COVID vaccine live updates: Here’s what to know in North Carolina on March 13
We’re tracking the most up-to-date information about the coronavirus and vaccines in North Carolina. Check back for updates.
Case count tops 882,000
At least 882,715 people in North Carolina have tested positive for the coronavirus and 11,691 have died since last March, according to state health officials.
The N.C. Department of Health and Human Services reported 892 new coronavirus cases on Saturday, which is inaccurate due to NCDHHS technical issues on Friday, officials said. The number will turn out to be higher once the issues are resolved by Monday, officials said. Friday’s count was 1,998 new cases and Thursday’s reported total was 2,061.
Fifty-eight coronavirus-related deaths were reported Saturday. Deaths don’t all occur on the day the state reports them. The state health department revises its daily figures as information becomes available.
Data to be published on Monday “will be higher, as it will incorporate case and test data that would have been reported on Saturday,” DHHS posted on its COVID-19 Dashboard on Saturday.
At least 1,028 people in North Carolina were reported hospitalized with the coronavirus as of Saturday, down from 1,037 reported the day before.
As of Saturday, 5.4% of coronavirus tests were reported positive, up from 3.7% on Wednesday, the latest previous day for which data was available. Health officials have said 5% or lower is the target rate to control the spread of the virus.
More than 3 million doses of the COVID-19 vaccine have been administered in North Carolina, and 1.2 million people have received both doses of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine.
School reopening law will bring changes
Gov. Roy Cooper signed legislation Thursday that requires North Carolina school districts to offer in-person instruction to every student this school year.
Under the law, elementary school students and special-education students must be offered full-time, in-person instruction under Plan A. Middle and high school students can use Plan A or Plan B, which requires 6 feet of social distancing, The News & Observer reported.
School districts in Beaufort and Henderson counties have already approved plans to offer daily in-person instruction to all grade levels.
In the Triangle, Wake County is weighing whether to switch from Plan B to Plan A. The Wake County Board of Education is scheduled to discuss the matter its March 16 meeting.
Durham Public Schools plan to stay with Plan B, and the Chapel Hill-Carrboro school system will have to make major adjustments since it didn’t plan to bring students back for full-time, daily in-person instruction at this time.
NC expects to receive more vaccine doses
North Carolina expects to get more weekly COVID-19 vaccine doses by early April, according to health officials.
The state could receive up to 400,000 first doses per week, up from the 223,120 doses given out this week, The News & Observer reported Friday. Some providers have higher capacity or haven’t received allocations due to limited supply.
“We want our capacity to be far ahead of our supply,” said Kody Kinsley, deputy secretary of the N.C. Department of Health and Human Services. “So that way, as it ramps up over the coming weeks and months, we’ll be ready.”
Kinsley also said vaccines could be allocated differently in a future plan that would shift efforts from providing doses based on a county’s population and instead focus on the number of people who haven’t been vaccinated in an area.
Spring break could thwart Charlotte COVID trends
While hopeful that Mecklenburg County could reach COVID-19 herd immunity by June, the county’s public health director is concerned about spring break, The Charlotte Observer reported.
“People just need to be smart and use good commonsense, and think about not just themselves, but everybody else in our community as they decide what to do about spring break,” Gibbie Harris said at a news conference Thursday.
Between 65% and 85% of county residents would need to be vaccinated for the county to reach herd immunity, Harris said.
As of late Thursday, only 8% of the county’s population was fully vaccinated, according to the N.C. Department of Health and Human Services. Another 13.4% were partially vaccinated. The numbers don’t include vaccinations at long-term care facilities.
This story was originally published March 13, 2021 at 8:13 AM.
