of new cases has decreased by 7% on average over the past two weeks. The county has an infection rate of 36 per 100,000, compared to 48 per 100,000 in Navajo County and 44 per 100,000 nationwide. Apache County has a 68% vaccination rate – which largely reflects the reservation’s large population.
Outside the reservation, Navajo County has a vaccination rate of only 39% and Apache County only 26%. If the White Mountains were to form a county of their own, it would have one of the lowest vaccination rates in the country.
Hospital admissions rose 60% in Navajo County and 68% in Apache County. That compares to a nationwide increase of 26%.
Navajo County continues to report about 20 new cases per day and Apache County about 10 cases per day – most of them in the White Mountains.
The most recent surge has affected children and young adults much more severely than the three previous increases in new cases since the pandemic began. The virus has shown a strange tendency to rise, plateau, fall sharply, and then rise again. The declines only roughly correlate with various efforts to contain the pandemic, including lockdowns, masking requirements and vaccination campaigns.
The displacement could reflect a difference in the distribution of the delta deformation. Studies show that the strain produces 1,000 times higher levels of the virus in the nasal passages and throat. This can explain why it is spreading twice as fast. There’s also growing evidence that the Delta strain makes people sicker – and makes it easier to infect people who have been vaccinated or have recovered from infection with a previous strain. Fortunately, the current vaccine still offers very strong protection against serious illness and death from the Delta Tribe. Studies have shown that the vaccine offers much more protection against Delta than simply recovering from a previous infection.
Public health officials say the key to containing the virus remains vaccination, which has now been certified safe and effective for anyone over 12 months old – which could open the door to making the vaccine mandatory for high school aged students do. The FDA continues to collect long-term safety data on the use of the vaccine for people ages 12 to 16 and for children under 12 years of age. Collecting and analyzing this data can take an additional four months, which means schools have to work for months with no vaccination for children under 12 years of age.
Unfortunately, the vaccination campaign in the White Mountains was all but stalled until the recent surge in weekly vaccination rates spiked.
The increase in cases reflects the vaccination coverage by county. Counties with much higher vaccination rates – including Coconino, Apache, and Navajo counties – have all seen falls in cases, while cases have increased in poorly vaccinated counties like Gila, Graham, Greenlee, La Paz, and Yuma.
In Navajo County, only 19% of those under the age of 20 were vaccinated, which is the national average, according to the state Department of Health website. That’s 19% in the state and 25% in Apache County.
While Delta has caused more breakthrough cases, the unvaccinated still account for the overwhelming majority of hospital admissions and deaths. Since the pandemic began, children have made up 18% of cases in Arizona and 1% of deaths.
In Maricopa County, children now make up 6% of hospital admissions. Children account for about 25% of infections in Maricopa County’s recent surge.
University of Arizona health researcher Dr. Joe Gerald, has reported a “profound” change in the number of children who become infected with the Delta variant. That’s partly because schools have resumed face-to-face tuition with few precautionary measures, reflecting a new state law requiring face-to-face tuition, but bans mask mandates and guidelines that encourage vaccination of students and staff. Elementary school students do not have an approved vaccine, but middle school and high school students do.
Public health experts and the Arizona School of Education, Kathy Hoffman, have spoken out against masking bans in schools. At least 14 school districts have ignored the new law and imposed mask requirements in the classrooms.
“It’s devastating,” Hoffman said of the surge in cases in children. “We don’t want children to get sick, and most of all we don’t want children to be hospitalized. It is so important to do everything possible to protect them, including any multilayer mitigation strategies. “
Despite recent trends, children are still far less likely to end up in hospital or die if they become infected. Doctors fear the spread to the community, however, as well as a still mysterious inflammatory disease that develops in some children months after what appears to be recovery from an infection. This inflammatory disease causes a very serious illness – even death.
A study in California showed how easily the virus can spread across campus. In this case in Marin County, an elementary school teacher infected half of her students, according to a detailed study that included genetic analysis of the strains each child carried. The teacher did not always wear a mask – and sometimes read to the children without a mask. The children in the front two rows were infected much more often than those in the back two rows. The children spread the infection to many family members and community contacts.
Peter Aleshire covers county government and other issues for the Independent. He is the former editor of the Payson Roundup. Reach out to him at [email protected]
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