The COVID-19 pandemic has created new obstacles for business, employees, elected officials, job seekers, and everyone in the Benicia community. The City of Benicia engaged Dr. Robert Eyler, PhD of Economics, to help us understand what this extraordinary event means for our local economy and our recovery.
VALLEJO, Calif. – At the Windsor Vallejo Care Center, 76 patients and 23 health workers have now tested positive for COVID-19.
Of those 99 cases, one of those patients is 64-year-old Joseph Quirarte of Pacifica.
He’s had both legs amputated because of diabetes. Now he has tested positive for the cornavirus.
His two children, including a son, an army staff sergeant stationed in Germany, are worried and frustrated.
“It’s a helpless feeling. I want to help, but I am on a separate continent,” said Sgt, Joe Quirarte Jr. from his base in Germany.
Daughter Maria Quirarte lives closer to the facility, but like all family members of nursing home patients, is not allowed to visit.
“We’re worried the COVID is in his system and we don’t know how his body is going to react. We are trying to be cautious and make sure he gets his meds on time,” she said.
The virus has hit the facility like an avalanche. On Friday there were 34 cases reported. Now it has almost tripled.
Solano County Public Health said it is working closely with the facility to manage the outbreak.
Quirarte’s family said his father had two roommates who also tested positive and were moved to another room, for which they are grateful.
“He’s had two amputated legs and a toilet that wasn’t working. He has since been moved from that room,” said Maria.
“You see the news stories about other facilities and just hope it won’t happen to your parent’s facility,” said Joe Jr.
State public health records show Windsor Vallejo was cited for improper infection control practices in March 2019.
The Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services gave the facility a rating of two stars out of five, base on health inspections and overall quality.
“Crucially, regulators have often given infection control pretty short shrift in terms of prioritizing inspections. And we are paying for it now,” says Michael Dark of the non-profit California. Advocates for Nursing Home Reform
To the Quirartes, the health care staff seems overwhelmed.
“We want to make sure they get the help they need to help our father, and others,” said Maria.
Management of Windsor Vallejo did not respond to our messages.
(Note that 1 new case was added on Friday 5/1 AFTER the 4pm report was posted, raising Friday’s total to 267.)
Solano County reported 1 new case late on Friday and 53 NEW POSITIVE CASES over the weekend and Monday – total is now 320. 1 new death, total now at 6.
OVER THE WEEKEND:
BY AGE GROUP
HOSPITALIZATIONS: 54 of Solano’s 320 cases resulted in hospitalizations, an increase of only 3 over the weekend. Relatively good news – a small increase despite the big number of new cases.
ACTIVE CASES: 65 of the 320 are active cases, an increase of 15 over Friday’s total of 40. The county does not report WHERE the active cases are. Below you will see that only 14 are currently hospitalized, which leaves 51 of these 65 active cases out in our communities somewhere, and hopefully quarantined.
The County’s “Hospital Impact” graph shows 14 of the 54 hospitalized cases are CURRENTLY hospitalized, 3 more than on Friday. The County’s count of ICU beds available and ventilator supply remains at “GOOD” at 31-100%. (No information is given on our supply of test kits, PPE and staff.)
CITY DATA
TESTING
The County reports that 5,160 residents have been tested as of today. This is an increase of 1,061 residents over the 3 days since Friday’s total of 4,099. That is only an average of just over 350 per day, about the same as on last Friday, but much better than Thursday when we added only 37 and Wednesday only 106. We are still not up to the earlier times when the County reported daily increases of 505 and 438 new tests. Testing numbers need to be much higher! We have a long way to go: only 1% of Solano County’s 447,643 residents (2019) have been tested.
The chart above shows Saturday’s big jump in the infection’s trajectory in Solano County. We may be seeing a flattening of the overall curve, but our nursing homes bear watching! (And I haven’t heard anything about Solano County jails….)
Nearly 100 individuals have been infected at the Windsor Vallejo Nursing & Rehabilitation Center with COVID-19, Solano County Public Health Administrator Jayleen Richards confirmed to the Times-Herald on Monday.
Richards said 76 residents and 23 health care workers have tested positive for the Novel Coronavirus.
Richards said the Solano County Public Health Department is “working closely” with the facility to manage the cluster outbreak. She said infected patients have been moved to another part of the facility to recover, while infected workers are recovering at home.
County officials began testing residents and health care workers last week after the facility reported nearly a dozen residents had been infected as of April 24. That initial number ballooned to 34 last week, and then doubled again with 76 residents infected with COVID-19 as of Monday.
It wasn’t immediately known if there have been any deaths at the facility due to COVID-19.
Attempts to reach facility officials proved unsuccessful on Monday, as no one answered the facility’s main phone line when the Times-Herald called for a comment. In addition, Josh Sable, general counsel for Windsor Healthcare, couldn’t be immediately reached for comment.
“I’m extremely concerned about the well being of the patients and staff members,” Vallejo Mayor Bob Sampayan said by phone when told about the 99 infected.
Sampayan said he’d like to see the non-infected residents be moved to another care facility while the infected patients recover inside Windsor.
The mayor said it might be necessary at some point for the state to step in to help stop the spread of Coronavirus in the facility.
Richards previously told this newspaper that the testing data from Windsor “has been and will be included on the COVID-19 Dashboard produced daily by Solano Public Health.”
The city of Vallejo has the most coronavirus cases in Solano County with 125 as of last Friday.
Eight other Solano County care facilities have reported no COVID-19 infections of residents or staff members, as of May 1, according to the state.
Check back as this article will be updated.
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