“It’s not clear that we’ve reached a peak. We would like to say that that is true, but we also know that there's an impact that's going to be seen as a result of the opening of schools. We're already seeing an increased number of cases in those congregate settings,” said Dr. Desmar Walkes, Austin-Travis County health authority in an Aug. 20 news briefing.
The seven-day moving average of daily hospital admissions—APH’s primary indicator for coronavirus risk—appeared to peak Aug. 11 at 83.6. By Aug. 18, the metric was down to 73.6, inching up to 77.6 by Aug. 20. Austin-area hospitals reported treating 620 total coronavirus patients on Aug. 20, an all-time high, with a record 162 patients on ventilators.
Transmission in Travis County is currently at 14.8%, driven by the highly contagious delta variant, which members of the University of Texas COVID-19 Modeling Consortium said Aug. 19 now accounts for most cases in Texas.
Exposures to COVID-19 on campuses may be tempered by mask use, Walkes said, as many area school districts implemented masking requirements heading into the first days of school, including Austin ISD.
AISD’s COVID-19 dashboard shows 48 new cases among staff and students were reported between Aug. 16—when the district offered testing ahead of the first day of class—and Aug. 18, two days into the school year. That number represents less than 1% of the district’s staff and students. There were 162 close contacts of those positive individuals asked to quarantine, according to the dashboard, including 156 students.
However, mask requirements are not in place at all of Austin’s college campuses. The University of Texas at Austin is not subject to the city of Austin and Travis County’s mask mandates due to its location on state-owned property, and has not issued its own mandate. The university’s football program is also gearing up, with the first home game scheduled for full-capacity attendance on Sept. 4.
UT is cooperating with APH to implement safety measures to mitigate the risk of transmission at games, APH representatives said, but with the community still solidly in Stage 5 risk, large events remain dangerous.
“Any event that brings people together in a congregate manner, people need to take measures to protect themselves,” said Janet Pichette, chief epidemiologist for Austin Public Health. “Your best measure is to make sure you're masking in those situations, and trying to keep distance.”
