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Data Snapshot  

UW Medicine Hospitals: 

COVID-19 Positive Inpatients May 19 2021

King County: The county reported 161 new positive cases and 3 new deaths on May 19.  

Washington: The state reported 391,925 cases and 5,673 deaths as of May 18.  

United States: The CDC reports 32,825,625 cases and 584,337 deaths as of May 19. 

Global: WHO reports 164,409,804 confirmed COVID-19 cases and 3,409,220 deaths as of May 20. 

Numbers update frequently, please follow links for most up-to-date numbers.  

UW Medicine COVID-19 Vaccine Distribution Update 

Total Vaccine Doses Administered: 297,382 

  • Total first dose: 155,966 
  • Total second dose: 141,416 

As of May 20, 2021. 

UW Medicine in the News 

KOMO News: Local health officials question CDC guidance on mask usage for fully vaccinated people
Featuring: John Lynch, Seth Cohen, Allergy & Infectious Diseases; Ali Mokdad, IHME
The CDC says it’s relaxing mask guidelines for two primary reasons. First, increasing data show that fully vaccinated people are highly unlikely to transmit coronavirus. Second, the vaccines appear to be very effective against variants. Medical Director of the COVID-19 Clinic Response Unit for University of Washington Medicine Dr. John Lynch questions whether this new guidance will be effective motivation for unvaccinated people to get their shot. ‘I actually don’t know of any data that supports this type of approach as an incentive, said Lynch. Many medical experts are worried that these changes will empower those who are unvaccinated to skip masking altogether – compromising the safety of those who are vulnerable.

UW Magazine: The race is on to deliver vaccine equity
Featuring: Paula Houston, Office of Healthcare Equity; Santiago Neme, Infectious Diseases
“When the vaccines first became available in December, Houston and her colleagues focused on equitably distributing the vaccine to the workers in the UW Medicine system, particularly to people of color. ‘We started with working on how do we get appropriate messaging to our workforce, particularly to our workforce who is of limited English proficiency, often essential workers who have great responsibility for keeping us running,’ she says. Right away, the team realized that communicating only in English and primarily by email wasn’t working. Almost 40 % of the workers they wanted to reach were declining the vaccine. We needed to do something different as we were rolling out invitations to come get your vaccine, she says. The Medicine team launched a series of community conversations (now available on YouTube) in multiple languages.

COVID-19 Literature Report  

COVID-19 Literature Situation Reportis a daily (M-F) newsletter put together by the Alliance for Pandemic Preparedness that provides a succinct summary of the latest scientific literature related to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Key Takeaways: COVID-19 Literature Situation Report May 18, 2021 

  • The Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine was 90% effective in preventing any SARS-CoV-2 infection during 7-27 days after the second dose (protection period) compared to 1-7 days after the first dose (reference period) based on a cohort study in Israel (n=1.2 million). Vaccine effectiveness was 71% among immunosuppressed participants, 82% among those aged ≥65 years, and 52% among those in both groups. More. 
  • The mean interval between exposure to COVID-19 and the development of symptoms was 3.2 days, according to an analysis of 186 likely infector-infectee pairs in England and Wales and was not statistically different among infector-infectee pairs in regions and study weeks with high percentage of infections due to the B.1.1.7 variant based on surveillance data. More. 
  • Adults aged >80 years with 11-12 week intervals between doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine  had 3.5-fold higher peak titers of anti-SARS-CoV-2 spike antibodies compared to adults >80 given a standard three-week interval between dosesHowever, the magnitude of spike-specific T cell responses 2-3 weeks after the second dose was 3.6-fold lower in the extended interval cohort compared to the standard interval cohort.  More.

COVID-19 Literature Surveillance Team, is an affiliated group of medical students, PhDs and physicians keeping up with the latest research on SARS-CoV-2 / COVID-19 by finding the newest articles, reading them, grading their level of evidence and bringing you the bottom line.

Read the latest report: May 14 | Weekly COVID-19 LST Report.

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