COVID-19 Update: Governor Jay Inslee’s emergency powers affirmed by federal judge

It’s time for anoth­er install­ment of of our spe­cial series COVID-19 Update, bring­ing you the lat­est devel­op­ments on the nov­el coro­n­avirus out­break that pub­lic health author­i­ties here and across the coun­try are work­ing to mitigate.

Wash­ing­ton

On Wednes­day, July 15th, a law­suit chal­leng­ing the emer­gency orders issued by Gov­er­nor Jay Inslee in response to the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic by Slide­wa­ters (a water park in Chelan Coun­ty that has remained open in vio­la­tion of state law) was dis­missed by Judge Thomas Rice of the East­ern Dis­trict Court of Washington.

The case was remand­ed to Chelan Coun­ty Supe­ri­or Court so that the state of Wash­ing­ton may seek a declara­to­ry judge­ment that Slide­wa­ters is in vio­la­tion of the procla­ma­tions, to enjoin them from fur­ther oper­a­tion, and to seek finan­cial dam­ages for relat­ed costs and attor­ney’s fees.

On Fri­day, July 17th, Home Depot required that cus­tomers in all its stores must wear masks with­in them, and that spe­cif­ic store per­son­nel would be assigned to enforce com­pli­ance in each store. The move comes after numer­ous reports of non­com­pli­ance at Home Depot stores in south King Coun­ty and por­tions of Pierce Coun­ty, and a recent report about non­com­pli­ance at their Tuk­wila store.

Lat­er that same evening, a small group led by mil­i­tant right wing extrem­ist Joey Gib­son of Patri­ot Prayer held a demon­stration at Spokane Region­al Health Offi­cer Dr. Bob Lutz’s house for enforc­ing mask-wear­ing rules issued by Gov­er­nor Inslee and the state Depart­ment of Health.

On Sun­day, July 19th, nine hun­dred and twen­ty new cas­es of COVID-19 were con­firmed with­in Wash­ing­ton state. On Mon­day, July 20th, sev­en hun­dred and nine­ty sev­en new cas­es of COVID-19 were con­firmed with­in Wash­ing­ton state. Every coun­ty with­in the state has now had at least one con­firmed case.

The Depart­ment of Health says it’s con­cerned that the state is on a path towards “run­away growth” in COVID-19 cases.

Oregon

There were a record four hun­dred and thir­ty-sev­en new con­firmed cas­es of COVID-19 in the Beaver State on Thurs­day, July 16th, and anoth­er four hun­dred and thir­ty-six on Sun­day, July 19th.

Repub­li­can offi­cials are ask­ing that Clacka­mas Coun­ty not be sub­ject­ed to the same restric­tions as Mult­nom­ah and Wash­ing­ton coun­ties. This is unlike­ly, though, as one of the first cas­es in Clacka­mas Coun­ty was from a Wash­ing­ton Coun­ty res­i­dent, and Clacka­mas Coun­ty, like rur­al coun­ties in Ore­gon, is suf­fer­ing from increased rates of infec­tion, which is strain­ing local resources.

Mean­while, Mult­nom­ah Coun­ty, which includes the city of Port­land, is strug­gling to keep up with trac­ing and test­ing requirements.

Idaho

On Thurs­day, July 16th, Ammon Bundy, lead­ing a group of demon­stra­tors that declared itself Peo­ple’s Rights, attempt­ed to force their way into the facil­i­ty where South­west Dis­trict Health nor­mal­ly holds their meetings.

After Bundy suc­cess­ful­ly forced his way in, he found that the meet­ing was being held remote­ly. Bundy demand­ed that in-per­­son pub­lic com­ment be tak­en, but this demand was reject­ed and the meet­ing was resched­uled, where­upon Bundy and his group of mil­i­tant right wing fol­low­ers left the building.

On Fri­day, July 17th, the the Pan­han­dle Health Dis­trict declined Fri­day to adopt a mask man­date in the midst of demon­stra­tions against the move by mem­bers of the pub­lic and resis­tance by mem­bers of its own Board of Health.

Bon­neville Coun­ty (which includes the city of Ida­ho Falls) may have to make out­side wear­ing of masks manda­to­ry, accord­ing to East­ern Ida­ho Pub­lic Health.

There were five hun­dred and fifty new cas­es of COVID-19 on Sat­ur­day, July 18th, and five hun­dred and sev­en­ty-one new cas­es of COVID-19 on Sun­day, July 19th.

British Colum­bia

One hun­dred and two new cas­es of COVID-19 were con­firmed with­in the province dur­ing the past week­end, with Provin­cial Health Offi­cer Dr. Bon­nie Hen­ry (who deliv­ers reg­u­lar updates about the pan­dem­ic) warn­ing: “We do have the pos­si­bil­i­ty of hav­ing explo­sive growth here in our out­break, if we’re not careful.”

Almost 4,400 peo­ple are being referred to enforce­ment author­i­ties with­in the province for pos­si­bly not fol­low­ing through with their required four­teen day quar­an­tine after entry into Cana­da through British Columbia.

The hard, cold numbers

Wash­ing­ton state has had 49,225 cas­es and 1,464 attrib­ut­able deaths.

826,354 peo­ple have been tested.

Ore­gon has had 14,847 cas­es and 262 attrib­ut­able deaths.

339,282 peo­ple have been tested.

Ida­ho has had 15,266 cas­es and 122 attrib­ut­able deaths.

150,142 peo­ple have been tested.

British Colum­bia has had 3,300 cas­es and 189 attrib­ut­able deaths.

236,669 peo­ple have been tested.