Vaccine numbers continue rising in Washington County

Vaccines are getting in the arms of Washington County residents.

Over the past week, 725 residents completed their rounds of COVID-19 vaccinations, according to Washington County Public Health Director Danielle Pettit-Majewski.

'That means two doses of Pfizer or Moderna or one dose of Johnson & Johnson,” Pettit-Majewski said at Tuesday morning's Board of Supervisors meeting.

She reported that 3,888 county residents have become fully vaccinated, compared to 3,163 last week.

In all, 10,144 vaccines have been administered to Washington County residents.

Pettit-Majewski explained that the numbers are for county residents vaccinated, regardless of where they received their vaccines.

'The data is by county of residence,” she said.

While the vaccination numbers continue to rise, there is concern about an uptick in positivity rates.

On Feb. 23, Pettit-Majewski reported that the positivity rate was at 3.4 percent, and it dropped to a low of 1.1 percent on March 9.

By March 16, the rate was up to 2.3 percent and 3 percent on March 23.

Tuesday, Pettit-Majewski reported that the county's positivity rate is at 2.9 percent.

'It's definitely something to monitor,” she said. 'We're really close to being done, but if we let off the gas too soon, we'll see more cases than we need to.”

She said that state health officials reported Tuesday that they are seeing B.1.1.7 - commonly known as the UK variant - making its way around the state.

'A majority of the people they did studies on did not travel outside the country,” Pettit-Majewski said.

She stressed the importance of continuing to wear masks, social distancing and other mitigation efforts.

'If we see increased spread, we could see additional mutations,” she said. 'We need to keep doing what we're doing. We're almost there.”

At Tuesday's Board of Supervisors meeting, Supervisor Jack Seward Jr. suggested that the county health department start posting weekly updates on both the county website and the department's website.

Pettit-Majewski agreed that it would be a good idea and said she would work to get that done.