Kansas COVID-19 Update, Week 50

Cases are still decreasing slightly in Kansas, but they're now rising in nearly all the surrounding states, including Missouri, which is now recording new case levels not seen since February. That will eventually have a spillover effect here. In fact, some border counties are already seeing slight increases, including Johnson County, which has more vaccine protection than most. The Delta variant is here, and those who are unvaccinated will be vulnerable.

The Good: The infection reproduction rate, Rt, dropped from 0.96 to 0.94. Always have to take this number with a grain of salt, because we've never done adequate testing. But it's good when Rt goes down. Here's the concerning part: look at this map. Missouri, Arkansas, Oklahoma and Nebraska all now have an Rt above 1.0, which means cases are increasing there. That's trouble for Kansas, especially during the summer travel season. 

The Bad: Hospital capacity fell a bit, from 39% to 37% this week, according to KDHE. That is still enough, but the number of patients hospitalized with COVID continues to climb, albeit slowly. The number in ICU does not seem to be rising proportionately lately, though, which is a good sign. Fewer infections are resulting in life-threatening illness.

The Ugly: Test positivity remained at 10.6%, according to Johns Hopkins. That's fourth-worst in the country, behind Arkansas, Idaho and Oklahoma (Missouri was fifth at 10.2%).

Bonus: An Associated Press analysis of data found that in May only about 1,200 of the country's 853,000 people hospitalized with COVID had been fully vaccinated (that's roughly 0.1%). Only 150 of the 18,000 Americans who died of COVID had been fully vaccinated (that's less than 1%). Hard to know for sure, but it's possible that all or nearly all of those 150 people were taking medications or had underlying medical conditions that made their immune systems less likely to mount a robust response to the vaccine. The vaccines are not foolproof, but they are nearly foolproof. Nearly everyone who is being hospitalized or dying from COVID right now is unvaccinated. That's it. That's the bottom line.