In the last day, Summit County joined a growing list of counties throughout the state that have substantial spread of COVID-19. Last week, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued updated guidance recommending to those who have been fully vaccinated against COVID-19 to wear a mask in indoor public spaces where coronavirus spread is considered high or substantial. The CDC said on Wednesday that nearly 80% of counties throughout the U.S. have high or substantial spread of the virus.
The number of new infections in Summit County, which had been low throughout June and into July, is experiencing an uptick, with infections from the delta variant also on the rise, according to Summit County Public Health.
The health department is collaborating with Akron Children’s Hospital, Cleveland Clinic Akron General and Summa Health on the mask recommendation.
The seven-day cumulative average of COVID-19 cases in the county had hovered in the single digits for a few weeks, but since July 14, that number has steadily risen to 37, as of Aug. 3, according to Summit County’s COVID-19 Dashboard.
That increase is one reason health officials want everyone to begin masking up again, said Health Commissioner Donna Skoda. People should mask up outdoors as well if they are in settings in which it’s difficult to keep a safe social distance.
The CDC reports the delta variant of the virus has grown from 1% to 80% of all cases since May, calling it more contagious than the flu and the common cold, and just as contagious as chicken pox.
“Therefore, you should protect yourself, because we now know that even if you're vaccinated, you can still perhaps have enough of a viral load to spread the virus,” Skoda said. “So we want to protect everyone.”
Wearing a mask, social distancing and sanitizing are still the top ways to protect against a COVID-19 infection, she said.
About half of Summit County’s 540,000 residents are at least partially vaccinated, according to Summit County’s COVID-19 Dashboard.
Health officials strongly encourage people to get vaccinated to help the county achieve herd immunity.
“We've been using that sort of magical 70%,” Skoda said, referring to the percentage of vaccinated people needed to reach herd immunity. “And that's about 100,000 more people that are eligible to get it, that could get it. We're trying to get anybody that will take it.”
The county has had a small increase in people getting vaccinated, she said, in part, because of incentives the health department and its partners are offering.
People should be mindful of those who can’t get vaccinated, or who are at greater risk of infection, she said, such as kids under 12, people undergoing treatment for cancer and other diseases, and those with compromised immune systems.
“We have to be extremely concerned for everyone,” Skoda said. “This is a very contagious airborne virus. You have to be thinking all the time, ‘I want to maintain social distance. I want to protect myself and others around me.’”
Summit County currently has no hot spots for COVID-19, she said, but most cases are in areas with the fewest vaccinated people, Skoda said.
“And if you think about it, it makes sense — you have more spread if people don't have protections,” she said. “And when you give the virus a place to go, trust me, it's going to take it because this is one smart virus.”
There is also a growing number of residents who are considered “long haulers,” with side effects from a COVID-19 infection that last, she said.
“If we could somehow identify who was at greatest risk, who had the most risk for these serious side effects, it would be one thing, but we can't,” she said. “So the best thing is for everybody to protect themselves from ever getting it.”
Although researchers don’t yet have all the answers about the delta variant, they do know it will keep mutating, Skoda said. And they don’t know what future mutations will look like.
“A virus mutates all the time and it could mutate 100 times,” she said. “But only one or two really have any serious consequences. That's the issue.”
Getting vaccinated helps stop the spread, which helps stop the virus from being able to mutate, she said.
“Then it doesn't have anybody to infect. That's why basic disease control works,” she said.
The majority of vaccinated people who do get infected have only slight symptoms, she said.
“They think they have a summer cold, they think they have some allergies or a little bit of a sore throat,” she said.
Anyone who has symptoms for longer than a couple days should get tested, she said. Check the health department website for testing locations.
About 25% of people will never get vaccinated, Skoda estimates. Fears of future side effects from the vaccine are unfounded, because the vaccine is messenger RNA, which tells your system to fight COVID-19, according to Skoda.
“They're not DNA. They can't get into your genetic material,” she said. “They just create this memory in your immune system that says, ‘If you see this, you better respond.’ That's kind of how it works. It's very simple. It's not doing anything to you, but making a memory and then going away.”
It’s also worth noting that women participating in the clinical trials for the vaccine were able to become pregnant, she said, so women should not be worried the vaccine will affect fertility.
The virus will never expire, so it’s important we control it like we have with influenza A and B, she said. But that requires people take the proper precautions.
“We're at the point now where we could win this war if everybody just wore a mask and got a vaccine,” she said.
To see the county’s vaccine clinic and pop-up clinic schedule and pop-up clinics, visit the Summit County Public health website.
At designated clinics, $100 gift cards will be distributed to Ohio Medicaid and MyCare-Ohio participants who get their first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine.