North Dakota health officials encourage COVID-19 testing and monoclonal antibodies as outbreak continues

Dr Josh Ranum, an internal medicine specialist in Hettinger, North Dakota, said those who test positive for COVID-19 or who have been identified as close contact should ask their medical providers if they are eligible to receive monoclonal antibody therapy.

Injecting antibodies into people with COVID-19 can lower their viral load, offering them protection against serious illness and reducing the risk of hospitalization by 70%, Ranum said in a virtual town hall on Tuesday, September 7.

Ranum said the treatment can only be used on patients who have not been hospitalized and are not already suffering from low oxygen levels, noting that the drugs become less effective the longer a person waits after receiving a result of positive test.

Since healthcare providers began administering the treatment at the end of last year, the drugs have become much more widely available and can now be administered to patients even if they are not considered particularly vulnerable to the disease. COVID-19, Ranum said. The antibodies are approved for use in people 12 years of age and older, although medical providers are most likely to green light treatment for older residents and those with underlying conditions, such as obesity, diabetes or heart disease. Ranum noted that even those without any underlying conditions should educate themselves about the treatment.

The antibodies have been widely accepted by patients and rarely cause negative side effects, Ranum said. Both large and small hospitals in the state have the ability to inject the antibodies, and the state’s contact tracers can help put North Dakotas in contact with an injection site after notifying them of their COVID-19 test positive.

Ranum noted that COVID-19 vaccination is still the best way to prevent COVID-19, but antibody treatment is a good option if it is too late for it.

“Monoclonal antibodies are great, but it’s a bit like figuring out which fire department to call, rather than preventing fires in the first place,” Ranum said.

Kirby Kruger, director of the North Dakota Division of Disease Control, also urged residents to request a COVID-19 test if they show symptoms of the disease, are identified as close contact, or are attending a crowded event. without having been vaccinated beforehand. State testing sites and state health care providers offer rapid and traditional PCR testing. Local test sites can be found at www.health.nd.gov/diseases-conditions/coronavirus/testing-care/where-get-covid-19-test.

Ranum and Kruger both discouraged residents from taking ivermectin to treat COVID-19. There is no conclusive evidence that the drug used to treat parasitic infections has any therapeutic effect for COVID-19 patients, and taking an animal version of the drug can be dangerous, Kruger noted. A chorus of medical organizations and Merck, the drug’s maker, said ivermectin should not be used to treat COVID-19 until clinical trials determine if it is helpful.

Nationally, calls to poison control centers due to ivermectin exposure have quintupled during the pandemic, but only two of those calls arrived from North Dakota and none resulted in serious illness, a Kruger said.

Statewide case rate

• NEW CASES REPORTED TUESDAY, SEPT. 7: 272

• ACTIVE CASES *: 2,590

• DAILY POSITIVITY RATE: 9.7%

• TOTAL KNOWN CASES DURING THE PANDEMIC: 119,963

• TOTAL RECOVERED DURING THE PANDEMIC: 115,809

* The Ministry of Health often changes the number of active cases after their first notification.

Although the southern United States continues to experience the worst outbreaks caused by the highly contagious delta variant, the upper plains and areas of the Rocky Mountains, including the Dakotas, Montana, and Wyoming, have seen some of the outbreaks in the fastest growing country.

North Dakota’s active cases are down 36 from the previous day, but testing levels plummeted over the Labor Day weekend. More than 28% of active infections concern residents under the age of 20.

Cass County, which includes Fargo, has the state’s best-known active cases with 533. Burleigh County had 470 known cases on Tuesday and Grand Forks County had 211 infections. McKenzie County, which encompasses the city of Watford and has one of the lowest vaccination rates in the state, has the most active cases per capita.

The state’s 14-day rolling average positivity rate was 6.4%, down slightly from last week’s high of 6.7%.

Cases have recently increased in nursing homes, although a 93% vaccination rate among residents has brought infections under control even as the number of viruses in the state grows exponentially. The state reported 13 resident cases and 55 staff cases on Tuesday.

Hospitalizations, death

Hospitalizations fell over the weekend, but healthcare providers have struggled lately to keep up with the surge in admissions due to staff shortages. Unlike last fall’s COVID-19 peak, hospitals are treating many non-coronavirus patients in addition to high-maintenance COVID-19 patients.

North Dakota had just 10 staffed intensive care beds available statewide as of Monday, as well as 210 staffed inpatient beds. The two hospitals in Bismarck did not have available intensive care beds and an inpatient bed, while the three hospitals in Fargo had a combination of five intensive care beds and 18 inpatient beds. The Altru Hospital in Grand Forks had an intensive care bed and no inpatient beds.

Bed capacity figures only reveal capacity at one point in time, and hospitals may actually have more or fewer beds open than when they reported to the health ministry, the chief of preparation said. in the emergency room, Tim Wiedrich.

The department began publishing data on “breakthrough” cases among fully vaccinated residents last week. During the week of August 29, the state reported that only seven of 78 hospitalizations were to fully vaccinated residents, meaning nearly 90 percent of hospitalizations were to unvaccinated or under-vaccinated residents.

Vaccination

• FIRST DOSE ADMINISTERED *: 351,772 (53% of the population aged 12 and over)

• COMPLETE VACCINE COVERAGE *: 323,778 (48.8% of the population aged 12 and over)

* These figures come from state vaccine dashboard, Although the Centers for Disaster Control and Prevention, which includes vaccinations performed at federal sites, reports slightly higher vaccination rates.

North Dakota ranks in the bottom 10 states in terms of vaccination rates, but fear of the delta variant has led to a slight increase in the vaccination rate in recent weeks, said the vaccination coordinator of the State, Molly Howell.

Even though a person can become infected with COVID-19 after being fully immunized, health officials point out that people with immunity often have less severe symptoms and are much less likely to be hospitalized.

You can find more information about vaccines at www.health.nd.gov/covidvaccinelocator.

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