It was a difficult week for many local families, as 10 Cherokee County residents died from COVID-19 complications.
The deaths of four residents were announced on Sept. 23, while five more died over the weekend and one more Monday. Their ages ranged from their mid-60s to mid-80s. There have now been 86 local coronavirus-related deaths since the pandemic reached the county about 18 months ago.
As North Carolina continues to battle the Delta variant of COVID-19, the state is beginning to see some positive signs. At a Sept. 21 press conference in Raleigh, Secretary of Health & Human Services Mandy Cohen said case numbers were beginning to plateau, and hospitalizations were beginning to level statewide.
"We're still averaging around 6,000 new cases each day. While the numbers are still too high, they are at least relatively level and at least not increasing further," Cohen said.
While hospitalizations were beginning to level off, and even decline slightly, those being hospitalized with COVID-19 were often extremely ill.
"For more than a month now, we have been above 900 North Carolinians requiring intensive care unit beds," Cohen said.
She also emphasized that younger people were being affected, with a third of hospital admissions during the second week of September being in people under age 49.
"Our hospitals are strained, and in other states we'ves seen that care is not readily available for people experiencing non-COVID threatening health crises," Cohen said.
Union General Hospital in Blairsville, Ga., is showing a slight decrease in the number of COVID-19 patients. However, the hospital is still over capacity, with eight patients in its five-bed intensive care unit as of Friday.
As of the same date, there were 31 COVID patients in the facility out of 53 total. Only two of the COVID patients were vaccinated, the hospital reported.
Erlanger Western Carolina Hospital in Peachtree declined to share similar information about how many patients are positive for COVID-19 and whether or not they are vaccinated.
Cherokee County Schools is also seeing fewer cases, with 35 students positive out of 213 in quarantine on Sept. 22. Comparatively, the school district saw 333 students in quarantine, with 67 positive, on Sept. 16.
The Learning Center charter school in Murphy also showed positive signs compared with past reports, showing only one positive case among 11 student quarantines or close contacts as of Friday. No staff or preschoolers fell into either group. On Sept. 12, the school reported one staff member and two students positive, with an additional staff member and 19 students in quarantine.
Case numbers released by the Cherokee County Health Department last week also showed a slight improvement, with only seven positive test results reported Friday. From Sept. 21 through Monday, there were a total of 100 positive test results reported, 95 with symptoms and 59 with no known source of transmission. None of these cases were hospitalized, and all have been isolated.
Since the pandemic began through Monday, the health department has conducted 20,285 tests in a county with about 20,000 adult residents, 15,813 which were negative, Of the 4,437 positive tests, 4,223 have been released, 86 are deceased and 128 are active.
According to the N.C. Department of Health & Human Services, 53 percent of state residents ages 18 and older have been fully vaccinated, while 57 percent have been at least partially vaccinated. There have been 11,107,619 total vaccine doses administered statewide so far.
Health Director David Badger continues to encourage local residents to get vaccinated as his department performs contact tracing and follow-up testing. The health department offers vaccines at no charge for ages 12 and up at the office in Murphy. For details, call 837-7486.