- (soft music) [Mike] COVID-19 cases surge to levels not seen since before vaccines were introduced.

Hospitals are being stretched thin.

Ohio's legislative redistricting efforts stumbles as a deadline is blown.

And Cleveland's shuttered I-X Center gets new life.

Ideas is next.

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(soft music) (bright music) - Hello, and welcome to Ideas, I'm Mike McIntyre.

Thanks for joining us.

We may wanna be done with COVID 19, but COVID 19 is not done with us.

Case numbers continue to spike to levels not seen since last winter.

Hospitals in Ohio are being stretched to meet the demand for care.

And schools, businesses and medical institutions are scrambling to keep students, staff and customers safe.

What is a constitutional deadline, not a deadline?

The Ohio Redistricting Commission blew its first deadline this week in the supposedly bi-partisan effort to redraw Ohio State Legislative Boundaries.

The shuttered I-X Center lives as a venue for big events.

It's under new management.

We'll talk about those stories and much more on the reporters round table.

Joining me this week, Idea Stream Public Media Health Reporter, Lisa Ryan.

WKSU Reporter, Kabir Bhatia.

And Statehouse News Bureau Chief, Karen Kasler.

Let's get ready to round table.

Cases of COVID 19 as I mentioned are rising at an alarming rate in Ohio.

On Wednesday and Thursday of this week, the state recorded more than 7,000 new cases of COVID-19 each of those days.

The number on Wednesday included a backlog of cases from a testing lab, but the Thursday number confirms we're in the upswing of a big spike.

The Ohio department of health says we have not seen this level of cases since January during the winter surge.

Karen, what happened?

- Yeah, that's a really good question.

And I think that the experts are saying the Delta variant may have been more contagious than people thought.

Fewer people got vaccinated.

There was an expectation, I think that people would be getting the vaccine as soon as they could get it.

And certainly that was the case initially for those people who did get the vaccine.

You might remember having to recheck websites and trying to figure out exactly where you go to get your shots.

Some people traveled four hours to get theirs, but that just didn't materialize into everybody doing that.

And so a couple more numbers to throw out here.

I track confirmed cases, and so yesterday there were 5,505.

Compare that to January 3rd, 5,662, that was in the middle of winter, when we were seeing all this death, when the hospitals were really concerned about their capacity.

But then going ahead just three months ago to May 3rd, there were 717.

I mean, we have come, the graph which you can see on the Ohio hospital associations website if you look at hospitalizations, you can see how the graphs have gone up and down.

And this whole idea of flattening the curve, which was a talk at the very beginning of the pandemic, that just seems to be gone.

Because flattening the curve involves things like, masking, social distancing, and now getting the vaccine.

And there's a significant percentage of people who are choosing not to do these things.

- Lisa?

- Yeah, Dr. Vanderhoff also hinted at what's to come.

And I think that that's a scary thought to think that, you know, we kind of brought down the numbers of flu and colds and other viruses because we were all wearing masks, because we were staying inside last winter.

And now I'm thinking basically things are going to continue.

People are not going to be wearing masks, people are going to continue hanging out, acting as if COVID doesn't exist.

And we'll see those rates go up and we'll see hospitals, I think become overwhelmed.

I mean, they're already pretty close.

They're nearing capacity right now and kind of trying to decide what to do.

And so I think we'll see this winter, I think it'll be a little bit of a scary time.

- So we are still on the upswing of a peak in your view?

- Yeah, I don't see any way that this is going to come down right now.

And I think that that's exactly what public health officials are most afraid of.

This is not plateauing.

This is not going down right now.

As of right now, we're seeing cases continue to rise.

- [Mike] Karen.

- And I think what's really driving some of this too, is because you have kids who are now in school.

Many school districts are not requiring masks and so you're seeing more cases in kids.

I mean, the doctors have talked about more hospitalizations, including kids who are in intensive care and on ventilators, sometimes kids who did not have pre-existing conditions.

So this idea early on that COVID-19 could not affect kids, that's been blown away here.

