Name: Ohio to reach 100,000 COVID-19 cases in less than half the time it took to get to 50,000
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Ohio to reach 100,000 COVID-19 cases in less than half the time it took to get to 50,000

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Max Filbymfilby@dispatch.comView CommentsIt took 112 days for the first 50,000 Ohioans to test positive for the coronavirus. But fewer than 45 days later, that number has nearly doubled, pushing the state toward a grim milestone of 100,000 total cases.The speed at which cases doubled in Ohio is a sign that the pandemic accelerated, propelling the state past the 100,000 mark quicker than had been thought possible, said Dr. Bill Miller, senior associate dean of research and professor of epidemiology at Ohio State University’s College of Public Health.“That’s a pretty significant escalation,” Miller said. “In some ways, that’s to be expected with an infectious disease. But in my mind, that’s still pretty meaningful. ... We have a lot more infection circulating in the community than we did a few months ago.“&gt;&gt;Read More: Although June brought with it a lower number of new cases per day, July brought the opposite. For about a month, new cases have hovered around 1,000 or more a day. The 1,733 new cases on July 30 are the most reported in the state in a day, according to the Ohio Department of Health.It’s that faster pace of infections, Miller said, that allowed Ohio to add another 50,000 cases and reach the 100,000 case threshold in about a month and a half.“It’s a mind-boggling number,” Gov. Mike DeWine said on Tuesday. “This is not anything that any of us expected. Certainly when I ran for governor, I did not have any idea that this was coming.”DeWine had a COVID-19 scare this week. In anticipation of President Donald Trump’s visit to Ohio on Thursday, DeWine took a rapid test that showed him to be positive for the virus. Then later that day, he was screened again using a different test, and the result was negative. A Saturday test confirmed that result.The upcoming case milestone, DeWine said, brings to mind the people who lost loved ones. More than 3,600 Ohioans have died of the virus.COVID-19 deaths in 2020 have already surpassed the number of car-accident deaths (1,221) and suicides (1,836) that occurred in Ohio in 2018, according to the Health Policy Institute of Ohio. The only causes of death that COVID-19 has yet to surpass in Ohio are cancer, which killed 3,851 in the state in 2018, and heart disease, which took the lives of 4,602 Ohioans that year.The governor said the case milestone also makes him think about the people who need to be protected and those who have contracted COVID-19 and “gone through hell.” Although more than 74,600 are presumed to have recovered, their bodies and lives might never fully return to normal, he said.More than 11,366 Ohioans have been hospitalized for COVID-19 since the pandemic surfaced in the state five months ago. By comparison, 11,005 people were hospitalized for the flu in the state over six and a half months, according to the state health department’s flu monitoring data.“I think every day about the other people who are out in Ohio that we need to do everything we can to protect, (and) the people who have suffered already ... none of that ever leaves my mind,” DeWine said.More than 25% of the state’s cases have been in central Ohio. Franklin County and the six surrounding counties have reported 24,568 cases.Public health departments are required to report cases of about 60 diseases to state and federal authorities, said Dr. Mysheika Roberts, Columbus Public Health commissioner. Those diseases include meningitis, chickenpox, mumps and now COVID-19.In a typical year, Roberts said, Columbus Public Health reports 10,000 to 12,000 cases of diseases up the public-health chain. But the number of COVID-19 cases has already far exceeded that number, totaling more than 13,000 in Columbus, she said."I never would have dreamed we would get to 13,000 cases in Columbus,” she said. “To think that in just less than five months, we have this many, that’s amazing to me.“&gt;&gt;Read More: The first sign of the pandemic in Ohio wasn’t a set of cases but the debate over the Arnold Sports Festival in Columbus in March. It’s something that Roberts said she remembers vividly.She recommended to Mayor Andrew J. Ginther, DeWine and Dr. Amy Acton, at the time the state health director, that the event be canceled or at least severely limited. In the end, Acton and DeWine ordered that the event largely ban spectators."I never really thought about what would happen next. ... We always planned for a big pandemic. But I don’t think we put any thought into it being this big,” Roberts said.COVID-19’s trajectory, local experts said, has been largely unpredictable. That makes it difficult to say where Ohio will be in in five months or so, Miller said.It’s possible, Miller said, that most Ohioans could have access to a vaccine. But, logistical issues could delay production and distribution until well into 2021.Miller expects that Ohioans probably will be in the same position they are now. The medical field might have a better handle on the virus, he said, but people will probably still be required to wear masks and distance themselves from others.As for another case milestone, Miller said he’s hopeful that it will take a lot longer for the number of cases to double again.“What I hope for is that we maintain this leveling off that we’ve had in the last couple of weeks,” Miller said. “It's not going to go to zero. But if we decline, those next milestones of, say, 200,000 are not going to come as quickly.”mfilby@dispatch.com@MaxFilbyFranklin County: 17,834Pickaway County: 2,378Fairfield County: 1,309Delaware County: 1,263Licking County: 1,202Madison County: 349Union County: 233Source: Ohio Department of Health, cases as of Thursday.View Comments

Max Filbymfilby@dispatch.comView CommentsIt took 112 days for the first 50,000 Ohioans to test positive for the coronavirus. But fewer than 45 days later, that number has nearly doubled, pushing the state toward a grim milestone of 100,000 total cases.The speed at which cases doubled in Ohio is a sign that the pandemic accelerated, propelling the state past the 100,000 mark quicker than had been thought possible, said Dr. Bill Miller, senior associate dean of research and professor of epidemiology at Ohio State University’s College of Public Health.“That’s a pretty significant escalation,”...

Ohio to reach 100,000 COVID-19 cases in less than half the time it took to get to 50,000

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