Curry, Roosevelt COVID-19 cases still going up

Curry and Roosevelt counties continue to see an increase in COVID-19 cases and Friday marked the most new cases in a day since Jan. 1 in Curry County.

The state’s Department of Health reported Curry County had 55 new virus cases on Friday, bumping the number of new cases in August to 695. The county saw only 549 new cases from March through July, records show.

Roosevelt County also is seeing significant increases in the virus. It has reported 272 new cases this month, compared to just 244 from March through July.

“We are seeing over 100 patients at our COVID clinic daily,” Jeanette Orrantia, a spokeswoman for Roosevelt General Hospital, wrote in an email Friday.

“We get so full,” she said, “we have to schedule an appointment for some of them.”

It wasn’t immediately clear if she was referring to RGH’s clinic in Portales, Clovis or a combination of the two.

Orrantia said in the email it was her opinion that recent county fairs in Clovis and Portales helped spread the virus, but she also noted schools are back in session and younger children do not qualify for the COVID vaccine.

“Vaccinations can help prevent the spread and significantly reduce the level of severity,” she said.

Four people with COVID-19 were hospitalized Friday at RGH in Portales, she said.

Plains Regional Medical Center reported an average of 26 COVID-19 patients hospitalized each day last week. The Clovis hospital reported an average of six COVID patients per day were in intensive care.

In other COVID-related news:

• New Mexico Department of Health has reported six Curry-Roosevelt County residents have died from complications related to COVID this month. The counties combined had no COVID-related deaths in July.

• Curry County reported 55 new COVID-19 cases on Friday. That’s the most in a single day this year since 56 new cases were reported on Jan. 1.

Through Friday, Curry County had reported 695 new cases in August – it recorded just 549 new cases from March through July.

• Presbyterian Healthcare spokeswoman Amanda Schoenberg provided the following information when asked why PRMC does not provide daily records on how many COVID patients are vaccinated:

“(New Mexico Department of Health) holds sole access to vaccine records. (PRMC Administrator Jorge Cruz) confirmed that his team would need to manually abstract vaccination information, if available, from each patient’s chart, which would be labor intensive to provide on a daily basis.”

State officials continue to report that vaccinated individuals make up about 13 percent of those hospitalized with COVID.

NMDOH is reporting 43 percent of eligible Curry County residents are fully vaccinated, while 34 percent of eligible Roosevelt County residents are fully vaccinated.

• New Mexico offers COVID-19 saliva testing at no cost through Vault Medical Services. For information: learn.vaulthealth.com/nm/

Testing is also provided at La Casa Family Health Centers in Clovis and Portales.

Anyone needing a COVID-19 vaccine can register online at vaccinenm.org to schedule an appointment.

• Leal's announced the temporary closure of its Prince Street location, effective Thursday, with under-staffing due to COVID-19 concerns.

"We have staff that have been out sick, others that have been exposed and we just can’t continue to serve our customers under these conditions," owner Laura Leal said in a press release. "Not only can we not provide adequate service, but we also need to ensure Leal’s has done everything in our power to keep the community safe.“

A reopening date is still undetermined.