I mean, just in the last couple of days, nearly 30% of new COVID cases reported in the last week were people under 18.

And that population 12 to 18 can get vaccinated but that vaccination rate is very low, it's only around 30%.

So with all of these things putting together, and like Lisa said that this is a winter virus.

And so I'm hearing anecdotally even from people in school saying the numbers of absentees look like they do typically in the winter time.

The state does track COVID cases in schools.

There's like 7,500 COVID cases that have been reported, at last report that I checked among students and staff.

And that's just the cases.

Then you've got all the kids in quarantine.

So this is, I think when they say the worst is yet to come, there's a real worry about that.

- Let's talk a little bit Lisa about vaccination.

So I was off the show last week, Rick filled in, I'll let you know that the reason that I was off was that, I had a meal with somebody who was also vaccinated, said they were, I believe it.

And who then later notified me that they had been diagnosed with COVID-19.

And that person had been in contact with somebody who they found out later was not vaccinated.

But the fact of the matter, the person who got it was vaccinated, still got COVID-19.

I did the, you know, stay away from work thing, I was tested five days later, it's now been more than 10 days and everything turned out fine.

But people who are vaccinated are still getting it.

It's not as though that's not possible.

In fact, Andy Chow of our Columbus Bureau was here on this show last week talking about how he was a breakthrough case.

But then that might lead some people to believe, well, vaccination, you can still get it anyway if you're vaccinated.

But what we're seeing by these numbers is, the ones who are not vaccinated are really driving this and the ones that are getting the sickest.

- Oh yeah, and well, and a lot of these breakthrough cases, the only way that people do actually know that they have COVID is because they were in contact with somebody and maybe get tested out of in abundance of caution.

They might not even have any symptoms.

So what we're seeing is is that some of these breakthrough cases, either they have no symptoms or mild symptoms.

And that leads me to wonder how many people who are vaccinated might be a breakthrough case technically and not even know it if they're not showing any of these symptoms.

So that that's a whole other issue.

But yeah, a lot of the people in the hospitals right now with COVID, I think about 98% are un-vaccinated.

Anecdotally, we're hearing from healthcare providers who as these people get sicker and sicker in the hospitals, they wish that they had gotten the vaccine.

And I mean, I go back to what I've been saying about the vaccine, because I did get the vaccine.

And a lot of people are concerned about the research and development of this vaccine and are worried about that.

And I just go back to, you know, we don't know the longterm effects of COVID-19 and we do know that people are dying every day of COVID-19, whereas no one has died from getting the vaccine.

So I feel like, you know, if you're on the fence at all, getting the vaccine is the smart thing to do so that you don't end up in the hospital and having those, you know, adverse side effects.

- Let me ask you about this development then.

So there are a number of people who won't get the vaccine, but yet they're the very same people who will take an experimental drug that they heard might work, that there was a study out of Egypt that said it would which has been attacked by the scientific community.

And I'm talking about ivermectin.

This is a drug that is used as a deworming drug for livestock.

It has been used in humans and is used in humans as an antiparasitic drug, not as an antiviral drug.

But word gets out that this is something that you should take, people are clamoring for it so much so that in Butler County a judge ordered a Cincinnati hospital to administer the drug to a 51 year old man hospitalized in the ICU with it, with COVID-19.

After his wife went to court compelling the hospital to administer a drug that the FDA has not approved and that his doctors say don't work.

So what is the thinking behind people who will say, ah, I'm not sure that we've done the right thing to make a vaccine safe, but yeah, I'll go ahead and take the livestock drug.

- You know, yeah.

that's a really good point.

I will say I've talked with doctors about this and they don't recommend taking ivermectin or any sort of other experimental medication to treat COVID-19.

The vaccine is definitely the best way to go.

But it is interesting because a lot of these, you know, misconceptions and these thoughts that pop up, come from a kernel of truth.

I talked with a doctor who said that at the beginning of the pandemic when people were dying and they didn't know what to do, they were giving people experimental drugs, potentially ivermectin.

