[BoulderCouncilHotline] Information for COVID briefing at Tuesday’s City Council meeting

[Weaver, Sam]


Fellow Council Members and HOTLINE followers,

As is our usual recent practice, at Tuesday evening<x-apple-data-detectors://0>’s City Council meeting we will receive an update on COVID disease status and the responses coordinated by the state and our county public health departments.  In preparation, I wanted to supply a little background.

On Saturday, a proposed new approach to managing the state-wide COVID status dial was unveiled, called Dial 2.0.  The rationale is to update the dial levels to reflect a new approach to matching measured metrics to indicated responses.  A presentation was given and is available publicly here and attached:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1YpsKcfhBFhFbv5wByzseK-X2Tg7Bhkrk/view

Jeff Zayach, Director of Boulder County Public Health, will be giving our health briefing on Tuesday.  Today he wrote the following feedback on the proposed Dial 2.0 approach, which I am sharing as background prior to our meeting:

“ Good afternoon everyone!

Per the attached emails the state is requesting feedback on proposed changes to the state dial. Public Health Directors met yesterday with the state to review the changes and provide feedback. In addition, many PH Directors are sharing emails with perspectives. I know many of you will have questions, so I want to share the feedback I have provided to the state regarding the dial changes, take it or leave it.

This dial change is being considered and will mean there are more cases in our communities across the state, with the educated belief that there will be less hospitalizations and deaths as the 70+ complete vaccinations. As you can see from the attached slides, the state will consider other phase 3 and 4 changes in the future as they evaluate vaccine completion and see how cases and hospitalizations respond in this phase 2 change.

Here is a summary of what I’ve provided:

  *   I support the shift to 7 day incidence as it is more responsive and works with a larger range such as what is being proposed
  *   I support the new ranges as long as:
     *   No county can move to this unless they have hit the target of vaccinating 70% of their 70+ population
     *   The Governor and CDPHE/will move counties when they hit new levels – up or down – leaving this to local orders WILL NOT WORK
  *   The metrics of hospitalizations need to be clarified.
     *   How exactly will stable or declining cases be assessed and using which metric (COPHS or EMR) specifically
  *   We need to evaluate how this impacts our ability for schools to operate from a capacity standpoint if there are more cases in the community
I understand this can be a double edged sword as we have many people in the state on public supports at this point, our suicide attempts have significantly increased across the state (see BC table below), and we need to have a better balance between health and social and economic stability. If the above can be achieved I believe it will offer the balance needed for accomplishing both – time will tell.

Best regards,

Jeffrey J. Zayach,MS
Executive Director
Boulder County Public Health ”

All the best,

Sam Weaver
Mayor, City of Boulder
weavers at bouldercolorado.gov<mailto:weavers at bouldercolorado.gov>
Mobile: 303-416-6130<tel:303-416-6130>

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