Brown County Public Health has taken to issuing a weekly report of new COVID-19 cases and deaths in the county, instead of a daily report. It’s too busy dealing with new cases to put the reports together.

When they have come out lately, the reports are not encouraging.

On Monday BCPH reported Brown County has cracked the 4,000 COVID cases mark. With 137 new cases recorded last week, Brown County is at 4,009. Two more deaths last week brought the death toll to 47 since the pandemic began.

The COVID patients are filling the local hospital, which has staff members spending a lot of time trying to find an ICU bed in neighboring communities.

It is discouraging that in the second year of the COVID pandemic, we are dealing with numbers of cases that rival the height of last year, and this at a time when we have the means to protect ourselves. Vaccinations started last December, and by April, over 6,000 doses a month were being given in the county. That monthly number has dropped to a little over a thousand in August and September, and 726 so far this month. In the county, 13,332 people are fully vaccinated. About 71% of the population over 18 is vaccinated, but that number isn’t going up.

Getting vaccinated is the best way for people to protect themselves and others from the COVID-19 virus. And yet doses are sitting unused. It is frustrating.