Fear of the highly contagious Delta variant is driving an uptick in COVID-19 vaccinations in the county as well as statewide, but experts question whether it will be sufficient to once again flatten the curve.

The state’s weekly epidemiology report released Wednesday by the Oklahoma State Department of Health showed 11,387 new COVID cases reported the week of July 25-31, a 40.4% increase over the previous week.

Based on population, Oklahoma ranks eighth in both the number of new cases reported in the last seven days and in cumulative cases since the start of the pandemic, according to the report.

Measuring the number of deaths per 100,000 in population, the state ranks 21st in total deaths and 12th in deaths occurring in the last week.

Nearly three and a half times as many new cases were reported in July (27,246) than in the month before (6,083).

Daily totals have increased exponentially from a low of only 99 new cases reported June 7 to 2,342 new cases reported Thursday.

Delta Driven

The sudden spike in numbers is driven almost entirely by the highly contagious Delta variant of the virus, which made its way into the state’s far northeast corner via Arkansas, Missouri and Louisiana and is now fueling rapid community spread.

“We have watched this wave come from northeast Oklahoma and we watched cases start to rise and the hospitals starting to fill,” Maggie Jackson, district community engagement and planning director for the state health department, said.

“Kingfisher County has been slower to increase, but now we are watching cases starting to pick up again.”

University of Oklahoma’s chief COVID officer, Dr. Dale Brazler, said in a Thursday interview that “almost the entire state is in substantial or high risk for community transmission.”

Renewed Stress on Hospitals

“When I think of the Delta variant, with the sharp rise in cases, we can expect a sharp rise in hospitalization,” Brazler said. “Whether we like it or not, a substantial portion of the people who test positive do end up in the hospital.”

Contributing to the shrinking supply of hospital beds is the medical staffing shortage that has intensified over the course of the pandemic, Brazler said.

More than 16,700 state healthcare workers are reported to have contracted COVID since January 2020, 72 of whom died, according to the epidemiology report.

That doesn’t count those who lost family members to the disease or suffered other illnesses triggered by the relentless stress of long hours in overcrowded hospitals during previous surges, all of which led to high turnover.

Brazler noted that many nurses left hospital bedside care for other nursing opportunities and many others left nursing altogether.

“Just because you have a bed available, you still have to have a person to staff it,” he said. “We’ve lost a lot of nurses during COVID.”

A shortage of available beds has left some recent COVID victims stranded in emergency rooms for days, or transported to hospitals in neighboring states where beds were available.

Former Kingfisher resident Jeanne (Dial) Gang spent four days in late July on a ventilator in an Okmulgee emergency room with no ICU bed available in Oklahoma, Texas, Arkansas or Missouri.

Finally transferred to a bed at a Tahlequah hospital, Gang remains intubated and in critical condition, her daughters Kassidy Kern and Kimberly Kern report.

COVID victims aren’t the only ones who suffer as available beds fill, Brazler said.

“It’s getting more and more difficult for rural hospitals to find a place to send any patients, not just Covid patients,” he said. “I think we’re going to see that much more commonly now.”

Another School Surge?

In its original form, COVID-19 infection numbers ticked upward as primary, secondary and college students returned to classrooms last August, a precursor to a new wave of infection that rolled through the state last fall and winter.

Brazler said it’s not unreasonable to expect a similar upswing this fall, except it will be building on a higher baseline of existing cases.

“What you see when you look at the seven day rolling average for the last month to month and a half is an almost exponential increase in the total number of cases,” he said. “We’re way ahead of the number of new cases per day than we were before school started last year.”

Kingfisher County has a slightly lower risk of community spread than its neighbors, based on data Brazler shared with media on Thursday.

However, 35 active cases were reported in the county on Thursday’s situation update from the state health department, compared to just 17 active cases on the same day last year.

“The biggest thing we’ve been talking about at the health department is what it will look like when schools start back,” said Jackson, who works in Canadian, Blaine, Garfield, Grant, Logan and Major counties as well as Kingfisher.

“The beginning of school is going to be tough.”

The Vaccination Factor

The rapid spread of the Delta variation is not changing every mind firmly opposed to the COVID-19 vaccine.

But for some fence-riders and procrastinators, Delta appears to be a motivator for action.

Sluggish at the beginning of summer, vaccination rates are starting to pick up again in Kingfisher County, as well as statewide.

Kingfisher County Health Department has administered a total of 5,122 shots so far in 2021, but the early flood of appointment requests had dwindled to just a trickle until recently, Jackson said.

“With the recent news about the Delta variant, our vaccination numbers are picking up again,” she said, noting that 75 shots were administered over the last week.

According to last week’s epidemiology report, 48.3% of Kingfisher County adults have received at least one dose, compared to 59.1% in Canadian County, 49.2% in Garfield County, 47.2% in Blaine County and 33.9% in Logan County.

“We’re scheduling mobile vaccination events across our district to make it more accessible and also make it easy for someone making a last-minute decision to go ahead and grab one,” Jackson said.

One of those events is scheduled at Hennessey Public Schools Aug. 11 and will be open to the general public as well as students and teachers.

Those mobile events also will offer TDaP booster shots for middle school and older students and adults who may have missed a booster last year due to the pandemic.

“It’s totally safe to get both the booster shot and a COVID vaccine the same day,” Jackson said.

A total of 2,514 breakthrough cases – those who have tested positive although fully vaccinated – have been reported statewide as of Aug. 2.

But vaccinated individuals account for just over one-10th of 1% of hospitalizations and just over one-100th of 1% of deaths.

“All the current vaccines provide great efficacy against being infected,” Dr. James Papan, pathology department faculty member at the OU Health Sciences Center, said. “But if you’re vaccinated, you’re 99.999% protected against hospitalization and death.”