Potentially, you know, some other medicines in the hopes that, you know, anything that they would try would work because they just didn't have anything to treat people with COVID-19 and they wanted to save lives.

So I think that's kind of an interesting thing.

And now doctors are saying that there are studies being done to try to see if ivermectin or any other medicines are working.

Right now, you know, the jury is still out on that.

So we don't know whether it's bad, we don't know whether it's good or not either.

But the thing is, you know, talk with your doctors before taking these medicines because any reputable doctor right now will say that this has not been studied you shouldn't take it.

So it is just kind of an interesting thing to have happened.

- Kabir, let's talk about rural areas.

The situation is not great anywhere, but it's particularly worse in the rural counties of Ohio.

They're feeling the real brunt of this.

- They are, the vaccination rates there tend to be much lower.

Access to vaccinations aren't as easy, of course, they're going to have less hospitals, less beds, and you know, Ohio is divided into zones.

So patients might end up being transferred from a rural area up to Akron or down to Cincinnati, Columbus up to Cleveland, that sort of thing.

Some of them when we're talking about schools, that's one of the places that rural areas are really feeling the brunt.

Down in Athens, they had to close a whole district just because they didn't have enough transportation for the students.

So it wasn't so much a case of students in quarantine, but the transportation staff, the busing staff, they just did not have enough people because of illness, because of COVID.

A lot of schools are transitioning to the online school or they're trying to, but then in rural districts you run into the issue of, do they have enough devices for everyone?

Is there internet access?

Rural areas in Ohio especially often have very poor internet access.

The kids end up going to the library and it's almost like they're setting back in a classroom.

So yeah, rural areas are really getting hit by this sort of thing a lot harder than say the more urban areas, highly populated areas where it's much easier to get a vaccine and the vaccination rates are higher so there's less transmission.

- We're seeing a lot of this Lisa with the schools, you mentioned that that young people are getting sick, although they're not getting as sick.

I mean, there are some studies that say they aren't getting as sick perhaps as some adults might.

- Yeah, well, you know, I've spoken with pediatric infectious disease specialists and they say that statistically, yes, your child will probably be fine if they get COVID.

But there are cases where kids are getting very sick and it's, you know, in some cases even dying.

There have been 400 kids across the country who have died of COVID-19 since this pandemic began.

And so it's just really sad to see those numbers and the pediatric infectious disease doctors that I've spoken with say, even if statistically your child will be okay, you don't wanna be the parent of that child or the child where you are in the hospital.

You either have, you know, long-term COVID, some people see the effects of COVID for longer than perhaps those two weeks that we know typically symptoms occur.

Or we've seen in kids this, MIS-C, MIS-C and that's an inflammatory disease that could then happen if a child does get COVID-19.

And they're doing more studies on this, but there can be some very serious effects if the child has COVID-19 into the future.

- All right, let's close out our COVID-19 part of the show by talking about how hospitals are impacted.

We do have by the way, one of our emails asks about the idea of mandating vaccination for employees.

And we've done some reporting on this last week, Marlene Harris Taylor and you and- - Anna.

- Anna Huntsman have all, I'm just trying to remember who was covering this.

Everybody's covering it.

That the Cleveland clinic and the university hospitals have not mandated but Metro Health has.

And Pat had written a note saying she wishes that her hospital system was one of those who had.

So that part of it.

But the hospitals say that they're, across the state are starting to be taxed.

What exactly does that mean, taxed?

Are we to the point where if I have an elective surgery I might have some trouble with that or is that coming?

- Not yet, but that would be one of the next steps.

And I think a lot of hospitals, some of their next steps could be using an underutilized floor for more COVID beds, you know, kind of rearranging essentially how they have their bed capacity.

We could also potentially see if a patient is closest to the Cleveland Clinic, let's say, and they're at capacity for the day, they might be redirected to another hospital because a lot of hospitals share resources.

They share staff, equipment, you know, PPE and things like that.

So we're seeing a lot of hospital systems sharing and yeah, in the future we could see elective procedures be postponed.

- And Kabir, we're seeing right now there's some proactive steps.

