Observations all along the line - Kimball & the Southern Panhandle First
Observations all along the line - Kimball & the Southern Panhandle First
COVID Continues To Impact Everyday Life In Kimball County
Dollar General is among the Kimball businesses where wearing masks has become a way of life.
Panhandle Public Health District has reported three COVID-19 deaths in Kimball County.
PPHD informed the public that a male in his 90s, male in his 60s and woman in her 90s all succumbed to deaths related to COVID-19.
Often people confuse the PPHD total positive cases with the active cases, so here is the breakdown for those cases according to the latest released figures. On Monday, Kimball County had 154 confirmed cases and 113 of those have recovered. The remaining 38 were active cases.
The Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services reported that in the past 14 days, Kimball County had 60 cases, whereas Cheyenne County had 209 for the same period.
COVID has impacted everyday life in Kimball.
Like many area restaurants, Nebraska Coffee employees resumed wearing masks a few weeks ago.
Troy Harper at Main Street Market told the Observer that their corporate office issued a policy making masks mandatory for employees when they are working or shopping in the store. Harper also said that he thought more customers than not were wearing masks.
Meanwhile, the Scottsbluff Walmart was reported to be closed until Tuesday for deep cleaning.
A call to their pharmacy stated that the pharmacy was closed, and other calls were unanswered. As Scottsbluff active cases are over 1,000, it might be a great time to shop at local businesses in Kimball for Thanksgiving and Christmas.
Regional West Medical Center in Scottsbluff responded to the Observer with an email stating that its staff is "continually assessing our capacity to care for patients needing hospitalization." According to the statement, Regional West is the only Level II Trauma Center west of Kearney and continues "to care for the region's trauma patients, as well as those critically ill, including COVID-19 patients, while monitoring our staffing needs."
Last week, as a result of significant increase in COVID-19 cases in Scotts Bluff County, Regional West Medical Center distributed letters to the mayors of Scottsbluff, Gering and Terrytown as well as the Scotts Bluff County Commission chairman, requesting the "highest consideration for requiring and enforcing the CDC guidelines for everyone to include masking as the best approach to impede the surge of positive COVID-19 cases in our local area as soon as possible."
The letter explained that "healthcare services can be quickly compromised due to limited and strained resources including staff, availability of treatment options, and hospital and clinic space for patients to receive care."
