Maine CDC reports 158 new cases of COVID-19, more deaths

The Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention reported 158 cases of the novel coronavirus and no new deaths on Sunday, as a group of Republican U.S. senators led by Susan Collins from Maine announced plans to release a reduced COVID-19 relief program .

Collins and nine other senators said on Sunday they would offer President Biden a compromise to his $ 1.9 trillion relief plan that would likely omit items such as a national minimum wage of $ 15. They said they had requested a meeting with the president and would release details of their plan on Monday.

Cumulative COVID-19 cases in Maine rose to 39,324 on Sunday. Of those cases, 31,689 have been confirmed by testing and 7,635 are considered probable cases of COVID-19.

Five hundred and ninety people have died from COVID-19 since the start of the pandemic in Maine, and 160 patients were hospitalized with the disease on Sunday.

In a letter to Biden, the group of senators led by Collins said they were offering their compromise in response to the president’s calls for unity in his inaugural address and debut in office.

“We want to work in good faith with you and your administration to address the health, economic and societal challenges of the COVID crisis,” they wrote.

While Republican senators have signaled that they will not back Biden’s plan in sufficient numbers to reach a bipartisan threshold of 60 votes, Democrats have been preparing to use a budget maneuver that would allow them to pass the legislation with a vote. party line within 50 years. 50 Senate.

In a press release, the 10 Republican senators said their compromise included the $ 160 billion proposed by Biden for vaccines, testing and the health care system. The Republican alternative would also add more targeted relief to Americans in need, senators said.

Alongside Collins in the group is Sens. Lisa Murkowski from Alaska, Bill Cassidy from Louisiana, Mitt Romney from Utah, Rob Portman from Ohio, Todd Young from Indiana, Shelley Moore Capito from West Virginia, Jerry Moran from Kansas, Mike Rounds from South Dakota and Thom Tillis from North Carolina.

Meanwhile, Maine is still struggling to build a centralized vaccine delivery system with enough doses to immunize the population as quickly as expected. But Maine is still moving faster than many other states.

As of Sunday, Maine had given 112,916 people the first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine, with an additional 38,407 given a second dose, for a total of 151,323 cumulative vaccinations. More than 8 percent of Maine’s 1.3 million people had received their first dose, up from the national average of 7.5 percent on Saturday, according to Bloomberg News.

Although Maine has now administered around 30,000 doses to people 70 and over, some older Mainers say they have trouble knowing when it’s their turn to get the vaccine. Future vaccinees always register through their medical providers, each with different plans and schedules, rather than through a centralized state system. And after signing up, the older Mainers say they haven’t heard of a date, which leaves them wondering if they’ll fall through the cracks.

Figures from the Maine CDC indicate, however, that the state is distributing doses almost as quickly as it can get them from the federal government. By the end of last week, health workers had administered at least 76 percent of the 169,225 first and second doses that had arrived in Maine.

Maine is near the top in terms of speed and efficiency in dispensing vaccines, but some even faster states, like West Virginia, have done better by giving doses to independent pharmacies rather than signing a partnership. federal with Walgreens and CVS. Maine health officials have now started redirecting doses to independent pharmacies as well.

County by county Sunday, there had been 4,313 cases of coronavirus in Androscoggin, 1141 in Aroostook, 11197 in Cumberland, 771 in Franklin, 779 in Hancock, 3113 in Kennebec, 578 in Knox, 471 in Lincoln, 1908 in Oxford, 3420 in Penobscot, 203 in Piscataquis, 776 in Sagadahoc, 1089 in Somerset, 512 in Waldo, 622 in Washington and 8,429 in York.

By age, 14.7% of patients were under 20, 17.9% in their twenties, 14.5% in their thirties, 13% in their forties, 15.5% in their fifties, 11.8% in in their 60s, 6.8% in their 70s and 5.8% were 80 or older.

Of the 160 COVID-19 patients in hospitals in Maine on Sunday, 52 were in intensive care and 29 were on ventilators. The state had 95 intensive care unit beds out of a total of 391 and 224 out of 320 ventilators. There were also 443 reciprocating ventilators.

Globally on Sunday night, there were 102.8 million known cases of COVID-19 and 2.2 million deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University. The United States had 26.1 million cases and 440,942 deaths.

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