Jay County remains at high risk

Jay County is rated high risk for the spread of coronavirus for the fourth consecutive week.

In its update Wednesday, Indiana State Department of Health was again rated “orange,” joining 68 other counties at the high risk level. Twenty counties were rated “red” (extreme risk) and three were rated yellow (moderate risk).

Jay County’s numbers in the statistics the state uses to determine coronavirus risk levels both went down this week. Its cases per 100,000 residents came in at 401, down from 562 the previous week but still significantly higher than its early August number of 44. Its seven-day positivity rate ticked down slightly to 11.93% from last week’s 12.19%.

Through Tuesday, the county had recorded 90 cases this month, already more than the 69 it had in all of September 2020. (After recording at least 19 new cases each of the first three days of the month, numbers were in single digits the next four days.) August’s 273 cases were the most for a month since December.

Adams, Wells, Blackford, Delaware and Randolph counties all joined Jay in being rated orange this week.

IU Health’s East Central Region reported Tuesday that at that time it had 78 patients hospitalized with COVID-19 at its Jay, Blackford and Ball Memorial facilities. Of those 78, 87% were unvaccinated. All of its 44 patients in intensive care and 21 on a ventilator were unvaccinated.

Jay County continues to have one of the lowest vaccination rates in the state, ranking sixth-lowest among Indiana’s 92 counties.

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention numbers show 38.7% of Jay County residents 12 and older have been fully vaccinated.

The CDC recommends vaccination as the best way to prevent illness and spread of COVID-19.

“COVID-19 vaccines are effective at helping protect against severe disease and death from variants of the virus that causes COVID-19 currently circulating, including the Delta variant,” it says.

Vaccination clinics in Jay County are available at Jay County Health Department, Walgreens in Portland and CVS in both Portland and Dunkirk.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends wearing a mask indoors for those who are in an area of “substantial or high transmission,” which includes Jay County.

Coronavirus is mainly spread through respiratory droplets or particles from an infected person coughing, sneezing, talking or breathing. The CDC reports that it may be possible those particles and droplets remain in the air for an unknown period and travel beyond 6 feet, especially indoors. The virus causes a range of symptoms, including fever and shortness of breath, which can appear two to 14 days after exposure.