Another Dare County resident has died of COVID-19, according to today’s Dare County Dept. of Health and Human Services dashboard update, bringing the total number of local deaths attributable to the coronavirus to six.
The DCDHHS’s report does not provided any particular details about the person who died. One could surmise that he/she had been hospitalized because the number of COVID-19-related hospitalizations of Dare County residents reported on the dashboard has declined by two since yesterday.
The DCDHHS is inconsistent in its updating of hospitalizations, however. Yesterday, the dashboard showed 12 Dare County residents hospitalized, and today, it shows only 10.
Today’s update also includes the report of a male Dare County resident between the ages of 25 and 49 who has been hospitalized for COVID-19. The man is one of only six new cases—five of them residents—reported by the DCDHHS today.
In contrast, the DCDHHS reported 37 new COVID-19 cases yesterday; 73 new cases on Saturday; and 52 new cases on New Year’s Day.
The Beacon is saddened by the loss of another person’s life. We wish his/her loved ones comfort and kindness from others during their grief.
North Carolina residents and property owners age 75 or older may register now to receive a first dose of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine at one of three Dare County vaccination clinics in the next two weeks, according to a news bulletin posted this afternoon on the Dare County Dept. of Health and Human Services’ website.
To be effective, a second dose of Moderna vaccine must be administered 28 days after the first. The State of North Carolina has not yet received second doses of the vaccine, according to Dr. Mandy Cohen, Secretary of the N.C. Dept. of Health and Human Services, who spoke at a briefing in Raleigh last week. (Vaccine shipments arrive on Tuesdays, she said. Distributions are made on Fridays.)
The vaccination clinics will be held Wed., Jan. 6, at the Thomas A. Baum Senior Center, 300 S. Mustian St., in Kill Devil Hills; Mon., Jan. 11, at the Dare County Parks and Recreation Center, 602 S. Mustian St., in Kill Devil Hills; and Sat., Jan. 16, at the Fessenden Center, N.C. Hwy. 12, in Buxton.
“Vaccine clinics will be offered on an ongoing basis,” the DCDHHS bulletin states, “based on our weekly allocation of the vaccine from the state.
“We are currently only receiving a very limited number of doses each week. Please be patient and understand that it will take time to provide everyone the vaccine who wishes to receive it.”
As The Beacon recently reported, Dr. Cohen said at the briefing that the State is currently receiving weekly 60,000 doses each of the Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna vaccines.
That means that Dare County will be receiving its “limited” weekly allocation from just 60,000 doses. According to Dr. Cohen, there are 2 million people age 75 or older residing in North Carolina.
To register for a clinic appointment, you must call the COVID-19 Call Center at (252) 475-5008, Monday through Friday, from 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. There will be no walk-in appointments.
You will need to produce documentary proof of North Carolina residency or property ownership, which may include your driver’s license, your copy of a current lease or mortgage, your current vehicle registration, or your current tax record, according to the bulletin.
The DCDHHS’s bulletin does not restrict registration to Dare County residents and property owners, referring instead to N.C. residents and property owners. Why?
To be eligible for registration, you also cannot have been vaccinated for any other reason within 14 days before your scheduled COVID-19 vaccine and cannot have been in direct contact with anyone who has had the virus in the past 14 days or have been infected yourself in the past 14 days.
We do not know how many people age 75+ live in Dare County and nearby counties, but we would suspect you will encounter a major problem with getting through to the Call Center to register for the free vaccine. The bulletin says only that the DCDHHS is “expecting a high call volume, so please keep trying if you do not get an answer right away.”
The Beacon finds both the DCDHHS’s bulletin and its plan of action grossly lacking.
First, we would like to be told how many vaccine doses the DCDHHS is currently receiving from the State and can expect to receive in Phase 1B. This seems to us to be a matter of fundamental public information that public-health officials—if not the Dare County Board of Commissioners—should provide.
The DCDHHS also should have explained in its bulletin the steps in the vaccination process, not just the registration process.
Exactly how will people age 75 or older–many of whom may be frail or non-ambulatory–be vaccinated? Will they be able to wait in their vehicles for a nurse to come to them to administer their injections? Precisely what physical demands will be made upon them?
Further: What hours will the clinics be held? How much in advance will people have to arrive for their appointments? How many people can be vaccinated at each clinic in a given hour?
We could go on.
The scheduling of a clinic this Wednesday (!) in what is essentially “downtown” Outer Banks virtually guarantees a telephone logjam. We wonder if the DCDHHS thought to prioritize the administration of these vaccinations, starting with the “oldest old” and progressing from there?
