Hill County sees uptick in COVID-19 cases

Hill County Public Health Director and Health Officer Kim Berg said, in a Hill County Board of Health COVID-19 update last Friday, that the area has seen an uptick in cases these past few weeks.

Berg said by 11 a.m. that day the department had already found four new cases bringing the total for the county to 17 active cases with three hospitalizations.

She said contact tracing is still ongoing so the numbers may still go up, but for now, 60 people are in quarantine and being monitored by her department.

She said these new cases are not all connected and the area still has community spread, with exposures happening at workplaces, schools and more.

Berg said this recent crop of cases is also more evenly spread out in terms of age group than it was a few weeks ago with about half of them being in people 30 years or younger.

“We’re seeing a pretty even spread with our new active cases,” she said.

Berg said since the last update two weeks ago the county has had one more case in someone who was fully vaccinated, and seven cases so far have been identified as variants.

Of these cases, she said, three are classified as variants of interest and four are variants of concern by the Centers for Disease Control.

A variant of interest is defined by the CDC as one with specific genetic markers that have been associated with things like reduced neutralization by antibodies generated against previous infection or vaccination, reduced efficacy of treatments, or a predicted increase in transmissibility or disease severity.

Variants of concern are ones for which there is evidence of an increase in transmissibility, more severe disease — e.g., increased hospitalizations or deaths — significant reduction in neutralization by antibodies generated during previous infection or vaccination, reduced effectiveness of treatments or vaccines, or diagnostic detection failures.

The CDC also defines a third category, Variant of High Consequence, which means it is one that has clear evidence that prevention measures or medical countermeasures have significantly reduced effectiveness relative to previously circulating variants, but so far no known variants of COVID-19 in the world rise to this level of classification.

On the vaccination front, Berg said, 41 percent of the eligible population in Hill County has been vaccinated, up from two weeks ago by 5 percent.

She said the state is at about 43 percent.

She said the department is still offering the Moderna vaccine, which is approved for everyone 18 and older, on the third Tuesday of every month. The next offering is set for June 15.

She said people can call 406-400-2415 to get scheduled for vaccination.

Berg said she’s hoping the department will have access to the Pfizer vaccine, which is approved for people 12 and older, as early as next week, but certainly within the next two weeks.

The next COVID-19 update will be June 18 at 1 p.m.