Tracking the Curve

What’s noteworthy in today’s COVID-19 data? 

Garfield County has reported 27 new COVID-19 cases since Monday and Eagle County has added 17 cases. Pitkin County has recorded eight cases since Monday.

Carly Senst, Pitkin County Public Health epidemiologist, said at the county’s board of health meeting on Sept. 8 that the reformulated new COVID-19 vaccine boosters, also called bivalent vaccines, are now available for anyone over the age of 12 for the Pfizer vaccine and over the age of 18 for Moderna.

State vaccination bus will come to El Jebel on Sept. 28 and Glenwood Springs on Sept. 29. The bus will be in Snowmass on Oct. 5 and Aspen on Oct. 6 and 7. (Appointments are required and can be made at this link.) Interested individuals need to have received a primary dose series of any vaccine before getting this updated shot.

“These bivalent vaccines could be effective against any new future variants,” Senst said.

Pitkin County’s COVID seven-day new-case incidence rate increased from 115 per 100,000 on Sept. 19 to 120 on Sept. 22. The county’s test-positivity rate is hovering around 16%

Eagle County’s positivity rate is down from around 15% on Sept. 15 to 11% on Sept. 22. Eagle County’s incidence rate drooped from about 63 on Sept. 15 to 36 on Sept. 22.

It is worth noting that the rise in usage of at-home tests and the reduction in free PCR testing in the valley are impacting positivity rates.

“Symptomatic individuals are more likely to seek testing, both at home testing as well as proctored PCR tests which our local testing providers use,” Carly Senst, the Pitkin County COVID-19 response lead, wrote in an email. “While both positive and negative results are reported with the PCR tests, the only self reported at-home tests we receive are positives.”

Senst added that fewer individuals were seeking testing around the Fourth of July, resulting in a higher rate of symptomatic individuals testing. The festivities also increased the number of cases as people were gathering to celebrate.

“We do indeed continue to have high community spread within the county,” Senst wrote. “Covid-19 is certainly still here and everyone, especially individuals who are at higher risk, should take that into consideration when choosing their personal mitigation strategies.”

Senst noted that percent positive remains an important metric when taken with case rates to know whether we have widespread community transmission.

As testing sites in our valley have changed and more at-home testing kits are being used, Tracking the Curve is no longer reporting data on the number of tests by county. Please, visit Pitkin, Eagle and Garfield counties websites for more information.

Colorado has added about 2,000 new COVID-19 cases since Monday.

The Northwestern region of Colorado, which includes Pitkin, Eagle, Garfield, Clear Creek, Grand, Gilpin, Jackson, Moffat, Rio Blanco and Summit counties, is identified as having an “sustained decline” by the state, which means that COVID incidence is decreasing. Two weeks ago, the state’s dial identified the region as “elevated incidence plateau,” which meant that COVID incidence was high but remained stable.

Hospitalizations across the state are down from last week, with 145 people in the hospital.

There are now about 95.7 million cases and more than one million deaths in the country, according to the CDC.

There are possible discrepancies in the data published by the counties and the state as they don’t necessarily use the same data collection techniques. Also, CDPHE and local public health departments may process and report COVID-19 data on a different day, resulting in a lag in the data.

How many vaccines do we have?

More than 4.5 million people have received at least their first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine in Colorado so far, and approximately 4.1 million people are fully immunized.

According to CDPHE data, about 265,000 vaccine doses have been administered in Eagle, Garfield and Pitkin counties.

According to CDPHE, 99.9% of Pitkin and Eagle County residents aged 5 and older have received at least one dose of vaccine, compared to 74.7 % of Garfield County 5+ residents and 78.9% of Garfield County 12+ residents. That makes Pitkin and Eagle counties two of the four most-vaccinated counties in Colorado, along with San Miguel and San Juan counties.

There is still a wide racial disparity in vaccine uptake. As of March 28, 72% of white people and 41% of the Latino population have received at least one dose of COVID-19 vaccine in Garfield County. That 31-point disparity has widened since Jan. 27, when 68% of the white population and 37% Latinos had received at least one shot in Garfield County, which was a 22-point gap. In May 6, when Aspen Journalism published a story on the vaccination lag for the Latino population in the region, 36% of the white population and 21% of Latinos had received at least one shot in Garfield County, which was a 15-point gap.

Seventy-five percent of the white population in Pitkin County has received at least one shot as of March 28, while 35% of Latinos have received at least one dose of vaccine. About 30% of the vaccines administered in Pitkin County were to individuals with an “unknown” race or ethnicity. In our last update in January, about 31% of Latinos and 74% of whites had received at least one dose. This means that the gap has slightly narrowed from 43 to 40 percentage points.

In Eagle County, as of March 28 as a share of total population, most whites (the data indicates 102% of whites, but not every individual gets counted in the Census) have received at least one dose, while 41% of Latinos have received at least one shot, which is a wider gap than 97% for whites and 41% of Latinos in January. It also bears noting that the state’s data on vaccine uptake by race includes large portions of individuals registering as race “unknown” — about 13% in Garfield County and about 15% in Eagle County, of all vaccines given as of Jan. 27.

Where are the COVID-19 cases in Colorado?

The state’s northwest region, which includes Pitkin, Eagle and Garfield counties, was classified on Sept. 22 “Sustained decline.” This means that “Incidence is decreasing,” according to CDPHE.

How many people are in the hospital?

CPDHE is now updating hospitalization data weekly. During the week of Sept. 21, CDPHE reported 145 patients currently hospitalized for COVID-19 in Colorado. There have been more than 68,000 people who have been hospitalized for COVID-19 across the state since March 2020.

How many people have died from COVID-19?

On Sept. 21, one person died from COVID-19, according to CDPHE. There have been more than 13,000 fatalities due to COVID-19 since March 2020.

Since March 2020, eight Pitkin County, 36 Eagle County and 97 Garfield County residents died from COVID-19.

Different methodologies exist at the state and county level to count COVID-related deaths. Unlike the state, Pitkin County does not make a distinction in its total death count between deaths “among” cases and deaths “due to” COVID. According to the state public health department, while deaths “due to” COVID include deaths where COVID was the main factor, deaths “among” COVID cases include any deaths of an individual who tested positive for COVID-19 in the 30 days preceding their death. They may have died of COVID or some other causes.

Additional data sources and media Selection

Selection from John Hopkins Data is not included anymore as John Hopkins stopped updating its maps on Sept. 21, 2022.

Selection from The COVID Tracking Project is not included anymore as the project ended on March 7, 2021.

“MAP: Where Colorado’s coronavirus cases, deaths have been identified” The Colorado Sun

“Colorado Covid Map and Case Count” The New York Times

“Coronavirus tracked: the latest figures as countries fight Covid-19 resurgence” Financial Times

“Covid-19 pandemic: Tracking the global coronavirus outbreak” BBC