Surely, there is a more efficient, rational, and less frustrating way of administering vaccinations to the members of Group One of Phase 1B than as a first-come/first-serve free-for-all. A lottery system strikes us as more fair and equitable than the system implemented.
Good luck, everyone. The Beacon is not going to be calling the DCDHHS any time soon. We would appreciate hearing from anyone who is able to register for an appointment about the directions they receive from the Call Center. We would love to learn that our skepticism is not warranted.
Dare County Manager/Attorney Bobby Outten is expected to inform the Town Council at its meeting tomorrow how much of a financial contribution the Town will receive from the County’s Beach Nourishment Occupancy Tax Fund for its 2022 beach nourishment project.
The Town Council will meet tomorrow at 5:30 p.m. in the Pitts Center. Anyone wishing to attend the meeting in person must observe infection-control protocols, including wearing a facial covering. The meeting will be live-streamed at Southern Shores – YouTube.
Dare County sets aside one-third of the 6-percent occupancy taxes that it collects from rentals of all local lodging accommodations for its Beach Nourishment Fund (BNF).
All of the Dare County towns that have performed beach nourishment thus far have received monies from the BNF.
Town Manager Cliff Ogburn estimated in an email to The Beacon last week that the County will allocate to Southern Shores about “$7 million upfront with a yearly contribution to the debt service [of] around $750,000 a year.”
Mr. Outten, a Chicahauk resident who is expected to appear at the meeting in person, will “share with the Council how the money in the County [BNF] is going to be allocated for each [Dare County beach] town,” Mr. Ogburn said.
In addition to Southern Shores, the unincorporated community of Avon on Hatteras Island has submitted a first-time beach nourishment proposal to Dare County. The towns of Duck, Kill Devil Hills, Kitty Hawk, and Nags Head also are seeking funds for their upcoming re-nourishment projects.
“It looks like the [County’s] plan is to reduce [its] contribution to each town’s project by the amounts of . . . recent grant awards” by the N.C. Dept. of Environmental Quality, Mr. Ogburn explained.
Southern Shores, Nags Head, and Kitty Hawk each received $1,408,247.19 from the State, while Duck and Kill Devil Hills received $1,450,921.35.
Mr. Ogburn confirmed that Southern Shores does not yet know how much its 2022 project will cost because engineers with Coastal Protection Engineering of North Carolina (CPE) have not told the Town “the amount of cubic yards of sand we need.”
He is anticipating a $14 million to $16 million project.
CPE, formerly known as APTIM Coastal Planning and Engineering of North Carolina, is the Wilmington-based engineering firm that the Town has hired to handle all aspects of its 2022 project.
“Right now,” Mr. Ogburn said, “I’m still figuring on the MSD [municipal service district] and townwide revenue needing to generate about $1,250,000 per year.”
In addition to the usual Town staff reports, tomorrow’s meeting agenda features the appointment of a new member to the Historic Landmarks Commission to replace founding member Lorelei Costa, who will be honored for her contribution; direction to the Town Planning Board to conduct its final review of the Town Code update/revision by CodeWright Planners, a project that is 5½ years in the making; and consideration of the Town’s participation in the formulation of the North Carolina League of Municipalities’ legislative goals.
Mr. Ogburn is advising the Town Council to “review, discuss, and determine” which 10 of the NCLM’s 17 espoused advocacy and policy goals it supports and to designate a voting delegate to cast a ballot with these chosen goals by a Jan. 15 deadline.
You may present public comments in person at the meeting or submit them in advance in an email, with “public comment” in the subject line, to info@southernshores-nc.gov.
UPDATE ON VACCINE ROLLOUT: We have learned that the Dare County Dept. of Health and Human Services expects to provide details about vaccinations for local people who are age 75 or older and, therefore, are in the first group of Phase 1B, today at 2 p.m. We will report on the DCDHHS release as soon as practicably possible.
We will be very interested to see how Dare County plans to ration out the limited number of vaccine doses that it will receive.
COVID-19 metrics posted today on the N.C. Dept. of Health and Human Services’ dashboard show a record-high 3,635 hospitalizations statewide and a record-high positivity rate of 16.5 percent. Deaths statewide now total 6,941 people.
Dare County reported 73 new COVID-19 cases today, setting a new single-day case record high—the day after reporting the previous record high of 52 COVID-19 cases.
Of the 73 new cases, 49 are Dare County residents and 24 are nonresidents, according to a 6 p.m. report on the Dare County Dept. of Health and Human Services’ dashboard.
