by Carrie Moritz, Gazette
Case numbers in South Dakota continue to trend downward, heartening public health experts. As of Tuesday, active cases in South Dakota were at 11,519, which was down from the 16,783 active cases reported last Tuesday. Minnehaha County is down to 2,808 from 3,923 active cases reported last Tuesday. Daily new cases reported in Minnehaha County are still around 200 new cases per day.
The "post-holiday bump" in case numbers that was possible after Thanksgiving did not emerge in South Dakota, allowing health officials to thank residents for their diligence in preventing the spread of the virus. They encourage South Dakotans as a whole to continue practicing mitigation efforts, as the rate of death has increased substantially over the past several weeks. In the last week alone, South Dakota lost 150 people due to COVID-19.
The United States has seen case rates increase substantially across the country over the past two weeks. As of December 15, the United States had crossed over 16.5 million total cases and 300,500 deaths. The country set a single-day record of 232,369 cases reported in one day on Monday, and with the Christmas holiday coming up, health officials worry case counts will only worsen just as vaccine administration gets off the ground.
In comparison, Canada has had just over 475,000 cases and 13,000 deaths, and Mexico has had 1.25 million cases and 114,000 deaths. Mexico is currently 4th in the world for total numbers of deaths from COVID-19, behind the U.S., Brazil (over 180,000 deaths), and India (over 143,000 deaths). Mexico's case-fatality rate is currently one of the highest in the world, at 9.1%, per Johns Hopkins COVID-19 dashboard.
The FDA approved an emergency use authorization for Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine last week, and is expected to approve the Moderna vaccine this week. Sanford, Avera, and Monument Health received a total of 7,800 doses on Monday and Tuesday, allowing them to begin vaccinating their emergency and front-line staff. The second dose will be given in approximately three weeks, and weekly shipments of the vaccine will allow the three health systems to begin protecting their staff.
The SD Department of Health plan indicates that first responders and long-term care workers will also be at the front of the line to receive the vaccine, and residents of care facilities are expected to be next. It takes approximately 14 days for the first dose to partially protect the recipient, and 14 days after the second dose for the recipient to be fully protected.
Enough vaccine to protect the general population isn't expected until early spring.
Due to this, on Monday, hospital administrators Dr. David Basel and Dr. Mike Wilde expressed caution with regards to the upcoming holidays.
"It's still a sobering reality that many of our ICU discharges come because of deaths in the ICU. This is still a very serious problem, we're still seeing very high numbers of very sick individuals, so this is not over by a long shot," said Avera's Dr. Basel.
The CDC is recommending that holiday gatherings be suspended this year, a request that was echoed by Sioux Falls Mayor Paul TenHaken on Monday. If families do decide to gather over Christmas, the CDC recommends all attendees be masked around those they don't live with, to social distance at least 6 feet or more, and to practice hygiene methods such as handwashing and avoiding touching mask, eyes, nose, and mouth.
Garretson School continues positive trends, modifies activities attendance
On Monday, Superintendent Guy Johnson gave a report to the school board that was positive.
The week before, he informed the Gazette that only a small handful of students were out with active cases, though a fairly large number of students were out due to close contact quarantine. Both last week and on Monday, Superintendent Johnson reiterated that low numbers were attributed to the mandatory mask policy in the school.
Because of the policy, not a single case of student-to-student transmission has been found within the walls of the school. Any cases that have occurred between students have been traced to other activities outside of school, he said. Due to this, the mandatory mask policy will be continuing for the foreseeable future.
He was also grateful to see such high masking compliance among attendees at the double-header basketball games that were held this past Friday and Saturday, and is proud of the school's staff.
"This has been a difficult year in every way, but they really rose to the challenge," Supt. Johnson said.
Due to the CDC changing some of its guidelines, on Monday, he also recommended new quarantine guidelines to the school board. If a household member tests positive, the school will continue the 14-day quarantine, but if it is a one-time contact, a student could return to school after 7 days if there is a negative test that was taken on day five. The antigen tests are now allowed, whereas before, a PCR (nose swab) test was required.
The school also changed its guidelines for winter activities. In order to limit attendance, all attendees must have a voucher, and only 4 vouchers per participant for a single event are allowed. For double-headers or multiple contests in one day or evening, only 2 vouchers per participant are allowed. This does not apply to Garretson school students or staff, and there are exceptions that can be requested for split families. All students are required to be masked, and attendees are strongly encouraged to wear a mask.
In order to allow as many people as possible to watch the games, however, all home games will be streamed for free at https://www.nfhsnetwork.com/schools/garretson-high-school-garretson-sd, and will be aired on the Alliance Channel.
