To access the Herald’s local coronavirus/COVID-19 coverage, click here.
COURT HOUSE – Pfizer’s vaccine gained U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) emergency use authorization Dec. 11, and frontline health care workers Dec. 14 began receiving the first of two required shots. The Moderna vaccine is likely to be up for review before the FDA’s panel of experts in several days.
New Jersey will receive about 76,000 initial doses of the Pfizer vaccine, and health care workers, in Newark, were the first, in New Jersey, to get initial shots Dec. 15. Gov. Phil Murphy said the state would be receiving an increased weekly allotment until the amount plateaus, in January.
In Cape May County, Cape Regional Medical Center (CRMC) is equipped with the required ultra-cold freezer to safely store the vaccine. The hospital plans to begin vaccinating health care staff as soon as the doses are available.
As vaccine allotments increase, long-term care facilities will also be priority recipients. The logistics of vaccinations at these facilities may require several days of lead time since consent forms will be needed. For some, that process can involve family. The federal Pharmacy Partnership will be the vehicle used to provide vaccinations at the facilities.
The new vaccine arrives as the numbers of new cases continues to grow at a steady pace. This week (Dec. 8-14), the county reported 326 new county resident positive tests, almost 47 per day, on average. There were also nine additional new cases among nonresidents, all in Cape May.
The number of active cases in the county declined, moving from 514, at the beginning of the week, to 509. What is keeping the active case numbers steady is the large number of individuals the Cape May County Health Department can remove from quarantine, with 328 removed this week.
The week also saw three additional COVID-19 fatalities, two long-term care residents, in Dennis Township and Ocean City, along with one community death, in Wildwood Crest. The county’s COVID-19 fatalities stand at 119, with 14 reported in December’s first two weeks.
As of Dec. 11, CRMC reported 26 COVID-19 patients, with six in the intensive care unit (ICU).
Daily county Health Department reports confused readers since they state the “daily” report of new cases comes from test results collected over “the past several days.” This is a characteristic of all COVID-19 reporting at national, state and local levels. New case numbers and fatalities have a built-in lag in the statistics due to the need for laboratory confirmation of COVID-19.
What is important in reporting confirmed cases and associated deaths is the trend line. If the number of new cases grows, the fact that each day’s numbers are an amalgam of several days of test results is less significant than the overall increasing trend line.
At national, state and local levels, the numbers reported are generally those where lab confirmation of the disease occurred, providing a snapshot of test results recorded on a given day. It is the only way to report confirmed numbers. Lab confirmation takes time, and that lag is built into the reporting system.
The county’s Dec. 12 report listed seven new nonresident cases in Cape May. That is not a report that seven individuals who do not permanently live in Cape May became infected that day. Rather, it is that seven nonresidents had positive test results and could be reported as confirmed cases of COVID-19.
To dispel another bit of confusion, nonresident cases do not just refer to short-term visitors who have likely left the county. A county Health Department spokesperson Nov. 27 clarified the categorization of individuals by noting that anyone who does not have a permanent address in Cape May County, whether that individual is here for a week or is “a second homeowner,” is categorized as a nonresident.
What is critical in this report is not that Dec. 12 was a bad day for COVID-19 infections, but that those seven individuals were added to a rising number of nonresident cases in Cape May, unmatched elsewhere in the county. The report on confirmed cases countywide shows 30 active nonresident cases Dec. 14, all in Cape May.
Why one municipality has all the nonresident cases is unclear. Even though some city nonresident individuals were moved to the off–quarantine category in recent days, the new confirmed cases grew faster than the off–quarantine numbers, causing the overall number of active cases to rise.
The rolling seven-day average number of new cases across the county is showing signs of leveling off at 47 or so reported cases per day. It is a higher than desirable number but remained in a steady range for the last two weeks, a sign, perhaps, that the predicted surge following Thanksgiving is not occurring in the county.
Health officials continue to urge vigilance and adherence to health protocols while the county awaits a vaccine being generally available.
To contact Vince Conti, email vconti@cmcherald.com.