One is this week, Ohio stopped accepting transfer patients to help conserve hospital space.

- That's correct, from hospitals and places where it's really raging, Arkansas, Missouri, Louisiana, Texas, they've started calling up here and saying, you know, is there a way we can transfer patients up there?

Even I think Kentucky, you know, trying to come over the border a little bit.

And the hospitals up here saying, not only do we not have the beds or we're getting close to capacity, a lot of times they're saying we don't have the space.

I mean, I'm sorry, the staff to accommodate people even if we did have the beds.

And within Ohio it's still working out those zones I mentioned earlier, they're still able to transfer patients sometimes for capacity issues as Lisa mentioned.

But as far as out of state, they're really putting the brakes on that.

Unless the patient has a previous relationship with the health system, you know, maybe they were here for a cancer treatment or something like that, then they've been sort of finding a way.

But very quickly, this last few weeks we've found that something from out of state that's kind of a new case, setting them up here, they're not allowing that here in Ohio.

(upbeat music) - It has been to say the least an underwhelming start to the redistricting process in Ohio.

The Ohio Redistricting Commission blew the deadline set in the constitution by voters.

September 1st came and no map.

Karen, what's the purpose of putting a deadline for this process in the constitution if it's just gonna be ignored?

- That's a really good question, isn't it?

But this is a constitutional amendment that voters approved overwhelmingly in 2015, that would change the way that Ohio lawmakers would draw those maps for district lines for Ohio house and Senate.

And then in 2018, they also added a constitutional amendment that addresses the congressional map.

What we're talking about here is the map for Ohio's state senators and state representatives.

The constitution says there was supposed to be a map proposed and two public hearings held and a vote by September 1st.

None of that's happened.

There have been meetings, last week there were 10 meetings around the state where people offered their opinions, but there was no map to actually weigh in on.

There's been no official map proposed from the seven members of the Ohio Redistricting Commission.

And they met this week to talk about what's next and admitted that they have essentially blown this deadline.

They say the Republicans on this panel say, it's because the census bureau that we were supposed to get in April was delayed until August.

This of course is the first time in dealing with these new rules that are very complicated.

And so this is gonna take time.

But there was certainly a lot of suggestion in that meeting that a map is being drawn.

The Democrats on the panel including Emilia Sykes from Akron have been saying, "Hey, if there's a map that's being drawn, we need to be a part of that so that we can see what's happening.

The whole point of these constitutional amendments was to guarantee a more bipartisan process.

I just have to think this whole thing is setting up for a possible lawsuit for whatever map is produced, because there was a constitutional deadline here that did not get observed and so here we are.

- So where are we then?

Here we, but where are we?

So the idea was, we're going to have this bipartisan panel.

There are Democrats and Republicans.

The accusation is if you look at our district maps, unproportional, a number of Republicans are represented in Ohio.

If they were drawn a little bit differently, it might be more representative of the actual split of partisanship in the state.

So they're not actually sitting together coming up with this.

I heard the Democrats by the way came up with a...

Here is a sample map, check this out.

We can do it in two days.

- Yeah, the Ohio Senate Democrats came up with a map.

They had to go back and re tinker with it a little bit, but no map yet from the Ohio Senate Republicans, from the Ohio house Republicans and the Ohio house Democrats.

The Republicans though, they dominate this panel five to two.

So what the Republicans put out there is the one that we're gonna be really looking at, because the constitutional amendment says, "If you want a map that lasts for 10 years, you have to have a Democrat buy into that."

You have to have a Democrat support that.

- [Mike] Right.

- Yeah.

But that's right.

Both Democrats, yes.

But if you want a four year map, you don't have to have any democratic support.

And so I think that there's a real fear here that we're going to go to a map that is really very partisan and very Republican, and there will be no democratic support for that.

It will be a four year map and of course there will most likely be a legal challenge.

I mean, groups that are advocating for fair districts say, when you look at how Ohio voted in 2020, 53% Republican, 45% democratic, that's what the map should look like.

Well, that just seems really unlikely.

