Local COVID-19 hospitalizations mostly unvaccinated

More than 85 percent of Hays County residents in the hospital with COVID-19 are unvaccinated, but some fully vaccinated individuals are also in the hospital. For the first time since the pandemic began, the county is now releasing hospitalization totals separated by vaccination status as well as particular markers of severity.

On Friday, August 20, there were 55 Hays County residents in the hospital with COVID-19. Of those, 47 were unvaccinated and eight were fully vaccinated. One of the eight fully vaccinated people in the hospital with COVID-19 was in intensive care, seven were not in the ICU. None of the fully vaccinated people were on a ventilator.

For those in the hospital who had not been vaccinated, 18 were not in the ICU, 12 were in the ICU but were not on a ventilator and 17 were in the ICU with a ventilator. There have been 1,126 total hospitalizations since the start of the pandemic in the county as of Friday.

In Wimberley, active COVID-19 totals had been dropping steadily for a week before seeing a slight uptick at the end of last week. However, new reports from the first week of school show an increase in on campus. On August 13, Wimberley had 131 active COVID-19 cases, which is the highest total during the current spike of infections. Those totals ticked down steadily to 111 on August 19 before rising one to 112 on August 20. At WISD, there were 13 active cases between students, staff and faculty before school started on August 16. Of those, 10 are considered recovered but there are now an additional 23 cases reported by the school. Of the total cases, 26 are considered active, as of Monday. There are four staff members at Wimberley High School with active cases and 12 WHS students. At Danforth Junior High, there is one staff member with an active case and three students. At Jacob’s Well Elementary, no staff members have an active case but four students do. At Blue Hole Elementary no staff members have an active case but two students do.

For the third time in a week, Hays County reported more recoveries from COVID-19 than new cases.

On Friday, the Hays County Local Health Department recorded 144 additional recoveries, 132 new lab-confirmed COVID-19 cases, six hospital discharges and four hospitalizations on Friday, August 20.

Hays County considers 2,243 cases active — 12 fewer than Thursday — and there have been 23,630 total cases since the first diagnosis of the virus within its boundaries on March 14, 2020.

There have been 21,232 county residents who’ve recovered from the coronavirus following the 144 recoveries tallied Friday.

Hays County has recorded 296 coronavirus-related fatalities since the onset of the pandemic.

The local health department has received 212,962 negative tests and there have been 236,721 tests administered in Hays County. The positivity rate for Friday’s report was approximately 12.58%. During its weekly audit, the county removed three cases for out of county or duplicate records.

The Texas Department of State Health Services has conducted random testing for positive cases of the Delta variant and there has been one confirmed positive Delta case detected in Hays County. The county, however, stated that the case is no longer considered active.