CLEVELAND — Cuyahoga County Executive Armond Budish and leaders from the Cuyahoga County Board of Health provided an update on the county's response to the COVID-19 pandemic during a Friday briefing.
Budish was joined by Cuyahoga County Board of Health Commissioner Terry Allan and the Board of Health Director of Epidemiology, Surveillance, and Informatics, Jana Rush.
According to Budish, a total of 458,000 Cuyahoga County residents have received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine, which is 37% of the county's total population.
"While minorities are still way underserved, we’ve seen progress there too," Budish added, pointing to data that showed the percent of vaccinated people in the zip code covering Central neighborhood is up 71% in the last 3 weeks. In the zip code covering the Kinsman neighborhood, the increase is 77%. For the Collinwood neighborhood, the increase is 80%, and in the Fairfax neighborhood, the increase is 92%.
Friday's briefing came as the race continues to vaccinate as many residents as possible amid concerns about growing case numbers and COVID-19 variants.
Several weeks ago, Ohio was hovering around 1,000 new cases of COVID-19 per day. As of Friday, that number stands at 1,946. Hospitalizations from COVID-19 are also on the rise, according to the Ohio Department of Health.
The statewide numbers were reflected in Cuyahoga County, with more than 200 new cases in the past week. "We're trending in the wrong direction," said Allan.
In addition, the state's average cases for 100,000 people has climbed to 183.7. DeWine has put the target at 50 cases per 100,000 in order for the state's health orders to be removed.
The race against variants is ongoing, with predictions showing that the B117 variant first located in the U.K. is now the dominant strain in the United States, and is known for being spread more easily than the original strain.
There is some good news as far as vaccinations are concerned. Gov. Mike DeWine reported Thursday that one-third of Ohioans have received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine. Locally, the mass vaccination site at Cleveland State University continues to efficiently operate, giving doses to 500 people an hour.
According to Budish, since the mass vaccination site at the Wolstein Center opened three weeks ago, over 120,000 people have received doses.
You can watch Friday's full briefing in the player below:
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