DALLAS — Medical experts in North Texas are encouraging residents to continue social distancing, after data shows an increase in hospitalizations and daily case numbers.
“The virus is not going to bend to our will, no matter how much we want it done,” Dallas County Medical Society President Dr. Mark Casanova said. “It's not going to change its behavior pattern.”
Dallas County reported almost 800 new, confirmed COVID-19 cases Tuesday.
Also on Tuesday, Tarrant County surpassed 50,000 reported COVID-19 cases.
“At the end of the day, something is happening,” Dr. Casanova said. “The virus just didn't change its activity scope last week. We know why the numbers go up. The numbers go up because we get in closer contact with each other.”
During a presentation to county commissioners Tuesday, Tarrant County Public Health Director Vinny Taneja talked about school districts doing in-person learning.
“Data is now giving us caution,” Taneja said. “Those schools need to be ready: If they start to experience outbreaks, they need to have plans ready to switch to virtual learning.”
An updated UT Southwestern report released this week said North Texas hospitalizations “are on the rise again," projecting that both hospitalizations and the number of patients in the ICU will increase over the next two weeks in Dallas and Tarrant counties.
“I think it's all a matter of perspective. We were doing ‘better,’ but ‘better’ was defined against ‘horrible,’ which is where we were in the earlier part of the summer. So we were improved. But it was all relative,” Dr. Casanova said. “We knew we were walking a very fine line, and it wasn't going to take much to tip us back into what we may be heading towards, which is a worsening of the COVID-19 situation in North Texas.”
So what can we do?
Taneja reminded Tarrant County Commissioners Tuesday that anybody, who came “within six feet” of a person who later tests positive for COVID-19, needs to quarantine for 14 days.
“You could be the unlucky one,” Taneja said. “We’ve seen it: A person got ill on Day 13 or 14 of their exposure. On Day 5 or 6, they (tested) negative. So there’s really no good out of that 14 days at this point.”
“Let's just remind ourselves: We know what to do. It's not rocket science: Wear your mask, wash your hands, and keep your physical distancing,” Dr. Casanova said. “There's also this notion of pandemic fatigue. We get it. We know it's real.”