The age breakdown of the 73 people who tested positive for COVID-19 is:
Age 17 and younger: nine
Ages 18 to 24: 10
Ages 25-49: 28
Ages 50-64: 20
Age 65 and older: six
We no longer are surprised by single-day case reports. We now wonder only when the December-January surge in cases will subside.
Dare County will release on Monday details about how people age 75 or older will be vaccinated locally for COVID-19, according to a bulletin posted yesterday on the Dare County Dept. of Health and Human Services’ website that referred to the “how, when, where” of vaccine registration.
The DCDHHS “is still wrapping up the vaccinations for [people in] Priority Phase 1A,” yesterday’s bulletin stated, and expects “to move immediately” into vaccinations for the next prioritization phase, which includes the age 75-and-over population.
At last Wednesday’s COVID-19 update briefing in Raleigh, however, Dr. Mandy Cohen, Secretary of the N.C. Dept. of Health and Human Services, said that she did not expect most local health departments to start administering vaccines to this age group until the week of Jan. 11.
North Carolina has both the Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna vaccines, which are administered in two doses weeks apart.
According to the bulletin, the DCDHHS anticipates finishing its Prioritization Phase 1A vaccinations on Tuesday, Jan. 5.
Priority Phase 1A includes healthcare workers who are at a high risk of exposure to COVID-19 and staff and residents of long-term care facilities.
The vaccinations of the latter are being administered by CVS and Walgreens through a partnership with the U.S. Government. These facilities include skilled nursing facilities, such as nursing homes, as well as adult, family, and group homes.
(The Beacon has previously referred to the prioritization phases as groups, a term the DCDHHS also has used. We will henceforth call them phases.)
As The Beacon reported Thursday, the N.C. Dept. of Health and Human Services dramatically changed the prioritization order of vaccine recipients on Wednesday when it updated its guidelines to conform with recommendations by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (“ACIP”). (See The Beacon, 12/31/20, slightly revised 1/1/21.)
Previously, the NCDHHS had not assigned any prioritization to potential vaccine recipients on the basis of advanced age alone. Instead it emphasized recipients’ living situations and health status. The revised prioritization phases reflect a reordering of recipients’ “place in line” according to age.
Because of a limited supply of vaccine delivered to North Carolina, “each group [in a phase] will be taken one at a time,” Dr. Cohen said at the briefing. The phases and the groups within them are as follows:
Phase 1A: Healthcare workers who are at high risk for COVID-19 exposure or who are “vital to the initial vaccine response”; and long-term care facility staff and residents.
Phase 1B:
*First Group: Anyone 75 years old or older, regardless of health status or living situation.
*Second Group: Healthcare workers not vaccinated with Group 1A and frontline essential workers who are 50 or older.
Frontline essential workers include first responders, such as firefighters and police officers; corrections officers; food and agricultural workers; U.S. Postal Service workers; manufacturing, grocery store, and public transit workers; and educational and child-care workers, including teachers, support staff, and day care workers.
*Third Group: Healthcare workers not vaccinated with Group 1A and frontline essential workers of any age.
Phase 2:
*First Group: Anyone 65 to 75 years old, regardless of health status or living situation.
*Second Group: Anyone 16 to 64 years old, regardless of living situation, who has one or more “high-risk” medical conditions that the CDC has said increase the risk of severe disease from COVID-19.
The CDC lists the following such conditions: cancer; chronic kidney disease; COPD; Down Syndrome; heart conditions, such as heart failure, coronary artery disease, or cardiomyopathies; immunocompromised state from a solid organ transplant; obesity (a BMI of 30 to 40) and severe obesity (a BMI greater than 40); pregnancy; sickle cell disease; smoking; and type 2 diabetes mellitus.
The CDC also lists conditions that “might” subject an individual to an increased risk for severe illness from SARS-CoV-2. Asthma, hypertension, type 1 diabetes, and dementia are among the conditions in this categorization.
*Third Group: Anyone who is incarcerated or living in another close congregate setting who is not already vaccinated due to age, medical condition, or job function.
*Fourth Group: Essential workers who have not yet been vaccinated.
Phase 3:
*College and university students.
*K-12 students age 16 or older. The vaccines have not been approved for younger children yet.
N.C. Senate leader Philip E. Berger reportedly has issued a statement objecting to the decision by Dr. Cohen and Governor Cooper to prioritize for vaccination healthy college students ahead of people in their early 60s.
Because college students are perceived as spreaders of the virus, however, Governor Cooper is so far standing by the plan.
VACCINE DISTRIBUTION: A COMPLEX PROCESS
Both the Governor and Dr. Cohen expressed concern at Wednesday’s briefing, in response to reporters’ questions, about violations of the prioritizations.
