Greetings,
Roses are red, violets are blue, MoPoetry has some words of wisdom for you. This Valentine's Day, we celebrated urban Appalachian poet, Moneeca "MoPoetry" Phillips, in this week's blog post. In this post, MoPoetry discusses her craft, adapting her work to fit a virtual setting, and provides some encouraging advice:
"A person who journals is different from a page poet. A page poet is different from a spoken word artist. A spoken word artist is different from a slammer. Some people experiment with various things. Some people have perfected their craft just in one area. Some have perfected their craft in multiple areas. Nevertheless, we have to respect and support each other!!!! Don’t look down on what you aren’t a part of. You are just better at other things.”
Plus, celebrate Black History Month by attending some upcoming community events, check out January's COVID-19 data from our Research Committee, and be sure to check out our Featured Artist of the week from our Cultural Resurce
Sincerely,
UACC
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January Coronavirus Update
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Core Members Mike Maloney and John Bealle have been keeping and will continue to keep a close eye on COVID-19 infection rates and vaccinations for those living in the Cincinnati area.
INFECTION RATE. Since early January, the infection rate in Cincinnati has continued its dramatic decline, reaching levels not seen since early November. In Cincinnati the test positivity rate has been steady at 12.4%, not following the decline in new infections. MSD Wastewater detection measurements included two very good numbers in late January, although these are the only two readings reported during the previous month.
There were two worrisome spikes in late-2020 that were attributed to holiday travel and gatherings during the Thanksgiving and Christmas periods. The absence of gatherings since then has been mentioned as a likely factor in the decline. In Ohio, around 10% of the population has received the first dose, so this may have played a role also.
On the horizon, however, we are watching two circumstances that could trigger new spikes. In late January, the Kentucky Department for Public Health reported two cases of the new UK Covid-19 variant, which is considerably more infectious than what is in current circulation. The vaccination initiative has been depicted as a race against time as we anticipate the spread of the UK variant.
The other pertains to effects from Super Bowl gatherings. These trigger annual spikes in flu infections particularly in the cities whose teams are playing. Thus far infection numbers have not reflected any effects from these circumstances.
VACCINATIONS. For those eligible for vaccinations, we continue to recommend the Heath Collaborative Vaccine Info page as a resource for making appointments. Vaccine supplies have been limited recently so that most providers have had no open appointments. Moreover, searching for open appointments is an arduous process. For online appointments, some providers make you complete an eligibility questionnaire each time you check if appoints are available. Others, such as Kroger, don’t report openings for their entire system, you have to check each store one-by-one. This system favors those with the resources to carry out time-consuming online searches.
Some providers, such as the Cincinnati Health Department, allow you to register to be notified of openings. Although there is little or no feedback from registration, such as an acknowledgment of registration or status updates, our experience is that you will indeed be notified if appointments are available. The same is true for established patients with electronic medical records (MyChart) in the major health networks. When it works, this is certainly the easiest way to get a vaccination appointment. There seems to be no downside to registering with any provider that schedules appointments in this manner. If you are notified of availability, you should act quickly if you aim to make the appointment, or if not just ignore the notification.
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