After three days of triple digit new Covid cases in Spokane, the weekend and Monday brought better news. The health district reported 192 cases, an average of 64 a day, from Saturday through Monday.
Health Officer Bob Lutz says younger people who test positive are helping to drive recent increases in the count.
“Over the last two weeks we’ve been monitoring our incidence rates in our younger demographics and breaking it down by our 13-to-18 year age group. Our incidence rate over the last two weeks was 192.7. So we’ve seen a significant uptake in that," he said.
Lutz says younger children in the 0-to-12 age group have positive coronavirus rates that are less than a third of the rate for the teenagers. That’s one reason why Lutz says he supported opening up schools for kindergarten-through-the-second grade.
He says he’ll continue to work with school districts to monitor health-related metrics. Lutz says there are no specific timetables for districts to open school to older students.