Posted on by Bonnie

COVID-19 Update October 22

COVID-19 Update October 22

  • Total: 376 confirmed cases in Salem
  • 1 out of 79 Salem residents have been infected
  • Salem Today: 6 new cases, 21 active cases 

Community Transmission (per NH Department of Health and Human Services)

The overall level of community transmission is defined using three metrics.  A community is then assigned an overall level based on the highest-level determination for any specific metric.  

  • Since discovering the Community Transmission info on the State’s website about two weeks ago, I’ve been watching how these numbers have been changing. There are very minimal changes in the hospitalization rate and the positivity rate; things would need to get much worse before we see significant changes in those metrics. For now, I’ll concentrate on the number of new cases, as that is where we are seeing the most changes.
  • NH Community Transmission Metrics:
    • New Cases per 100k over 14 days: 
      • Scale: Minimal: <50; Moderate: 50 – 100; Substantial: >100. 
      • Today: 1,124 cases; Daily average: 82.9 (Moderate)
    • New hospitalizations per 100k over 14 days:
      • Scale: Minimal: <10; Moderate: 10 – 20; Substantial: >20, 
      • Today: Total hospitalizations: 13 total; Daily average: 2.0
    • Average PCR Test Positivity Rate over 7 days:
      • Scale: Minimal: <5%; Moderate: 5% – 10%; Substantial: >10%
      • Today: Tests over last 7 days: 459.  Total. PCR Tests over last 7 days: 39,820 Daily average: 1.2%
    • Today’s Level of Transmission: Moderate
  • Rockingham County Transmission:
    • New Cases per 100k over 14 days: 90.6
    • New hospitalizations per 100k over 14 days: 1.3
    • Average PCR Test Positivity Rate over 7 days: 1.4
    • Rockingham County Transmission: Moderate
  • Other NH Locations
    • Manchester: Substantial. (116.4 new case average; 2.7 hospitalizations; 2.5% positivity.)
    • Nashua: Substantial (133.2 new case average; 1.1 hospitalizations; 2.1% positivity.)
    • Merrimack: Substantial (121.7 new case average; 1.3 hospitalizations; 1.9% positivity)
    • Hillsborough County excluding Manchester and Nashua (97.1 new case average): Moderate 
    • Belknap County (59.0 new case average): Moderate
    • Strafford County (52.3 new case average): Moderate
    • Coos County (44.3 new case average): Minimal
    • Grafton County (35.6 new case average): Minimal
    • Carroll County (14.4 new case average): Minimal
    • Sullivan County (18.5 new case average): Minimal
    • Cheshire County (30.1 new case average): Minimal

• • • • • • TODAY’S SPOTLIGHT • • • • • •

  • Today six Salem residents were diagnosed with COVID-19. It was early June when we had more new cases than we had today. This is 20% of the mew infections in Rockingham County.
  • Salem now has 21 people who are considered to be infectious, an increase of 5.
  • In Rockingham County, over the past week we have averaged 6.6 new cases per 100K residents. We have gone from 6.1down to 4.5, and then up to 9.0 today.
  • 12 children under the age of 18 were infected today. We have averaged over 14 per day for the past two weeks.
  • Communities:
    • Notable changes in active cases from yesterday to today:
      • There are now only 9 communities with more than 20 active cases. Between them, these 9 communities have 406 total cases, accounting for 49% of all active cases. (Shown: # of active cases and change from yesterday). 
        • Salem and Hudson are back on this list, with 20 or more active cases. Londonderry dropped to below 20, and is now removed.
        • Nashua: 64 (-21)
        • Manchester: 98 (+5). Bedford: 55 (+3). Concord: 43 (+1). Warner: 42 (+0). Derry 32 (+9). Hudson: 27 (+8). Portsmouth: 24 (+0). Salem: 21 (+5).
    • Some of the communities with significant changes in cumulative cases:
      • Derry (+9). Manchester, Nashua and Hudson (+8 each). Salem (+6). Bedford (+3)
  • Today there were 2 more unique people hospitalized because of COVID-19. The number of patients who are hospitalized has gone up by 4, indicating several people have been readmitted. 
  • Outbreaks at Long-term Care Facilities
    • Bedford Hills Center: 61 residents, 24 Staff, 15 Deaths
    • Pine Rock Manor (Warner): 44 Residents, 9 Staff, 2 Deaths
    • St. Theresa Rehab & Nursing Center (Manchester): 19 Residents, 5 Staff, 0 Deaths
    • The outbreak at Warde Health Center (Windham) was closed today.
  • The number of new infections across the world shot up by well over half a million today. This is the highest number since I started watching global numbers in late May. Today: 571,868. The two week daily average is 374,217.
  • Th number of new infections in the US went up by 82,033; the two week average is 58,897.
  • US daily average of deaths for the last two weeks is 1,077. The two-week average is 760 per day.

