Losing ground. Tri-Cities area slips behind in COVID reopening effort

The Tri-Cities area lost ground this week in its efforts to meet state requirements to reopen more businesses during the COVID pandemic.

No part of the state will move forward to Phase 2 of reopening under the new Healthy Washington — Roadmap to Recovery plan, according to an update released by the Washington state Department of Health on Friday.

Gov. Jay Inslee announced earlier this month that he was dividing the state into eight regions with counties evaluated jointly for the new Healthy Washington Roadmap to Recovery.

The new plan, which starts with just two phases, focuses on reducing the rate of new COVID cases.

All eight regions of the state were rolled back to a revised Phase 1 as the new reopening plan launched. Most indoor restaurant and bar service, small indoor gatherings and indoor fitness center use at 25% capacity will not be allowed until Phase 2.

On Friday, the state reported that the South Central Region, including the Tri-Cities, had met just one of four goals to advance to Phase 2. Its rate of new hospital admissions met state requirements.

The previous Friday it was meeting two of the goals, a decreasing case rate and declining hospital admissions.

Tri-Cities region scores

Here’s how the South Central Region stood as of Jan. 22:

▪ The region had a 36% decrease in hospital admissions for COVID-19 for the two weeks from Dec. 20 to Jan. 2 to the two weeks of Jan. 3-16.

That meets the state requirement of a 10% decrease.

▪ The six counties combined had a 9% increase in new cases of COVID-19 per 100,000 people from the two weeks of Dec. 13-26 to the two weeks of Dec. 27 to Jan. 9.

That does not meet the state requirement of a 10% reduction.

Last Friday it had a 22% decrease.

▪ Some 90% of hospital intensive care unit beds were in use by patients of all types on average for each day from Jan. 10-16.

The region barely missed the state requirement of less than 90% ICU occupancy for the second week in a row.

Last Friday it had 91% occupancy.

▪ The region had 23% of COVID-19 tests return positive for the week of Dec. 27 to Jan. 2, the most recent period for which testing data is complete.

That is up from 19% positive test results reported the Friday before.

The state requirement is fewer than 10% positive tests for the coronavirus.

To move to Phase 2, the South Central Region will need to reverse its rising case rate trend, reduce its percentage of positive test results and have just slightly fewer ICU beds in use.

One other region in the state also met just one of the four requirements for moving to Phase 2, the Southwest region. It includes the five counties along the Columbia River west of Benton County.

None of the eight regions of the state were meeting more than two of the requirements to move to Phase 2.

The state will issue its next Roadmap to Recovery report on Jan. 29.