Five more people in Central Oregon have died from COVID-19, the Oregon Health Authority reported Tuesday. Before mid-July, Deschutes, Crook and Jefferson counties had reported zero deaths from the virus. That spiked later in the month, after an outbreak at Mt. Bachelor Memory Care in Bend, where three residents died last week.
The deaths reported Tuesday include a 77-year-old woman from Jefferson County, who died at St. Charles Bend July 23, an 88-year-old man in Deschutes County who died at St. Charles Bend July 25, a 78-year-old woman in Deschutes County, whose location of death has not yet been released and who died July 23, and two 64-year-old and 82-year-old women in Jefferson County, whose locations of death are still being confirmed. OHA reported that each of the five Central Oregonians who died either had underlying health conditions, or for whom the “presence of underlying conditions are being confirmed.”
Tuesday’s death totals bring Oregon’s total deaths to over 300, at 303 as of the date of the report.
This article appears in Jul 22-29, 2020.
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Three of the individuals who passed were in hospice care before they were diagnosed. Did they die with Covid or from Covid? In a situation like that, how are those determinations being made?
This will probably cause more questions than it answers, this is copied directly from the CDC website:
As of April 14, 2020, CDC case counts and death counts include both confirmed and probable cases and deaths. This change was made to reflect an interim COVID-19 position statement issued by the Council for State and Territorial Epidemiologists on April 5, 2020. The position statement included a case definition and made COVID-19 a nationally notifiable disease. Nationally notifiable disease cases are voluntarily reported to CDC by jurisdictions.
A confirmed case or death is defined by meeting confirmatory laboratory evidence for COVID-19.
A probable case or death is defined by one of the following:
Meeting clinical criteria AND epidemiologic evidence with no confirmatory laboratory testing performed for COVID-19
Meeting presumptive laboratory evidence AND either clinical criteria OR epidemiologic evidence
Meeting vital records criteria with no confirmatory laboratory testing performed for COVID19.
So as you can see, no lab test to positively identify COVID 19 as the cause of death is required to report a cause of death as Covid 19
Dear Leaders In Bend:
Why are you not doing your jobs and closing down bars, Airbnb’s, vacation rentals in Bend? I went on a walk last night masked and NO ONE near or at the river were wearing masks or social distancing. Restaurants were packed. And everyone other license plate is from California or Washington. This is out of control.
We were notified last night that as of now, school is not going back in session for BLS due to rise in cases and deaths in our community. I am seriously questioning our leadership here and does our leadership have other monetary interests contributing to the reason that they are not closing things down so we can get our kids back to school???? I am hearing from other residents in Bend that leaders are invested in real estate rentals and businesses here in Bend and they simply don’t want to loose the income. I surely hope this is not the case. As leaders, you are elected to serve our community and keep the communities best interest on the forefront. We need to go back to phase one or set some tough guidelines and make sacrifices to get our children back to school.
Quibbling over whether or not COVID-19 is the direct cause of a death is easy to do when no one you know or are related to has died in this pandemic. People are dying. Yes, of course, underlying conditions make some more susceptible than others. Does that make their deaths somehow not worthy of acknowledgement? Less important? I have a good friend who was 49-years-old, lived a very healthy life, and had no “underlying conditions” who died alone on an incubator one week after being diagnosed. She was a health care provider and if she had chosen to not try to help others hit by the coronavirus she’d be alive today. This is a real virus and it is really killing people. Wake up.
Now let’s look at the number of deaths caused by people not getting the treatment they need. I have a friend with cancer. He needs surgery to remove the mass. The hospital, again, is classifying cancer surgeries as “Non-Essential.”
Yes, the bars, brewpubs, and restaurants were opened too early and the local economy will pay the price. Meanwhile the vacation rental across the street from our house still has one guest group after another. Anyone know where I can get a “Go Home” lawn sign?