Boone County Health officials optimistic about mask order while cases climb

COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)

Thursday marks the 42nd day Columbia has had a mask ordinance in place, almost halfway through the 90 days it is set to last.

Boone County continues to see spikes in cases and record-breaking daily case totals, but the rolling average of daily cases and the positivity rate of COVID-19 tests are below the peaks reached just before the Columbia City Council enacted the ordinance.

In the days leading up to the mask ordinance that went into effect on July 10, the five-day average of daily cases was rising sharply. After hovering around 23 to 24 cases July 4 through July 7, the average reached its peak of 42.2 on July 11.

The five-day average dropped continuously over the next six days to 18 on July 17.

August has seen dips and spikes in the average, with a high on Aug. 1 of 34, and the low on Aug. 6 of 17.6.

The positivity rate is another factor health offcials say is key to containing the virus.

Before the mask ordinance in Columbia, Boone County's positivity rate was increasing sharply in June. The week of June 5-11, the rate was at 1.3 percent. It was at 15.6 percent for the week of June 26-July 7.

After hitting its peak of 15.8 percent during the next week, the positivity rate dropped 9.6 percent during the week of July 10-16.

Scott Clardy, the assistant director of the Columbia/Boone County health department, said it's hard to know if the mask ordinance was a factor in the positivity rate drop because a scientific study would be the only way to prove it. But he is optimistic about the ordinance's effectiveness.

"In the absence of anything else that changed, the mask ordinance is clearly the thing that we knew of that changed kind of what was going on as that point," Clardy said. "We have to think the mask order had a big role in that."

While the positivity rate has again started to climb after the big drop, Clardy said it isn't near where it was heading at the beginning of July.

The current week's positivity rate will be posted on Friday, and Clardy expects the numbers to go down a bit, even though Thursday broke the record for new daily cases with 64.

"I think a lot of that has been driven by the fact that we have had a lot more people get tested over the weekend than we normally have to be perfectly honest," Clardy said.

Clardy said looking at the age of cases can provide clarity about where the spikes are coming from. Half of the 64 reported cases on Thursday are in the 20-24 age range. This comes as thousands of young people are returning to Columbia for college classes.

"We knew this was going to happen, we've been saying for weeks this was going to happen, and it's happening," Clardy said.

He said a lot of the new cases can also be traced back to household spread, saying if one member of a house catches the virus, health officials have been seeing almost everyone else in the home getting sick as well.

The cause of the spikes could be a combination of people not following health guidelines and students flocking back to campuses, Clardy said. He said it's hard to pinpoint because the University of Missouri and local colleges also have very strict guidelines in place.

"The cases are coming in so rapidly right now that we haven't been able to analyze it that closely, but anecdotally looking at some of the notes, we know it could be a combination of all those things," Clardy said.

He said they have continued to seen a steady stream of complaints of mask order violations.

Clardy said it is too early to say whether the city will extend the mask ordinance, which expires in early October, but the next public health order will be looked at next week. The current order expires Aug. 31.

Watch ABC17 News at 9 and 10 for a full report.