(Spirit Lake)– Officials with Dickinson County Public Health say they’re becoming increasingly concerned over the recent continued increase in COVID-19 cases in the county. Katy Burke, the agency’s Director of Population and Public Health, tells KUOO news it points out the importance of several factors…
“At this point Steve we are seeing our seven day positivity rate at 10.9 percent so it is trending upward. Our 14 day we were at 8.7. So we are one of the highest percentages in the state and we’ve continued to be for the last few weeks. So what we’ve seen in seven days, we’ve had 33 more of those positive cases. It is a good reminder that COVID is still with us and it is really important to be proactive and to use those mitigation strategies, continue to use those, and then also really to get vaccinated.”
And when it comes to vaccinations, Burke says there’s good news and bad news to report…
“We are thrilled that we’ve had almost 7,500 people get doses through just Dickinson County Public Health alone and we’ve been grateful for all of the support that Hy-Vee has offered our community as well and other local partners getting the vaccines out. But we have seen a stall in vaccine interest so we want to encourage people to continue to get vaccinated. It is really important that we work on getting our percentage rates higher in the community so we can, we can really fight COVID and get past this.”
Burke says Dickinson County Public Health will be offering several walk-in clinics in coming days and weeks for the Moderna vaccine…
“For the next three Thursdays on tomorrow, April 22nd and the next week, April 29th, and then the following Thursday, May 6th, we are, excuse me, May 6th, we will be having walk-in clinics from 10:00 to 2:00 for anyone that first or second doses, and then we also have people scheduled for in that time as well.”
Those clinics will be held at the Lakes Area Senior Citizens Center in Spirit Lake.
