Covid numbers rise with Delta Variant; Local hospital encourages vaccines and masks

BOWLING GREEN, Ky. – Bowling Green’s Med Center Health reported their Covid cases have increased from two to almost 40 in the last two weeks.

Additionally, the Warren County Public Schools website shows that in real time right now they report 95 students with Covid 19. They also report 14 teachers in the Warren County school system who are currently Covid positive. 

According to the Med Center Health here in Bowling Green, their hospital is currently treating 39 patients with COVID-19. Four of those patients are on ventilators.  Three of those patients on ventilators were not vaccinated.

They aren’t the only ones experiencing a spike in patients. Greenview Regional Hospital is treating 12 Covid cases at the moment as well. 

Since the upsweep of the new Delta variant, none of the Covid patients that Med Center Heath has seen are school aged children. However, they strongly encourage children returning to their schools to wear masks. Currently, the youngest a child can receive the Covid vaccine is 12-years-old. 

Research Foundation Executive Director Dr. Melinda Joyce said in many instances if a person who is already vaccinated contracts the Delta variant, their symptoms are fairly mild. She said for unvaccinated people who contract the virus, their symptoms are typically more severe.

Dr. Joyce said the statistics in Covid cases at their hospital compared to about a month ago are, “disturbing” where only a short while ago they typically saw one to two patients with the virus.

“A virus needs a home. It needs some place to live. Where it’s living is in people that are unvaccinated, and so then it gets easily spread from person to person,” said Joyce. “If you are fully vaccinated, if you are in a large group or with people that you don’t know whether they have been vaccinated or not, it’s still a really good idea to wear that mask and to socially distance.”

Facility Medical Director of the Medical Center ER Dr. William Moss said he has seen over a 9:1 ratio of unvaccinated versus vaccinated patients in the hospital with Covid.

He said contracting Covid is as easy as breathing in second hand cigarette smoke. 

“I think that as you’re going to be really prudent about this, you really ought to wear a mask. In all cases right now, it’s just that this string is so infectious. It’s highly infectious. You can be in the same room as somebody. A good example is if you can smell somebody smoking in a room, that exhalation of the smoke is, in essence, the same as how you would be able to get the virus to somebody in that room.”

Dr. Joyce said variants like this Delta wave will keep coming until more and more people receive the vaccine. 

“Once we get through Delta variant, we know they’ll be others provided that we don’t get a large number of people vaccinated,” said Joyce.