They said they are investigating enforcement measures that they would be authorized to invoke to prevent healthcare providers from “jumping the line” for their patients.
Their efforts could involve asking the N.C. Medical Board to propose punishments for physicians’ noncompliance, such as fines and medical license revocations.
Both officials also expressed sensitivity to the possibility of healthcare providers selling vaccinations for profit. Both COVID-19 vaccines are available free.
According to The Washington Post’s COVID-19 vaccine tracker, North Carolina had administered at least 73,423 doses of vaccine as of late afternoon Thursday. We can find no more up-to-date figure. The NCDHHS does not post online the number of the vaccine doses received by the State or the number administered statewide.
North Carolina was to be initially allocated 583,850 doses, and Dr. Cohen declined Wednesday to be specific about how many doses it has received. These are first doses only.
The NCDHHS Secretary estimated that the State is now receiving about 60,000 doses of each vaccine per week. But only the Pfizer vaccine was available in the first week, which was the week of Dec. 14, and the Secretary has consistently said that the dose allocations per week have been lower than anticipated.
Dare County “is receiving very limited allocations of the vaccine each week,” according to yesterday’s DCDHHS bulletin.
Dr. Cohen also said Wednesday that there are about 2 million people in North Carolina who are age 75 or older, and that it will “take some time for us to get vaccine to everyone.”
The Governor stressed that the vaccination process, which includes handling the special vaccine packaging, preparing the vaccine for administration, and training people to administer vaccinations, is “complex” and people need to “be patient” as the “logistics on the ground” are established.
We would advise you to expect delay.
LATEST COVID-19 CASE NUMBERS
The NCDHHS dashboard reported today 9,365 new COVID-19 cases, covering the past two days, with a positivity rate of 15.5 percent; 3,479 current hospitalizations; and 6,892 deaths, 144 more deaths than were reported on Thursday.
Dare County set a new record-high single-day COVID-19 case total yesterday of 52. Thirty-seven of the new cases are Dare County residents, including a man age 65 or older who was hospitalized, and 15 are nonresidents.
People in the 25-to-49 age group continue to dominate the COVID-19-positive test result numbers locally, closely followed by people in the 50-to-64 age group. The age breakdown of yesterday’s reported 52 cases was: four, age 17 or younger; five, ages 18-24; 21, ages 25-49; 15, ages 50-64; and seven, age 65 or older.
In its last COVID-19 update, which was issued on Tuesday, Dec. 29, the DCDHHS reported a weekly positivity rate of 13.8 percent.
“The vast majority of new cases of COVID-19 in Dare County,” the update said, continue to be “linked to direct contact between close friends, co-workers, and families.”
TOWN COUNCIL MEETING ON TUESDAY
We will preview the Southern Shores Town Council’s agenda for its Tuesday meeting in our next blog post. The Council will meet in the Pitts Center at 5:30 p.m.
Most significant on the agenda is a presentation by Dare County Manager/Attorney Bobby Outten regarding the funding the County will be giving Southern Shores for its 2022 beach nourishment project.
The big news out of Governor Roy Cooper’s COVID-19 update briefing yesterday is that the N.C. Dept. of Health and Human Services has revised its prioritization groups for vaccine recipients so that advanced age alone is a qualifier, regardless of a person’s underlying medical conditions.
If you are age 75 or older, you can anticipate being eligible for vaccination in early January, NCDHHS Secretary Mandy Cohen said yesterday, regardless of your general health, thanks to the revisions her department just implemented.
The North Carolina vaccine program, which was initially formulated in October, prioritizes recipients in four groups, the first of which is broken down into two sections.
Members of NCDHHS’s prioritization Group 1A, which consists of healthcare personnel who have a high risk of COVID-19 exposure and long-term care facility staff and residents, are currently being vaccinated. North Carolina received a supply of vaccine less than two weeks ago, and local health departments received their supplies just last week, Dr. Cohen said.
Vaccinations of staff and residents in long-term care facilities, such as nursing homes, are being handled by the federal government through an arrangement with CVS and Walgreens. All other vaccinations will be administered through local health departments.
You will not be able to go to your local pharmacy to be vaccinated against COVID-19.
As a result of NCDHHS’s revisions, Group 1B, which is next, now prioritizes recipients age 75 and older, regardless of their health status. They will be taken first among the Group 1B population, Dr. Cohen said, when this group’s vaccinations are initiated.
As the Secretary explained, within each prioritization group, there are subgroups that are also ranked by prioritization. Each subgroup “will be taken one at a time,” Dr. Cohen said.
Previously, Group 1B included more at-risk people (incarcerated people, migrant workers, etc.) and “other adults with 2 or more chronic conditions,” as defined by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The State has eliminated the medical qualifier, to conform with recommendations made by the federal government.
