Governor reinstates public health emergency

State’s 2,843 new cases biggest rise in 6 months

Gov. Asa Hutchinson said Thursday that he had no plans to postpone the start of the school year for public schools or to reimpose a statewide mask mandate or place restrictions on businesses. “This is all about the children and their health.” More photos at arkansasonline.com/730gov/.
(Arkansas Democrat-Gazette/Thomas Metthe)
Gov. Asa Hutchinson said Thursday that he had no plans to postpone the start of the school year for public schools or to reimpose a statewide mask mandate or place restrictions on businesses. “This is all about the children and their health.” More photos at arkansasonline.com/730gov/. (Arkansas Democrat-Gazette/Thomas Metthe)

Gov. Asa Hutchinson on Thursday reinstated Arkansas' public health emergency and said he would call a special session to lift a state law's prohibition on mask requirements for kindergarten through 12th-grade public schools.

At a news conference at the state Capitol, Hutchinson also said he would submit a request through a mutual aid network for other states to send health care workers to Arkansas and that he had directed the Department of Health to explore ways to streamline rules to allow retired health workers to more easily return to work.

At his request, he said the federal government was sending a "surge response team" to Arkansas to evaluate ways to maximize hospital capacity.

The Republican governor made the announcements as the state's count of cases rose by 2,843 -- the largest one-day new case total since Jan. 21.

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After rising for the previous 23 days, however, the number of covid-19 patients in Arkansas hospitals fell by nine, to 1,055.

The state death toll from the virus, as tracked by the Department of Health, rose by 11, to 6,110.

"We are in a public health emergency," Hutchinson said.

"Anytime you're having staffing shortages in the hospital, whenever today we have, I believe it is, four covid patients that are waiting in ambulances to be able to find a hospital to go to, that constitutes an emergency and a public health crisis."

Act 1002, signed by Hutchinson in April, bars state and local government entities, including public schools, from requiring people to wear masks.

Hutchinson said the special session, which will likely be held next week, would focus solely on making an exemption for kindergarten through 12th grade public schools because vaccines have not yet been authorized for children under age 12.

"I've thought about higher education. I thought about cities and whether they should have the local option, but the fact is each one in their city or each one in higher ed -- they can get a vaccine. They can protect themself and the solution is very easy," Hutchinson said.

He noted that 24 covid-19 patients were hospitalized Thursday at Arkansas Children's Hospital in Little Rock and Arkansas Children's Northwest, including five in intensive care and two on ventilators.

None of the patients had been fully vaccinated, and half of them were too young to receive the vaccine, he said.

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"I have consulted with [House] Speaker [Matthew] Shepherd and Senate [President] Pro-Tem [Jimmy] Hickey, and they have expressed to me that it's going to be a heavy lift to get passage of this in the Legislature, but I have confidence that as the Legislature looks at this, they will understand, one, that it's a conservative principle to utilize local decision-making. Not everything fits statewide. And then secondly that this is necessary, really, for providing local school boards the ability to protect those most vulnerable young people, 12 and under, as they go to school," Hutchinson said.

He said he had no plans to postpone the start of the school year for public schools or to reimpose a statewide mask mandate or place restrictions on businesses.

"Everyone knows what to do and the guidelines are in place," Hutchinson said. "This is all about the children and their health."

A spokesman for the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville in a statement Thursday "urged" legislators to consider broader anti-mask law changes that would also give leeway to colleges and universities.

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"Given the changed circumstances since the spring, including the rapid rise in infections and the emergence of the Delta variant, we commend the Governor and legislative leaders working to address this need for K-12 schools and urge them to consider adding higher education institutions as well," spokesman Mark Rushing said after Hutchinson's press conference.

"This would help increase the likelihood of a safe, in-person fall semester without interruption of instruction or in-person activities while also decreasing the chance of community spread."

At UA, faculty and instructors have been told that they can ask students to wear face coverings in their classrooms, but they may not make masking a requirement.

