Two deaths have been reported in August from virus, FDA approves the Pfizer vaccine

In the past days, the number of new COVID-19 cases has been on the rise in Polk County. The Polk School District hit a 1% threshold across the district requiring students to go back to some social distancing measures across campuses and limited visitors.

For good reason: as of Monday, the two-week number of new COVID-19 cases within Polk County went up to 390 according to the Georgia Department of Public Health’s latest afternoon update, with PCR positive test results increasing by 119 alone since week’s end. (As of August 19, the number was at 4,417 total COVID-19 PCR positives. That figure rose today to 4,536.)

Additionally, the DPH reported two more deaths from COVID-19 in Polk County since the beginning of the month, bringing the total to 89 since the pandemic began. Hospitalizations stood at 407 in total since March 2020.

The DPH reported that 30.6% of all hospital beds statewide are filled with COVID-19 patients, but that number goes up to 33% of regional hospital beds for medical centers surrounding Polk County (Region C.)

ICU beds are another story entirely. As of midnight Sunday morning, 89% of the state’s ICU beds were in use, or 89.5% of the capacity. More than 1,700 ventilators for adults were also in use as well, some 45.3% of the state’s capacity.

In Region C, that figure jumps to 99.35% of the ICU bed capacity, 153 out of 154 beds available in regional medical centers. Only Southeast Georgia’s Region M is using more ICU beds than those hospitals around Northwest Georgia and Polk County. Their 74 ICU beds are full, and 24 more patients being treated in ICU care bring their total to 98 patients, and 132% use.

Some good news in the fight against the virus: the Food and Drug Administration finally approved the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine according to multiple news outlets across the country (See the AP News story.)

It comes as Georgia’s new cases on Monday increased to 16,915 new positives, another 4,872 antigen positives and 71 confirmed deaths. Another 669 hospitalizations were reported as well.

Statewide the number of fully vaccinated residents remains below half the state at 42% who have received both doses, and now 50% of Georgians have at least one dose of the vaccine. More than 9.4 million doses have been administered to over 5.1 million people statewide, and 4.4+ million residents are fully vaccinated.

Polk County still remains below the state figures, with only 30% of the residents locally having gotten both doses (12,538 people.) 35% of Polk County residents have at least one dose of the vaccine, an additional 2,172 people.

Friday night provides a chance at the Rockmart-Cedartown game to get a vaccine dose. Check out more about that here.