Similarly, Group 2 prioritization has been revised to include people ages 65 to 74, regardless of their health status or living situation. Previously, this group specified “individuals age 65 or older with one or no chronic conditions,” to complement Group 1A’s prioritization.
Group 2 also has a subgroup, second in ranking, that includes “anyone aged 16 to 64 years with one or more high-risk medical conditions as defined by the CDC.”
Group 3 still consists of essential personnel not included in the earlier prioritization groups and students who are age 16 or older; and Group 4 encompasses “the remainder of the population.”
Dr. Cohen said again yesterday that it will be “well into the spring” before anyone “in the remainder of the population” who would like a vaccination will be able to get one.
She also said that vaccine supplies “are limited and will continue to be limited for the next few months.” We would not hold our breath.
STAY HOME. CARRY OUT. GIVE EVERYONE A HAPPY NEW YEAR.
Stressing the omnipresence of the coronavirus, Governor Cooper asked North Carolinians yesterday to stay home tonight and this weekend with the people in their household and to observe the COVID-19-infection control measures of wearing a mask, maintaining six-foot distancing, and frequently washing hands.
He reminded people that the 10 p.m. to 5 a.m. modified stay-at-home order—which has been referred to as a curfew—is still in effect.
The Governor also cautioned people age 65 or older to avoid ANY indoor space where they might encounter others who are not wearing masks (or, we would add, are wearing them improperly), such as in a grocery store. He said the latest recommendations from the White House Coronavirus Task Force “offer stark warnings” to people age 65 or older and to people with “an underlying health condition” to avoid potential exposure.
The task force recommends, he said, that these at-risk people have their groceries, medications, and other needed supplies delivered.
We would suggest that you skip all gatherings with people outside of your safe circle and celebrate New Year’s Eve by ordering a carry-out dinner. When you go to pick it up, wear a mask—and pull it above your nose. It is not a chin strap.
There will be other years for New Year’s Eve parties—we hope—and you can skip one Dec. 31 of reckless abandon. Show some self-control, respect, and basic good sense and stay home.
You also can skip the New Year’s Day open house.
The Beacon is still on holiday break, planning to write our next substantive blog on Jan. 2, but news of the revised vaccine guidelines and shock over recent statewide COVID-19 metrics and the number of cases reported by the Dare County Dept. of Health and Human Services disturbed our vacation mindset so much that we had to write something.
The NCDHHS reported yesterday a record-high number of cases in one day and a record-high number of hospitalizations due to COVID-19: 8,551 and 3,339, respectively. The daily positivity rate of 14.8 percent was a record, too.
One hundred fifty-five people died of COVID-19 in North Carolina in the 24-hour period between Tuesday’s report and yesterday’s, bringing the total number of deaths since March to 6,729.
Today’s NCDHHS report shows 6,715 new COVID-19 cases; 3,493 hospitalizations, an increase of 54, for a new record high; and 6,748 deaths, an increase of 19. The positivity rate is 13.3 percent.
The DCDHHS reported a staggering 50 new COVID-19 cases yesterday, besting the previous single-day high number of cases by 15. Thirty-four residents and 16 nonresidents contributed to that grim total.
Among the residents, seven were reportedly children age 17 and younger, whose parents are responsible for their health and well-being; 14 were between the ages of 25 and 49; and eight were between the ages of 50 and 64.
You do not have to know a single one of the people who have died of this viral scourge to have empathy for them and the people who love them and to recognize a human connection with all of them.
You do not have to know a single one of them to behave like a responsible citizen of our constitutional republic, and the world, and respect public-health protocols.
We may live on an island, but none of us is an island. In the immortal words of John Donne:
“Each [person’s] death diminishes me,
For I am involved in mankind.
Therefore, send not to know
For whom the bell tolls,
It tolls for thee.”
Here’s to a happier and healthier 2021.
Ann G. Sjoerdsma, 12/31/20; revised slightly 1/1/21
Two Dare County residents have been hospitalized with COVID-19, according to a late report today on the Dare County Dept. of Health and Human Services dashboard.
The man and woman, who are age 65 or older, are among 17 new COVID-19 cases reported by the DCDHHS. Of the 17, 12 are Dare County residents. Five of the other 10 are between the ages of 25 to 49, and five are age 50-to-64.
These two hospitalizations bring the number of Dare County residents hospitalized outside of the area for COVID-19 to 10.
This wraps up our last COVID-19 update of 2020. We wish swift and uneventful recoveries to the 115 local people who currently have active cases.