In one sign of the strain on hospitals, the state for the first time on Thursday did not have any hospitals identified as being able to accept transfers of covid-19 patients who needed intensive care, said Jeff Tabor, program manager for the COVIDComm system, which helps match covid-19 patients with hospitals.

He said Thursday afternoon that two patients had been waiting since midnight on Wednesday to be transferred to a hospital with an available ICU bed and one had been waiting since 7 a.m.

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Among the 40 hospitals identified by the Health Department as being capable of accepting transfers of covid-19 patients, none had available ICU beds, and regular hospital beds were "very limited," Tabor said.

"We did this throughout the winter months, and this is a first, for the system to show all red lights," Tabor said.

ASSISTANCE NEEDED

Hutchinson allowed the emergency he originally declared in March 2020 to expire on May 30 of this year, when the number of covid-19 patients in the state's hospitals was down to 194.

Act 403, signed by Hutchinson in March, directs the House and Senate to convene in "committees of the whole" within eight business days to decide whether to terminate the emergency he declared Thursday.

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Under the state's Emergency Services Act, the declaration allows the governor to issue executive orders and rules that have the force of law.

The declaration also allows Arkansas to seek assistance from other states through the Emergency Management Assistance Compact.

An executive order signed by Hutchinson on Thursday reinstating the state's emergency directs the state Department of Public Safety's Division of Emergency Management to seek staffing assistance for hospitals and other healthcare facilities "through available avenues," including through compact.

Division spokeswoman LaTresha Woodruff said the division was assessing the state's needs in preparation for submitting the request.

In response to a request to through the compact, Arkansas last week sent 10 ambulances to Springfield, Mo., to help with patient transports, triage and treatment amid a surge in cases in southwest Missouri.

Bo Ryall, CEO of the Arkansas Hospital Association, said he welcomed Hutchinson's declaration and call for assistance from the federal government and other states.

"It's overwhelming," Ryall said. "Hospitals are full. Emergency departments are full. Staff are exhausted. They're doing all they can to serve the patients that are there and trying to make room for more.

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"It's a very stressful environment in hospitals right now because of the amount of covid patients that are needing care."

The University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences Medical Center "would certainly welcome any sort of support that other hospitals could provide," spokeswoman Leslie Taylor said.

She noted that, in April 2020, about two dozen nurses and respiratory therapists from UAMS and Arkansas Children's Hospital traveled to New York City to help out at New York Presbyterian-Brooklyn Methodist Hospital at a time when the virus was surging there.

She said UAMS on Thursday had 70 covid-19 patients, including 29 who were in intensive care, 20 who were on ventilators and five who were on heart-lung bypass machines.

It had just opened a third covid-19 unit and was considering adding a fourth, she said.

At the same time, she said UAMS had 140 open nursing positions. Of those, 94 were at the hospital and the others were at its clinics around the state.

"Really, staffing is the most limiting factor for us right now," she said.

In a statement, Baptist Health CEO Troy Wells said Hutchinson "has always been extremely supportive and engaged with the healthcare community, and his support is once again shown today by reinstating the public health emergency."

"Additional help with staffing to streamlining license requirements can all help to relieve the stress on our healthcare system, and we are hopeful it can help create hospital capacity which our state desperately needs," he said.

VACCINE REQUIREMENT

Meanwhile, Conway Regional Health System on Thursday became the latest Arkansas health care organization to announce a vaccine requirement for its employees.

The health system said its executive leadership, directors and managers will be required to have at least one vaccine dose by Aug. 8 and be fully vaccinated by the end of August.

Newly hired employees will be required to be fully vaccinated within 30 days of employment.

The policy will include exemptions for medical and religious reasons similar to the ones for its flu vaccine requirement.

More than 75% of the leadership team at Conway Regional Medical Center is vaccinated, the health system said.

Since June 1, 88% of the hospital's covid-19 patients have been unvaccinated.

"This is a decision that has come after much discussion, analysis, and education," health system CEO Matt Troup said in a news release.

