Backlog skews extent of Idaho’s COVID-19 surge; doctors frustrated at school policies
The Idaho Department of Health and Welfare warned Wednesday that a recent downward trend in COVID-19 daily case numbers is the result of a backlog in cases at several public health districts.
“It looks like case numbers are decreasing, but recent data are incomplete,” wrote Niki Forbing-Orr, public information manager, in an email. “Several local public health districts are behind in their reporting to the state due to the high volume of new cases. We apologize for the confusion.”
Boise-based Central District Health, Southwest District Health and Panhandle Health District have experienced a backlog in cases over the past month as a result of limited staffing and a sharp increase in virus caseload.
“The combination of increasing COVID-19 positive cases ... and resource constraints have created a significant backlog in COVID-19 case investigations,” Central District Health wrote in a news release. “Central District Health is currently processing up to 1,000 labs per day, with about 6,300 labs, from up to 10 days ago, waiting to be processed in the queue — a significant increase from the number of labs seen in the last surge.”
A note on Health and Welfare’s COVID-19 dashboard home page says that case data for the most recent two-week period are incomplete.
“Due to the recent surge in infections, case investigation data are missing for approximately 11,500 outstanding positive laboratory results that are pending local public health district review and follow-up.”
Health and Welfare added 1,684 new COVID-19 cases and 25 deaths to the state’s totals on Wednesday. The latest deaths were in Ada (13 new, 619 total), Boise (1 new, 6 total), Bonner (1 new, 69 total), Canyon (5 new, 414 total), Kootenai (2 new, 318 total), Payette (2 new, 51 total) and Washington (1 new, 35 total) counties. One death was removed in Caribou County (14 total).
To date, Idaho has lost 2,854 residents to the virus, with a case fatality rate of about 1.12%.
The most recent data from Health and Welfare show COVID-19 vaccination is effective. For the period of May 15 through Sept. 11 in Idaho, 89.9% of COVID-19 cases (39,256 of 43,672), 91.1% of COVID-19 hospitalizations (1,683 of 1,847) and 88% of COVID-19 deaths (316 of 359) were among individuals who were not fully vaccinated.
Current hospitalization data from St. Luke’s backs those statistics up, with 89.29% of the health system’s 281 COVID-19 patients in the hospital being unvaccinated — and all 61 patients in intensive care being unvaccinated.
On Friday, COVID-19 hospitalizations reached a new high, at 793, but that total dropped to 749 as of Monday, including 196 patients in intensive care statewide. Crisis standards of care, requested by St. Luke’s, are still active statewide, after first going into effect in two North Idaho public health districts.
Idaho pediatricians want schools to do more to protect students
On Tuesday, the Coeur d’Alene School District scrapped a discussion about masks at its next meeting, following a Friday protest against mask mandates in which around 200 people showed up at a special meeting, according to the Coeur d’Alene Press.
The Friday meeting was canceled after police said they may not be able to handle the number of protesters who wanted to attend.
Also on Tuesday, the Pocatello/Chubbuck School District decided to make masks optional, according to East Idaho News.
At a press conference on Wednesday, doctors at Treasure Valley health facilities expressed frustration with school boards in Idaho that have not required masks for students and staff.
Dr. David Peterman, a pediatrician who is CEO of Primary Health Medical Group, said that several of his pediatric patients who were otherwise healthy have had severe mental and physical effects because of COVID-19 illnesses. He pointed to data collected by Primary Health, which has conducted tens of thousands of COVID-19 tests, indicating that the school districts with mask mandates in the Treasure Valley have lower positivity rates than those that don’t.
On Wednesday, he said masks work “unequivocally” and called the decisions of some school boards that have not taken more forceful action against COVID-19 “shameful.”
“At some point, we need to think beyond ourselves in our community,” he said. “When you think of children getting COVID and spreading it to someone who is immunocompromised or older, that’s when you begin to just shake your head.”
Dr. Kenny Bramwell, system medical director at St. Luke’s Children’s Hospital in Boise, agreed.
”I’m not coming up with any nice words to describe the way that the school boards have responded to this problem,” said Bramwell. “They don’t seem to understand the importance of masks in public settings. Masks, to me, are a rather trivial thing to wear in the course of my day as an emergency doctor.”
He pointed to data published by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Friday, which indicates that requiring masks at schools made the likelihood of an outbreak 3.5 times less than at schools where no masks were required.
”Because of inactivity from our president and our governor, we have left the public health decisions up to school boards, which they really have no interest in doing,” Bramwell added. “Some of them have engaged in these discussions and have sort of realized the level of importance that these masks (have) in preventing the spread of illness, and they have embraced it. Some of them have just chosen, perhaps out of self-preservation for the angry mobs at their meetings, to just ignore the question.”
This story was originally published September 29, 2021 at 6:48 PM.