One Kill Devil Hills restaurateur found reason to laugh about the Governor’s modified Stay-at-Home order, which ostensibly confines North Carolinians to their homes from 10 p.m. to 5 a.m. This is an example of a real hoax.
Of the 113 Dare County residents newly diagnosed with COVID-19 during the past week, 82 of them, or 73 percent, contracted the virus by direct contact in one of the following settings:
*Home
*Work conference room or break room
*Dinner party
*Wedding reception
*Funeral
So says Dr. Sheila Davies, Director of the Dare County Dept. of Health and Human Services, in her COVID-19 update yesterday. And so said Dr. Davies before, in more than one previous update, echoing what Dr. Mandy Cohen, Secretary of the N.C. Dept. of Health and Human Services, has said numerous times in briefings.
The COVID-19 warnings and explanations about transmission and spread from public-health and governmental officials continue, and still the “metrics” increase, both locally and statewide.
Yesterday again Dr. Cohen asked people in a statement to “please avoid traveling and gathering” during the Christmas and New Year holidays.
“If you absolutely must [travel or gather],” she said, “get tested ahead of time, wear a mask all the time, keep it small and keep it outdoors.”
Governor Roy Cooper asked North Carolinians to change their holiday plans, “if you haven’t already.”
“The best and safest option,” he said in a statement, “is to connect virtually or by phone. But if you gather in-person, keep it small and do it outside.” The remainder of his message echoed Dr. Cohen’s about testing and wearing a mask.
Does anyone believe these warnings will be heeded by people who previously have not heeded them?
As of 4:08 p.m. today, 328,139 people had died of COVID-19 in the United States. At least two new variants of Sars-CoV-2 have been identified, and still people hold and attend superspreader events and talk to their work colleagues in close quarters without wearing masks.
Dr. Davies is still professing to educate people, not “shame or blame” them, and Dr. Cohen is still urging people to “get behind the mask.”
Despite their entreaties, 90 percent of North Carolina’s 100 counties are now in the red or orange zones of community spread of the virus, according to an update yesterday of the COVID-19 county alert system.
Dare County is allegedly in the orange tier or “substantial” community spread tier, but it sure looks red to us. Red indicates a “critical” spread of the virus.
Dare reportedly has a 14-day case rate of 386.4 cases per 100,000 people and a 14-day positivity rate of 8.0 percent.
Since the last county update, neighboring Currituck County has gone red, with a reported 14-day case rate of 515.1 per 100,000 people and a 14-day positivity rate of 14.9 percent.
Hyde County, which includes Ocracoke, is also in the red, with 931.7 cases per 100,000 people and a positivity rate of 11.0 percent.
Previously, both counties were in the lowest yellow tier, which signifies “significant” viral spread. Only eight counties are currently in the yellow: Chatham, Graham, Greene, Madison, Northampton, Orange (home county to Chapel Hill, which is a ghost town these days), Polk, and Washington counties.
As of today, the NCDHHS is reporting 3,043 people hospitalized across the state for COVID-19 and its complications. That’s a record high number for the state.
Hospitalizations topped 3,000 for the first time yesterday, while new COVID-19 cases statewide topped 8,000 for the first time on Dec. 18 and have remained over 4,000 since Dec. 2.
The average number of new COVID-19 cases reported daily by the NCDHHS in December has been 5,652. The positivity rate has been above 10 percent every day this month except Dec. 8 when the NCDHHS reported it was 9.7 percent.
Deaths now total 6,360 people.
NEW DARE COUNTY CASES UP-CLOSE
During the past week, the number of new COVID-19 cases reported in Dare County has been as follows:
Tues., Dec. 15: 13 cases, 10 residents; three nonresidents; one local woman 65+ hospitalized.
Wed., Dec. 16: 20 cases, 14 residents; six nonresidents.
Thurs., Dec. 17: 14 cases, eight residents; six nonresidents.
Fri., Dec. 18: eight cases; seven residents; one nonresident.
Sat., Dec. 19: 20 cases, 16 residents; four nonresidents.
The case-report totals on Sunday and yesterday jumped out at us, as did the fact 26 of yesterday’s 35 new cases were people between the ages of 25 and 49. That is nearly three-quarters.
Overall, 37 percent of Dare County’s 1,423 COVID-19 cases are people in the 25-to-49 age group, and 23 percent are people ages 50 through 64.
The college-age group accounts for about 15 percent of the cases; the 65-and-over group accounts for about 13 percent; and the remaining 12 percent are children age 17 and younger.
Dr. Davies observed in her update that yesterday was a “rather extraordinary day” for the county health department because it received its first shipment of Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine. The County started vaccinating front-line health-care workers this week and will continue doing so in the ensuing weeks.
