“Data is currently unstable, outside of daily hospital admissions, due to inconsistent reporting and incomplete holiday data; there will be an ‘increase’ in cases and deaths as reporting catches up,” the task force said in several reports that to government officials dated Dec. 27 and obtained by CNN.
“The East and West Coasts, Sunbelt, Tennessee and West Virginia have been in a full winter push, so it will be difficult to see the boom above the current, continuing decline,” the reports read.
And although there has been an improvement in cases in some parts of the Upper Midwest, Northern Plains and Rocky Mountain states, reports have suggested that ‘virus levels are still high and that any recovery after the holidays will be evident’ on those places.
The reports state that most states “are on a high plateau for cases and positivity testing, and the risk of triggering local epidemics remains high.”
The reports, which the White House has sent to states every week for the past 28 weeks, provide the administration’s most unadorned assessment of the state of the pandemic, sometimes at odds with President Donald Trump’s messages.
Some of the reports obtained by CNN gave this stern warning: “No public meetings that are not masked are safe and no indoor private gatherings are safe without all members being completely masked unless all members are actively taking the same precautions. hit and regularly test negative. “
And a report from another state puts it simply: ‘Face masks have been shown, and the requirements for it, to reduce transmission; promote the use of face masks as a way to reopen local businesses and grow the economy again. ‘
The task force recommended aggressively increasing tests in countries such as Georgia, where there was an “unstable plateau in new cases but an increase in test positivity and a significant increase in new hospital admissions.”
As many Americans make public requests to avoid public family gatherings at Christmas, the task force in a one-state report recommended that officials “increase messages about the importance of tests, especially for those who attended household gatherings.”
Colleges and universities expecting students to return for the winter semester, the task force told several states, “must test all students regularly weekly.”
“Continuous aggressive nursing home testing” needs to be done, “reads one report,” along with a rapid vaccination of COVID “from long-term caregivers.
As states begin to deploy vaccinations, the task force also suggested to one state that it consider prioritizing frontline workers and residents by age “to save most lives.” Another report highlights the importance of ‘careful planning, effective implementation and transparent balanced messages about the state’s vaccination campaign’, and states the countries that launched the vaccination-specific online dashboards.
“Given the reluctance of vaccines, especially among minority groups, continued active encouragement by the governor and health officials, and possibly television vaccinations could be helpful,” reads a report.
Some states have chosen not to request the reports, CNN has learned, but others are now taking the extra step.
This week, California was the state with the most new cases per 100,000 population, followed by Tennessee, Arizona, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Indiana, Western Virginia, Nevada, Delaware and Mississippi in the top 10.
Oklahoma led with the highest test positivity, more than 20.1%, followed by Nevada, Arizona, Tennessee, Missouri, Virginia, Idaho, Indiana, Nebraska and Utah in the top 10.
According to Arizona, most Covid-19 hospital admissions per 100 beds, followed by Arkansas, Maryland, Oklahoma, California, Kentucky, Georgia, District of Columbia, Pennsylvania and New Mexico in the top 10.
And South Dakota has the most new deaths per 100,000 population this week, followed by Pennsylvania, Arkansas, Iowa, West Virginia, New Mexico, Arizona, Alabama, Nevada and Indiana in the top-10.