Haywood County COVID-19 cases increase by 130 in 4 days

Haywood County -- Haywood County Department of Public Health: FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE – Jan. 19, 2021

In the four days since the last press release, Haywood County Public Health has received notice of 130 new cases of COVID-19.  As of 5 p.m. Jan. 18, 2021, the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services has recorded a total of 2,906 cases in Haywood County since the pandemic began. There are 461 people isolating with COVID-19. The health department is monitoring these cases.

The health department is continuing to track the trend of people who refuse or ignore case monitoring or contact efforts. There are 48 such uncooperative positive cases now who may be ignoring the advice to isolate from others. Since we started tracking this number there have been 135 such cases considered released, meaning all attempts to communicate with them have been exhausted and the isolation period based on positive result date has passed.

“It’s been almost a year now that we’ve been coping with this pandemic and it’s natural to feel frustrated and tired as it continues this long, but we want to urge patience at this time as vaccines begin to roll out. Many people are enthusiastic about the prospect of getting vaccinated and we want to encourage that enthusiasm while reminding people even at maximum capacity, it will take some time for vaccines to be available to everyone. Please be patient and wait for your group’s turn, everyone will have their chance soon, ” said Interim Health Director Garron Bradish.

Vaccination is now well underway for people over the age of 75 in the 1B category. Although the county has not been allotted enough doses to cover this entire group at once, appointments are being scheduled in large groups, dependent upon vaccine availability. If you or a loved one over the age of 65 need to register, please do so at https://www.haywoodcountync.gov/vaccine or by calling 828-356-2019. 

For more information on the vaccine and the general order of distribution visit: https://covid19.ncdhhs.gov/vaccines

As the vaccine rollout continues, groups of individuals eligible to begin pre-registering for the vaccine will be notified through the health department’s weekly vaccine information updates.

During this period of increased caseload,  the health department has suspended monitoring cases in quarantine, and therefore will not report a COVID-19 working number until further notice. The health department is continuing to conduct case investigations and monitoring of positive cases and asks that the positives notify their close contacts of exposure. A close contact is identified as anyone who spent more than 15 minutes within 6 feet of a positive while not wearing a mask, within the time frame of 2 days prior to symptom onset (or test date if asymptomatic) to the date that the positive person goes into self-isolation.  

“If you have tested positive and you have friends or family that meet the close contact criteria, encourage them to self-quarantine and get tested 5-6 days after their exposure to you. Our end goal is to reduce community spread, so one day we can all be together again,” said Bradish. “Since we have placed a hold on monitoring close contacts, we can’t currently provide quarantine documentation for employers. Businesses need to be mindful that having quarantined employees return to work too quickly could cause a cluster of cases in the workplace. We ask that employers rely on the honor system and encourage employees who have been exposed to quarantine for the recommended time frame of 14 days from the date of exposure to help us reduce the spread during this surge of cases.”