Twenty-one days must elapse between the two doses of the Pfizer vaccine. Dare has not yet received its batch of second doses for what is known as Priority Group 1a of vaccine recipients. Vaccines are being administered across North Carolina according to a priority ranking of the recipients.
We end our last COVID-19 update of 2020 with a special birthday greeting to Dr. Anthony Fauci, Director of the NIH’s Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, who turns 80 tomorrow on Dec. 24, Christmas Eve.
Word is he is not planning to travel anywhere.
Dr. Fauci received his first dose of the newly approved-for-emergency-use Moderna vaccine yesterday and reported that he felt fine afterward. He did not even experience injection site pain, which is common with many vaccinations. He will receive his second dose in 28 days.
May the eminent, compassionate, and extremely hard-working Dr. Fauci enjoy doing whatever he darn well pleases on his birthday. He has not had a day off in nearly a year. Maybe he can enjoy some down time tomorrow.
We wish him many happy returns of the day and many more birthdays.
A POST-SCRIPT:
Today I visited the Kitty Hawk Post Office to ensure that the packages I dropped off there for mailing (I do click-and-ship) and for which I have not received any tracking information are not stacked up in a backroom reserved for oblivion.
I was assured that all packages received at the post office are loaded onto cargo trucks and transported the heck out of there as soon as possible. I was also told that I should not expect to receive any tracking information until my packages reach their destination.
So, there is still hope.
Merry Christmas and happy other holidays, everyone. Here’s to a bright and healthy new year.
And don’t forget. If you get cabin fever and decide you would like to violate the 10 p.m. “curfew,” just call up your favorite watering hole and order a “to-go” mixed drink. The Governor says it’s OK. See yesterday’s Beacon for details.
Southern Shores is the 18th safest city in North Carolina for 2020, according to a home security and safety advocacy website that we had never heard of until a publicist sent The Beacon an email about the town’s distinction. We thought we would share this news with you and let you assess its value, if any.
According to Safety.com, which claims to be an “independent review site,” Southern Shores ranked 22nd among the N.C. cities it surveyed for public safety and fourth overall for financial safety. These results, combined with the town’s rankings on natural-disaster safety and health safety, gave Southern Shores the 18th best score, it claims.
Carolina Beach is the only other N.C. beach town to break Safety.com’s top 20, although New Bern and Wilmington show up at No. 9 and No. 17, respectively.
Southern Shores also tied with No. 3 Huntersville, which is a town of lakefront homes and recreational opportunities on Lake Norman, for the second lowest poverty rate among the cities on Safety.com’s list, not all of which are not identified in its report.
Safety.com purportedly analyzed data provided by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the U.S. Census Bureau, The Insurance Journal, and The Gun Violence Archive, which is a non-profit research group that catalogs every incident of gun violence in the United States, as well as U.S. “health rankings” to derive its municipal “best-of” list.
The criteria it assessed for a public-safety analysis, it says, included population-based data on property crime, violent crime, aggravated assaults, and hate crime, provided by the FBI, and officer-related shootings and mass shootings, as reported by The Gun Violence Archive.
Safety.com analyzed financial safety by calculating a town’s or city’s annualized median rent, unemployment rate, cost of living, and poverty rate, and the percentages of its employed and unemployed residents who reported not having health insurance.
The top 10 safest cities in North Carolina, according to Safety.com’s analysis, are: 1) Cary; 2) Apex; 3) Huntersville; 4) Carolina Beach; 5) Mooresville; 6) Mocksville; 7) Pittsboro; 8) Fayetteville; 9) New Bern; and 10) Hickory.
In a press release datelined San Juan, Puerto Rico, the home security/safety advocate said it “offers reviews, recommendations and insights across multiple safety industries.” Its goal is “to make safety simple with trustworthy and accurate information, unique data, and easy-to-use tools.”
If you click on one of its advertising partners’ links on its website, Safety.com may receive a referral fee. It is fair to speculate that if you have “financial safety,” you may be more inclined to purchase a home-security system to protect it.
AS YOU MAY RECALL, JUST TWO MONTHS AGO, SOUTHERN SHORES POLICE CHIEF DAVID KOLE argued at the Town Council’s Oct. 20 budgetary and planning workshop that the Town needed to hire a new police officer during fiscal year 2020-21. (See The Beacon, 10/23/20, 11/1/20.)
Southern Shores “is not Mayberry” and needs two police officers on duty “with supervision” 24/7, Chief Kole maintained.
