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Covid-Related Hospitalizations Continue To Increase In Spokane

The number of Covid-related hospitalizations in Spokane County continues to inch up.

Today [Thursday], Health Officer Bob Lutz reported 30 people are receiving care, up two from Wednesday. Eighteen of them are Spokane County residents, up three from Wednesday. Ten are in intensive care.

Lutz told a county health board meeting that the percentage of cases attributed to people 20-to-39 years old is also increasing. He says 41% of the county’s 1,122 cases fall into that demographic.

More and more, he says, people are contracting it during social times, rather than at the workplace.

“We were on a phone call with a restaurant/tavern and, without naming this institution, I now have 21 cases over the course of two weekends and it’s likely that I will have more individuals. This was a restaurant-slash-bar-tavern where physical distancing was obviously not being followed. Masking was not present, based upon case interviews, so there’s great concern," he said.

Lutz says the county also continues to see inmates from the Coyote Ridge Correctional Facility, north of the Tri-Cities. Many of them are sent to the temporary regional care center at the Airway Heights prison.

As to whether Spokane is seeing many cases from Yakima, where the outbreak is particularly active, Lutz says not so much. He says many patients there are sent west to Seattle. He says Spokane has seen a few people sent up from the Tri-Cities, where the numbers have also been increasing.