Lane County set a grim record over the last month.
224 Lane County residents have died from COVID-19. Public Health spokesperson Jason Davis said there was an increase of 45 deaths in the last 30 days.
"That is the highest rate of death that we’ve seen throughout the pandemic," he said. "And, certainly a sobering fact that comes along with these surges.”
Davis said the vast majority of the people who have died from SARs-COV-2 have been unvaccinated. He said to prevent serious illness, hospitalization and death—vaccination remains the key strategy. 63.5% of the overall population has received at least one dose of vaccine.
The county is seeing a slight downturn in new cases however, public health officials expect deaths to continue to increase due to a build-up of COVID patients in intensive care and on ventilators.