The additional officer, whose hiring was given a green light Oct. 20 by Mayor Tom Bennett’s pronouncement that a “consensus” existed on the Council for it, will bring the Southern Shores police complement to 13 officers, according to the Chief, who alluded during his workshop presentation to a study supporting the addition of two officers, not just one.
“It’s not Mayberry,” the Chief said then. “. . . Bad things can happen to police, and things have gotten worse over the last two to three years.”
Only not, as far as we can tell, in Southern Shores.
There are “a lot of arrests, a lot of drug work,” he explained, without offering any evidence of physical threats being made to, or violence committed upon, Southern Shores police officers.
Although the Chief emphasized the safety of police officers, he presented data at the workshop to suggest that the number of service calls the police handle justify two new hires. We would have liked to have seen a more detailed breakdown of the nature of those calls and their disposition. (See The Beacon, 11/1/20, for our critique.)
With 14 officers on the payroll, there would be 24/7 coverage of the town by two duty officers and a third person supervising, Chief Kole said, a goal he has had since he first started working for Southern Shores 14 years ago.
That is one police officer for every 208 residents, if you use Safety.com’s population figure for Southern Shores of 2,907.
Despite there being no critical discussion about the need for police force expansion and no formal vote, Mayor Bennett told Chief Kole at the workshop that a “consensus” exists among Town Council members “that we need another police officer.”
The Town Council made the hiring official when it unanimously approved at its Nov. 4 meeting a budget amendment for the position, which was part of its consent agenda.
Funding a new police officer for the remaining six months of the fiscal year will cost $43,521—money that will come from the Town’s Unassigned Fund Balance.
On a number of public occasions, Chief Kole has referenced the dangers that his officers confront, especially in their drug work, and has said, “It’s a different world out there right now” than the one he started in nearly 40 years ago.
Every officer on the Southern Shores police force now wears a body camera.
We would like to be enlightened some time by the Chief about this world, especially about the drug crimes occurring in Southern Shores and the risks posed to residents by this criminal activity.
Looking just at FBI statistics and The Gun Violence Archive’s records, Safety.com ranked Southern Shores among the safest places to live in North Carolina. What reason is there to believe otherwise?
COVID-19 UPDATE: Buying Mixed Drink Now a Legitimate Reason for Violating Curfew
The Beacon will be back tomorrow with a complete COVID-19 wrapup before we take an extended holiday break. For now we will write just a few words about the Governor’s latest brainstorm, which we are still trying to fathom.
You may have heard that Governor Roy Cooper signed an executive order yesterday that authorizes ABC Commission-permitted sellers to sell “to-go orders” of mixed alcoholic beverages to purchasers for their off-premises consumption for as long as alcoholic beverages are permitted to be sold, which is 2 a.m. locally.
Sales of alcoholic beverages for on-premise consumption must still cease at 9 p.m., but restaurants, bars, clubs, hotels, certain distilleries—any Alcohol Beverage Control Commission permittee—now may sell one “to-go” mixed drink in a sealed container to a purchaser for his or her own off-premise consumption, either by pick-up or delivery service.
Executive Order 183 actually authorizes travel during the modified Stay at Home period for the purpose of buying a mixed drink! You can break curfew if you want to “take out” a Margarita or a vodka tonic. Can you imagine anything more ridiculous?
The EO takes effect at 5 p.m. today and continues through Jan. 31.
“This order,” the Governor said in a statement, “will help people avoid settings that can contribute to increased viral spread while giving restaurants and bars a financial boost that they need right now.”
The EO limits the number of mixed drinks that a purchaser may buy to one, but it specifies that this limit does not “prevent multiple people at the same address or multiple people in the same group from each being a purchaser and each ordering one mixed beverage.”
The Beacon will be off the grid for the next four days. We will next publish on Tuesday.
Your response to yesterday’s serial dog-poop offender article was gratifying. We are delighted to report that the offender has been identified, and a remedy is in the works.
It would seem that un-scooped dog poop, bags of poop left on the roadside, the dumping of trash on vacant lots, and just plain littering are problems throughout Southern Shores. None of these problems is beyond solving with coordinated and concentrated effort.
The Dare County Dept. of Health and Human Services reported today that another Dare County resident age 65 or older has been hospitalized with COVID-19, bringing the total number of current hospitalizations to eight. The local woman is one of 20 new COVID-19 cases reported on the DCDHHS dashboard, although the data only identified 19 by sex and age.
Of the 20 people who tested positive for COVID-19, 14 are purportedly Dare County residents and six are nonresidents. The dashboard listed only 13 residents: two who are age 17 or younger; six, age 25 to 49; and five, age 65 or older.
The Southern Shores Beacon 