Cobb Schools COVID-19 cases decline for fourth week in a row

Hunter Riggall, Marietta Daily Journal, Ga.
·3 min read

Sep. 18—The Cobb County School District is touting a 44% decrease in COVID-19 cases since the week of Aug. 27, when weekly cases peaked. Cobb schools had 576 new COVID-19 cases this week, bringing the total for the school year to 4,978 cases.

Among the district's 114 schools, 90% have reported declines in cases.

"For those schools which have not yet seen drops, we expect similar declines as COVID-19 spread also declines in those areas of the Cobb community," the district announced.

The past week saw the second lowest number of new cases since the school year began. The district has had the following new case counts in each week of this school year:

—Week 1: 253

—Week 2: 569

—Week 3: 942

—Week 4: 1,033

—Week 5: 947

—Week 6: 658

—Week 7: 576

Elementary schools where cases have not declined over the past month are Acworth Intermediate, Big Shanty Intermediate, Eastvalley, Fair Oaks, Keheley, Kennesaw Primary, LaBelle, Teasley and Timber Ridge.

Middle schools where cases have not declined over the past month are Dickerson and Hightower Trail.

All high schools have seen decreases.

COVID-19 cases among children have dropped statewide — the district noted there was a 48% drop in cases statewide over the past four weeks among people under 18.

Only six of the district's 66 elementary schools have 10 or more active cases. The highest is Addison, with 13.

The largest COVID-19 outbreak in the district right now is at Dickerson Middle, which has 38 active cases. Every other middle school has fewer than 10 active cases.

Of the high schools, seven out of 17 have 10 or more active cases. The highest is Harrison, with 18 active cases.

Despite pledging to publish a COVID-19 case update every Friday, Marietta City Schools had not done so as of 6 p.m. Friday.

County seeing decline in cases, deathsPer the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Cobb has seen a 15.6% decline in COVID-19 cases over the past week and a 9.5% decline in COVID-19 deaths over the past week. Hospitalizations have not declined as much, only ticking down 1.9% over the past week.

Over the past two weeks, Cobb has seen 697 cases per 100,000 people, per Cobb-Douglas Public Health. That is a decline from last Friday, when the number was 799 cases per 100,000, but still high. Anything over 100 cases per 100,000 people is considered high community transmission.

Here's a look at Cobb County and state coronavirus numbers reported Friday, and how they compare to the day before. All information comes from the Georgia Department of Public Health.

As of Friday, Marietta-based Wellstar Health System had 627 hospitalized COVID-19 patients, 88% of them unvaccinated. The system had 159 COVID-19 patients in Intensive Care Units, 93% of them unvaccinated, and 132 COVID-19 patients on a ventilator, 91% of them unvaccinated.

A Cobb-Douglas Public Health report, including data on how the coronavirus is affecting different ZIP codes, genders and ages, is available at reports.mysidewalk.com/17554e75c1#c-452027.

For the Georgia DPH's full report, visit dph.georgia.gov/covid-19-daily-status-report.

For a full Cobb County Schools report, visit https://www.cobbk12.org/page/40801/covid-case-notification.

For a full Marietta City Schools report, visit https://www.marietta-city.org/casereports.

National data can be found at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's website at cdc.gov.