Newsworthy

Dear Community Partners,

Get vaccinated.

Wear a facemask – especially in public indoor settings.

Social distance.

Wash your hands.

It’s déjà vu. These are all precautions we have heard and hopefully practiced during the COVID-19 pandemic. Now, with the highly transmissible and contagious delta variant in our region, these precautions are advised again, even for the vaccinated.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s new guidance released yesterday applies to much of Kansas because the delta variant is so widespread across the state. The guidance tells us to roll back to the facemask precautions to keep us from being infected or potentially spreading infection to others.

If enough of the unvaccinated group steps up for a vaccine, it will reduce the spread. Vaccination prevents severe illness, hospitalization and death.

What better time to get vaccinated than now – just as our children and grandchildren return to classrooms. It’s time for each of us to take some personal responsibility to curb this virus.

Here are today’s updates:

• COVID-19 Updates

COVID-19 Updates

All indicators are showing increased activity in COVID-19 services, including Call Before You Go triage line (784-354-6000), and drive up testing. Here’s a look at today’s COVID-19 scorecard:

• We have 27 inpatients who are COVID-19 positive today.
• We have 62 COVID-19 positive patients in the outpatient Enhanced Primary Care program. We have now surpassed the 1,000-mark of patients who have been cared for through this program. It that wraps care management services around patients to help them recover from COVID-19 at home and not in the hospital. The total number of patients supported to date is 1,004.
• The percentage of patients testing positive for COVID-19 at Stormont Vail facilities is 13.8%.
• We have administered 86,978 vaccinations, which included first and second doses of the vaccine.
• All Kansans age 12 and older are eligible to receive a COVID-19 vaccine.
• COVID-19 vaccines are available through the Stormont Vail Retail Pharmacy, 2252 S.W. 10^th Ave.
• To schedule a COVID-19 vaccine appointment:
  • Go through your Stormont Vail MyChart
  • Use the online scheduling assistant at www.stormontvail.org/covid19/vaccine
  • Call (785) 270-4786.
• Walk-ins are welcome from 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday.

We together,
Robert Kenagy, MD