Empty beds in the hallway of the emergency room at Salem Hospital (Amanda Loman/Salem Reporter)
Covid cases are ticking up in the Salem area and statewide, while average hospitalizations are up at Salem Hospital. Here’s our report for May 6, 2022.
HOSPITAL CAPACITY
The number of Covid patients at Salem Hospital is climbing again.
Salem Health stopped publishing weekly reports on Covid inpatients on March 25 as the number has continued to decline. As of Friday, May 6, the hospital had 14 inpatients with Covid, five of whom were in the ICU, and three on a ventilator.
There were 495 of 494 licensed hospital beds in use. The hospital is able to have more patients than it’s licensed for under emergency declarations related to the pandemic.
Lisa Wood, Salem Health spokeswoman, said the number of hospitalized Covid patients over the past week has remained between eight and 16. “The rise in cases is consistent with county and statewide increases,” Wood said.
The graph below shows the hospital’s trends from the start of the delta surge until March 25, when weekly reporting stopped.
(Graphic by Saphara Harrell/Salem Reporter)
Region 2, which is Marion, Polk, Yamhill, Linn, Benton and Lincoln counties, had 22 people hospitalized with Covid as of May 5, compared with 20 the week prior and 21 two weeks ago.
CASES
The number of new Covid cases reported climbed statewide and in Marion and Polk Counties. This data is for the week ending May 4.
Marion County: 67.6 new Covid cases per day on average, a rate of 135.5 cases per 100,000 residents.
That’s up from 51.9 average daily cases for the week ending April 27, and 35 average daily cases the week ending April 20.
6.4% of Covid tests this week were positive, unchanged from last week.
Polk County: 18.4 new Covid cases per day on average, a rate of 153.9 cases per 100,000 residents.
That’s up slightly from an average of 12.7 daily cases the week ending April 27 and 12.4 daily cases the week ending April 20.
7.6% of Covid tests this week were positive, up from 4.3% last week.
Oregon: 1,217.9 new cases per day on average, up from 896 average daily cases the week prior; 9.9% of tests positive, compared with 7.6% the week prior.
VACCINATION AND BREAKTHROUGH CASES
In April, Oregon Health Authority had 18,608 Covid cases reported to the agency, according to a breakthrough case report released May 5. Of those, 8,815 (47.4%) were in people not vaccinated against Covid, and 9,769 (52.5%) were in people vaccinated. Some 6,142 cases, or 33%, were in people vaccinated and boosted against Covid. About 76% of Oregon adults are fully vaccinated against Covid, and 45% are boosted.
The rate of Covid infection in unvaccinated Oregonians in April was double the rate in vaccinated Oregonians, the report said. The Oregon Health Authority will release its next breakthrough case report June 7.
MANDATES
Oregon’s mask mandate lifted on March 11 at 11:59 p.m.
-Rachel Alexander
