May 10, 2021

COVID-19 Update: This Week’s Numbers

Greetings on this fine morning. Hope your Mother’s Day weekend was full of love and happiness.

This week COVID-19 numbers continue to improve across the US with very few exceptions. For the third time in seven weeks, US average daily cases have decreased, this week by 30% to 41,057 (27% decrease last week, 16% decrease two weeks ago and 5% increase three weeks ago).

Locally there have been significant improvements in hospital admissions and daily cases.

El Paso Data

Average Daily New Cases: 67 (133 one week ago and 144 two weeks ago)

Average Daily Hospitalized Patients: 131 (155 one week ago and 170 two weeks ago)—(9% of Total Beds / 23% of Available Beds)

Average Daily ICU Patients: 40 (48 one week ago and 50 two weeks ago)—(17% of Total Beds / 52% of Available Beds)

Known Active Cases: 1,831 (2,258 one week and 2,375 two weeks ago)

Weekly Mortality

El Paso: 31 (28 last week)

Texas: 333 (370 last week)

US: 4,709 (4,846 last week)

Global: 90,262 (93,097 last week)

At this time, we continue to advise shelter-at-home until you and your contacts are vaccinated

This week the average number of hospitalized patients in El Paso decreased 18% (10% decrease last week). Average ICU patients decreased 21% (4% decrease last week). Overall hospitalizations have improved 13 out of the past 15 weeks. Daily cases have decreased 10 out of the past 14 weeks (with a 50% decrease this week).

Our current risk of COVID-19 infection and spread remains high with an estimated 190,000 who have neither had COVID-19 nor been vaccinated. With the authorization of the Pfizer vaccine for children, there may be additional room for improvement over the next few weeks. As a public good (and duty), please do not relax your efforts until we are truly safe and you and those you associate with are vaccinated. Full immunity does not develop until after the second dose of the two shot vaccines (1 week after Pfizer and 2 weeks after Moderna) and you can still catch and transmit COVID-19. With Janssen, immunity begins 2 weeks after the single shot.

COVID-19 Update: Vaccination

Pfizer is expected to gain emergency authorization to begin vaccinating children 12 to 15 years old this week. The study with 2,260 participants showed 100% efficacy in preventing COVID-19 infections, hospitalizations and deaths. There were no major adverse reactions or deaths due to the vaccine.

This week worldwide COVID-19 vaccinations reached 1.29 billion doses (1.18 billion last week). US vaccinations stand at 260 million (247 million last week) and the US is currently 3rd best per capita and 2nd best in total vaccinations. China has now vaccinated 324 million. This equates to 17% of the world population and 79% of the US population. About 114 million or 35% of Americans are fully vaccinated (32% last week). India has now vaccinated 12% or 168 million doses, which is the third most overall (population 1.37 billion). Brazil, with a population of 211 million, has vaccinated 47 million or 22%.

To clarify, following per capita vaccinations versus those fully vaccinated is a method of comparing vaccination efforts in different places. However, it includes all doses given and does not always represent immunity.

The US remains second in total vaccinations after being surpassed by China last week.

El Paso continues to make progress toward our threshold for herd immunity of 70 to 90%. As of today 425,536 (412,177 last week) have received at least one dose and 307,279 (277,122 last week) have received both. (Our population 16 and older is 640,180). This means 37% of our population is fully vaccinated. If we add to this an estimated 343,000 infections, our estimated combined immunity is 650,000 or 77% (infections + fully immunized—73% last week). Approximately 190,000 El Paso residents have not been vaccinated.

If you have the chance to be vaccinated, please take it. In Texas all adults are now eligible for vaccination and children 12 to 15 are expected to be eligible this week. Remember, so far these vaccines appear to prevent nearly 100% of hospitalizations and deaths due to COVID-19. To reiterate, these vaccines are both extremely safe and extremely effective. Use of the Janssen vaccine has been cleared by the FDA, including for premenopausal women. The six widely publicized cases of rare blood clots among 7 million vaccine recipients turns out to be near the incidence of this disorder in the general population.

Please get vaccinated as soon as possible, if not for yourself, for the good of others.

Vaccination Links:

Text or call myWELLNESS® at (915) 845-5700

University Medical Center

Immunize El Paso

City of El Paso Department of Public Health

Albertsons

Walmart

CVS

Walgreens

UTEP (Students and Employees)

VA Patients

El Paso Times COVID-19 Vaccination Guide

myWELLNESS® COVID-19 Vaccine Update

Military Retirees / Active Duty: WBAMC call (915) 742-2915

Wishing you good health,

CG Escandon, MD

Douglas Payne, MD

COVID-19 Information

For the week of 5/10/2021

Assumptions:

• Mortality rate between 0.5% and 1.5% — using 0.75%

• This means 1 death for every 133 infections

• For May 9 — 2,571 total deaths = 343,000 total cases

• 59% or 497,000 El Pasoans have not been infected yet

• The number of deaths lags behind the number of infections by 2-4 weeks

• We estimate the current infection rate to be higher than stated as of May 9th

Assumptions:

Staffed Hospital Beds: 1754

Available Hospital Beds: 572 (1/3 of total)

Staffed ICU Beds: 234

Available ICU Beds: 77 (1/3 of total)