"It's one we do not take lightly. As the community's health system for 100 years, we feel strongly that we must lead our community in vaccine adoption and set an example for the communities we serve. We have a responsibility to our patients, to our team members, and to the community to do the right thing. The evidence is clear that the COVID-19 vaccines are safe and effective at preventing the spread of the COVID-19 virus, as well as hospitalizations and death."

MORE ON VENTILATORS

Despite the drop in hospitalized patients on Thursday, the number of virus patients who were on ventilators rose by 10, to 219, its highest level since Jan. 17.

The number in intensive care rose by 12, to 398, the largest number since Jan. 18.

The average daily increase in the state's case count over a rolling seven-day period rose to 1,749, its highest level since Jan. 27.

With new cases outpacing recoveries, the number of cases in the state that were considered active rose by 1,431, to 17,232, the largest number since Jan. 30.

At the news conference, Hutchinson noted that covid-19 patients made up 14.8% of all the state's hospitalized patients, 35.2% of ICU patients and 53.3% of patients on ventilators in Arkansas on Thursday.

As of Wednesday, 18% of Arkansans age 65 and older with active infections were in the hospital, down from 27.4% on Jan. 11, at the height of the state's winter covid-19 surge, which Hutchinson said reflected the high vaccination rate for that age group.

For other age groups, however, the percentage with active infections who were hospitalized had slightly increased. For instance 1.2% of children with active infections were hospitalized Wednesday, up from 0.9% on Jan. 11.

Since Jan. 1, people who had not been vaccinated made up 96.4% of the state's cases, 95.4% of its hospitalizations and 97.4% of its deaths from covid-19.

"That should be an encouragement to anybody who's concerned about their health and their community to get vaccinated," Hutchinson said.

VACCINATION UPTICK

After bottoming out in early July, the pace of vaccinations in the state has been on the rise.

For the second day in a row, the number of vaccine doses that had been administered, including second doses of the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines, rose Thursday by more than 10,000.

The average number of vaccine doses administered each day over a rolling seven-day period rose to 9,632, its highest level since the week ending May 11.

According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the number of Arkansans who had received at least one vaccine dose rose by 8,617, an increase that was larger by more than 1,000 than the one a week earlier.

The average daily increase over a rolling seven-day period in the number of Arkansans who had received at least one dose rose to 7,327, its highest level since the week ending April 22.

The increase on Thursday brought the number to 1,397,052, or about 46.3% of the state's population.

The number of Arkansans who had been fully vaccinated rose by 2,846, to 1,092,321, or about 36.2% of the population.

Among the states and District of Columbia, Arkansas continued to rank 42nd in the percentage of its residents who had received at least one vaccine dose and 49th, ahead of only Mississippi and Alabama, in the percentage who were fully vaccinated.

Nationally, 57.2% of people had received at least one dose, and 49.4% were fully vaccinated.

STATE RANKINGS

CDC rankings Thursday continued to show Arkansas trailing only Louisiana and Florida in new cases per capita over a rolling seven-day period.

Arkansas also continued to have the second-highest number of new deaths per capita, after Nevada, over the previous seven days.

Within Arkansas, Pulaski County had the most new cases on Thursday, 381, followed by Washington County, which had 209, and Benton County, which had 193.

Health Department spokeswoman Danyelle McNeill said 15.1% of the state's coronavirus tests were positive over the seven-day span ending Wednesday, up from the 14.7% that was initially reported for the week ending Tuesday.

The state's cumulative count of cases rose Thursday to 382,569.

The number of people who have ever been hospitalized with confirmed infections in the state rose by 79, to 18,503.

The number who have ever been on a ventilator rose by 10, to 1,879.

Information for this article was contributed by Jaime Adame of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.

Secretary of Health Dr. Jose Romero (left) talks with Rep. Denise Ennett, D-Little Rock, after Gov. Asa Hutchinson’s news conference Thursday at the state Capitol.
(Arkansas Democrat-Gazette/Thomas Metthe)
Secretary of Health Dr. Jose Romero (left) talks with Rep. Denise Ennett, D-Little Rock, after Gov. Asa Hutchinson’s news conference Thursday at the state Capitol. (Arkansas Democrat-Gazette/Thomas Metthe)

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