More than 200 boosters distributed

A mass-vaccination event Wednesday at the Quay County Fairgrounds distributed more than 200 COVID-19 booster shots to residents while local infection caseloads continued to surge at a high rate.

C. Renee Hayoz, administrator of the Quay County Family Health Center in Tucumcari, said she saw the need for the event because the clinic's waiting list for booster shots had swelled to more than 400 people.

In the fairgrounds' exposition center, health workers gave Moderna boosters to 191 people who had been scheduled to get it, plus another 40 who were walk-ins.

"I anticipated we'd have 200 (show up) because the list kept growing and growing," Hayoz said.

She said the clinic had brought 300 boosters in anticipation of the demand.

Afterward, she estimated the clinic's waiting list had been whittled to 25 or 30 - partly because some of those patients had contracted the virus.

Hayoz said she might organize another booster event in the future.

According to state data through Friday, 50.3% of Quay County residents have been fully vaccinated against coronavirus. That was an increase of 0.4% from the previous week.

About 56.3% of county residents have received one shot of COVID-19 vaccine through Friday, an increase of 0.7% from the previous week.

The county for months has lagged in its vaccination rates compared to the state average. In New Mexico, 75% of eligible residents had been fully vaccinated by Friday, with 87% receiving at least one dose of vaccine.

New Mexico Health Secretary David Scrase said during a briefing Wednesday more than 422,000 booster shots had been administered.

Residents still can schedule vaccinations through the state's registration portal at VaccineNM.org. Parents can sign up children over age 5 for vaccinations at the state's portal at vaccineNM.org/kids or their health provider.

The Department of Health's vaccination help line also is available at 855-600-3453, option 3.

New Mexico residents age 18 and over also may now schedule a booster shot if:

• They received the Johnson & Johnson vaccine more than two months ago, or;

• They completed the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine series more than six months ago.

In the past 30 days, with 85% of the COVID-19 deaths in New Mexico have occurred with the unvaccinated.

State epidemiologist Christine Ross said during the briefing the risk of breakthrough infections among vaccinated people without a booster was four times higher.

Case numbers

A total of 91 new confirmed cases of coronavirus were reported last week in Quay County, including 25 on Friday.

That number was similar to recent weeks. A total of 121 were reported last week from a nine-day reporting period that included the Thanksgiving holiday, plus 91 the week before that.

According to state epidemiology reports, Quay County continued to have the worst COVID-19 case rate in New Mexico with 147.2 new cases per 100,000 people from Nov. 23 to Dec. 6.

The county also had the state's worst test-positivity rate, at 24.2%.

Quay County's state-high rate has persisted for nearly a month.

Neighboring De Baca County had the second-worst rate.

The total number of cases in the county since the pandemic began in spring 2020 rose to 1,462 by Friday.

Last week's cases were throughout the county, but mostly in the Tucumcari, Logan and House ZIP codes.

The breakdown of COVID-19 cases by ZIP code in Quay County through Friday was 1,094 in Tucumcari, 236 in Logan, 66 in San Jon, 20 in House, 15 in Bard, 15 in McAlister and 12 in Nara Visa.

A total of 1,063 people in the county were deemed by the DOH to have recovered from the virus.

The death toll in the county remained at 25 since the pandemic began in spring 2020. About two-thirds of the deaths have occurred in the last six months.

These COVID-19 rapid responses in the county were reported last week:

• Quay Apartments, Tucumcari, one case reported Dec. 6;

• Logan Municipal Schools, one case reported Dec. 6;

• Tucumcari Public Schools, one case reported Dec. 7;

• Blake's Lotaburger, Tucumcari, one case reported Dec. 8;

• Circle K, First Street location in Tucumcari, one case reported Dec. 8;

• House Elementary School, one case reported Dec. 8;

• 10th Judicial District, Tucumcari, one case reported Dec. 9.

A typical rapid response consists of isolating positive cases, quarantining close contacts, ceasing operations to the extent necessary to isolate affected areas, disinfecting these areas, implementing safety procedures and resuming operations. Typically, operations are ceased for fewer than 24 hours before it is safe to reopen.

In New Mexico, a total of 1,468 new COVID-19 cases were reported Friday, bringing the total to more than 329,000 since the pandemic began.

Thirteen COVID-19 deaths were reported in the state Friday, raising the total to 5,472.

A total of 691 people were hospitalized in New Mexico with the disease Friday, an increase of 16 from the previous week.

Michael Richards, senior vice president for clinical affairs at University of New Mexico Health, said its hospitals were seeing record-high volumes of patients. He said UNM hospitals were operating at 156% of normal capacity for adults and 126% of capacity for intensive-care units.

The Amarillo metro region on Friday totaled 3,890 active cases of the disease, an increase of more than 400 from the previous week. The metro area was experiencing the highest hospitalization rate in Texas.

The active-case count in the metro was about 300 earlier this summer.

The disease has killed 955 people in the Amarillo metro since the pandemic began.

In the U.S., more than 49.8 million people have been confirmed with COVID-19 since the pandemic began, with more than 796,000 deaths, through Friday.