The leader of the Governor’s Office of Drug Control Policy has issued a 2022 strategy that hopes to build on Iowa’s positive trends while addressing challenges tied to the COVID-19 pandemic and the availability of more potent substances.
Iowa’s four Catholic Dioceses launched a campaign this week to encourage Iowans to be fully vaccinated against COVID-19. The effort was launched after conversations about vaccine hesitancy between the Diocese of Davenport and the University of Iowa.
Local vaccine providers say they are still seeing high demand for COVID-19 vaccine appointments for children aged 5 to 11 years in the two weeks since federal health officials approved the two-dose Pfizer vaccine for this age group. Health care providers say children who receive the first shot this week will be fully vaccinated by the end-of-year holidays.
New infections increase for fourth week in a row; available ICU beds hit all-time low
Mercy Medical Center says 98.1 percent of all staff are compliant with its COVID-19 vaccine requirement as of Monday, the final day for employees to be fully vaccinated or have an exemption. Hospital officials say “a small percentage” of staff requested and were approved for a religious or medical exemption.
Friday marked the final day for employees of MercyOne to be fully vaccinated against the coronavirus or receive an exemption. The health care system had extended the deadline to comply with a new state law that allowed staff previously denied an exemption to reapply.
Linn County Public Health is holding four vaccination clinics at Cedar Rapids schools for children 5 to 11. The clinics, open to any child with a parent present, will take place from Monday, Nov. 29 to Thursday, Dec. 2.
The contagious delta variant is driving up COVID-19 hospitalizations in the Mountain West and fueling disruptive outbreaks in the North, a worrisome sign of what could be ahead this winter in the U.S.
Mercy Medical Center in Cedar Rapids announced new steps to develop its cardiovascular program as part of officials’ ongoing goal to grow the heart program as its patient numbers continue to climb. “We wouldn’t have gone down that path unless we were pretty confident.”
9,067 new cases of COVID-19 infections were reported in the past week, up from 7,643 the previous week and from 6,983 two weeks ago.
Fred Horn, 62, has never served in the military. But on Oct. 5, he was admitted to the Veterans Affairs Health Care System in Iowa City under the “fourth mission,” a policy that allows the VA to assist in times of crisis.
Eric Bradley, an environmental health manager at Scott County Public Health, will take on a new role at Linn County Public Health as the deputy director later this month.
The first young Iowans got the first shots of the two-dose COVID-19 vaccine Wednesday following the approval of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine for kids aged 5-11 years. For those kids, the shots represented the first step to returning to normal.
More than 7,600 new cases of COVID-19 reported in Iowa in past week. Also, virus deaths surpass 7,000 in Iowa since March 2020.
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