There are various models that show when Nevada's peak of COVID-19 cases will happen. A model from the Institute of Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington predicts the number of daily deaths in Nevada will peak at 22 on April 19. It also shows a death total of 445 by August 4. The accuracy will depend on a few things including social distancing and the number of cases per capita.

"We think that we're going to lag behind the statewide peak," Kevin Dick, Health Officer for the Washoe County Health District said. "We have had a lower per capita rate of COVID-19 cases so far than we've seen occurring in Clark County."

Another model from covidactnow.org shows the peak happening in May, depending on stay-at-home orders. With strict stay-at-home orders, Nevada's hospitalizations could peak at 3,773 by June 13 but with lax stay-at-home orders, that number climbs to 16,935 by June 19. 

"That model is incorporating the social distancing measures that are in effect which end up pushing out the peak and flattening that curve," Dick said. "It shows us being about eight days behind Clark County as far as when we might hit overload."

 

Nevada's Coronavirus Peak Could Come A Week Before Washoe County's Peak

 

Dick says the later peak, overall, is a good thing for our region.

"It's better that we're going to have more time before we see our peaks hit here in Washoe County because that provides us with additional time to prepare," Dick said.

Dick says the downside of that could be any impacts of resources that Washoe County might eventually need.

"If we have more surges occurring in other parts of the country and in southern Nevada, whether resources would be deployed to those locations and we're having difficulty getting them here," Dick said.

As more people are testing positive, so is the number of recoveries. There are two ways for the state to consider someone as officially recovered. One of them is based on time.

"We release people from isolation seven days after they had initially had any symptom onset and they have recovered and have been fever-free without use of any fever-reducing medication for at least 72 hours," Dick said.

The other way to constitute a recovery is through testing.

"They have two negative tests that occur 24 hours after one another, so a separation of 24 hours for two negative tests," Dick said. "We're using that test-based approach for health care workers and first responder personnel as our strategy for their release."

Dick says there have been some false negative tests in Washoe County and that they usually happen when people get tested during the first day or two of showing symptoms. He recommends that people wait several days before getting tested in order to reduce the number of false negatives and improve the reliability of the tests. 

He says the Nevada Health Laboratory has an adequate amount of test kits. It can test about 400 people per day. Additional testing is happening through commercial labs, including LabCorp and Quest Diagnostics.

For a closer look at the COVID-19 models follow these links:

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