• • • • • • DIAGNOSTIC TESTS IN NH • • • • • • 

  • New positive cases by my math (Total of today’s cases minus yesterday’s total): 77
  • New positive cases per DHHS: 82
    • 58 PCR tests
    • 24 Antigen tests
  • Children under 18 in new cases: 12
  • Total positive cases in NH: 9,994
  • Percentage of today’s tests that are positive per DHHS: 0.8%
  • Total PCR tests results reported today (Positive results plus negative results: 4,881
  • The daily average of diagnostic (PCR) tests reported from 7 days ago to today: 2,480
  • New negative results reported today:4,804
  • Total negative cases in NH: 313,179

• • • • • • ROCKINGHAM COUNTY • • • • • •

  • Total cases in Rockingham County: 2,452
  • New cases in Rockingham County: 28
  • Rockingham County: New cases per 100K residents: 9.0
  • Rockingham County 1-week average per 100K residents: 6.6
  • Rockingham County Positivity Rate: 1.4%
  • Percent of all cases from Rockingham County: 24.5%
  • Percent of all cases from either Hillsborough County or Rockingham County: 77%

• • • • • • ACTIVE CASES • • • • • •

  • Active cases in NH: 832
  • Active cases in Rockingham County: 184
  • Percent of NH’s active cases that are in Rockingham County: 22.1%. 

• • • • • • OTHER TEST RESULTS • • • • • • 

  • New antibody tests: 27
  • Total antibody tests (No break downs of positive vs. negative): 31,879
  • The daily average of antibody tests reported from 7 days ago to today: 32

• • • • • • CHANGES BY AGES • • • • • • 

  • 0-9: +8 (3% of all cases. 10% of new cases
  • 10-19: +8 (8% of all; 10% today) 
  • 20-29: +14 (18% of all; 18% today) 
  • 30-39: +15 (14% of all; +19% today)
  • 40-49: +9 (13% of all; 12% today)
  • 50-59: +15 (15% of all; 19% today)
  • 60-69: +5 (12% of all; 6% today)
  • 70-79: +0 (7% of all; 0% today) 
  • 80+: +3 (10% of all; 4% today)
  • Unknown: 0 (0% of all; 0% today)

• • • • • • RECOVERED IN NH • • • • • • 

  • Announced today: 42
  • Total Recovered: 8,692
  • Percentage of diagnosed cases that have recovered: 87.0%

• • • • • • HOSPITALIZATIONS IN NH • • • • • • 

  • New: 2
  • Current: 18
  • Total Hospitalized: 763
  • Percentage of those who have been infected that have been hospitalized: 7.69%

• • • • • • DEATHS IN NH • • • • • • 

  • Lives lost today: 1
  • Persons over 60 years of age who died today: 1
  • Persons under 60 years of age who died today: 0
  • Total fatalities in NH associated with COVID-19: 469
  • NH Residents diagnosed with COVID-19 that died: 4.73%
  • Lives lost in Rockingham today: 0

These are not simply numbers. We must not forget that these are all someone’s husband or wife, mother or father, sister or brother, son or daughter, friend or neighbor.

Hello, Salem!

I have decided to stop sharing daily information about the infection in the schools. There is too much discrepancy between what we hear from the State vs. what we hear from the schools.

I became aware of a message sent to parents on October 7 from Michael Delahanty, Superintendent of Salem Schools.  At that time, over sixty Salem high school students have been quarantined. Here are some additional extracts from Dr. Delahanty’s message:

  • We stay in close contact with state and local health officials and respond to their recommendations and guidance. 
  • In an effort to keep everyone aware of our circumstance and necessary precautions, the school district is committed to transparent reporting of health and safety information related to the ongoing pandemic.
  • We will communicate events and actions that directly impact schools, students, or staff members.
  • We will provide general district-wide notifications when a student or staff member tests positive for COVID-19 that results in potential exposure within the schools or school-related activities. Additional communications will be sent to staff and parents of students directly affected.
  • Not every virus-related circumstance will elicit a district-wide communication. 
  • We are aware of state dashboards and reporting systems, and while these can be helpful in monitoring trends or assessing community spread, they can often provide confusing data specific to schools due to reporting delays or errors.

If I hear of additional information from the schools, I will let you know. In the meantime, stay safe, and always, be kind.

~Bonnie

This is a screenshot of the school dashboard, although I question how accurate this is. As far as I have been able to determine, this newest case at Salem High School, and one of the recovered students at that school are not Salem students. Also, I believe that North Salem Elementary and Woodbury Middle School have not had an infection, despite what the School Dashboard says. I don’t know anything about GSAA.

This screenshot comes from https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/69/wr/mm6942e2.htm?s_cid=mm6942e2_w

This report is explained here:
https://www.clickondetroit.com/health/2020/10/20/cdc-from-january-to-october-us-had-299k-more-deaths-than-in-previous-years/

This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is Changes-by-month-877x1024.jpg

Useful links

Sources used to create these reports:

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