I mean, they're talking about things like they want 45 Democrats, democratic districts in the house, for instance.

Ohio has not had more than 40 Democrats in the state house since these maps were drawn in 2011.

So it seems unlikely that they're gonna get what they want and really the constitution amendment guaranteed a bipartisan process but it didn't guarantee an even split of a map.

- Is it really about bi-partisan and fair representation or is it as some people would claim, if the Republican are in power, the Republicans will try to have the map in their favor.

If the Democrats are in power, they would do the same thing.

So that's just politics.

- And certainly that is an argument that's been presented by Republicans who have been saying, "Hey, we wanna do this more bipartisanly, but honestly Republicans do dominate the state.

We've won these elections.

This is our map to draw.

Democrats have pushed back saying it doesn't represent how voters actually voted.

And so that's been the struggle back and forth and it shows why these state legislators and this Ohio Redistricting Commission, they are so important when people are deciding who to vote for, their membership on these panels is really important.

I mean, when you talk about the Redistricting Commission, that's the governor, the state auditor and the secretary of state, as well as legislative members.

Those people are drawing the map for state lawmakers.

State lawmakers then draw the map for members of Congress.

And again, our congressional delegation, somebody in that congressional delegation, one of those 16 is gonna lose their job.

And whether that map will be 12 Republicans, three Democrats, could it even be 13 Republicans, two Democrats.

That's the question that I think a lot of people are looking beyond to not just the state house map, but then the congressional map.

(upbeat music) - This week, Ohio joined 19 other Republican dominated states in a lawsuit aimed at the Biden administration extension of protections against discrimination for LGBTQ people.

Lay this out for us Karen, why is Ohio joining in this lawsuit?

What is it against?

- What this is, is you've got 20 Republican states that are pushing back on these extensions of protections against discrimination for LGBTQ people.

And the idea comes from a case that the Supreme court decided saying that employers can't fire somebody because of their gender identity or sexuality.

Dave Yost Ohio's Attorney General had joined in that lawsuit saying that that shouldn't be the ruling.

And because of it, he was arguing the civil rights do not protect LGBTQ workers.

And so now here we are, he's pushing back on the Biden administration trying to extend those protections.

But LGBTQ advocates are saying, this is a terrible idea.

It opens the door for bills on transgender, athletes and sports and the bills that require people to use the bathroom that, rather than the gender they identify with, the one that's on their birth certificate.

And so it just, it potentially opens the door for some other things that LGBTQ activists say are really problematic for people in those populations.

- Lisa, we talked with Ken Schneck, the editor of the Buckeye Flame about the medical conscience clause, which was the idea that a physician could not treat somebody if somehow it went against their religious beliefs or their ethics or something.

And so therefore could possibly refuse treatment to someone from the LGBTQ community, that's how it's been interpreted.

And he was talking about how, what effect that has on Ohio as a welcoming place and a place where LGBTQ people want to live.

Now we look at this lawsuit and the idea of fighting against the extension of protections.

What does that say about Ohio according to LGBTQ activists?

- Well, I think it has an impact, you know, outside of just the LGBTQ community.

Because if Ohio isn't offering protections for the LGBTQ community, for housing, for employment and things like that, we're seeing a lot of people not wanna come here, perhaps.

So how are businesses going to recruit people?

And we already are seeing staffing shortages throughout the state and throughout the country.

We know that Ohio has lost population in the 10 years.

So we're seeing that happen.

I'm thinking that potentially students might not want to either stay in the state to go to college, or we might not see students making the decision to go to an Ohio college if they're not being offered those protections.

So they might choose to go somewhere else.

So I think that it really does have a ripple effect throughout the economy, throughout the health world, as you mentioned, and throughout so many other things.

(upbeat music) - Cleveland's I-X Center will open again for events under new management.

Industrial Realty Group is taking over the dormant property.

Most everything's coming back.

I know these, RV Super Show, like things that people really make destination.

I mean, it's why you go to the I-X Center.

Those seem to be coming back.

- It does, the list, I mean, they're rushing to get these things in because they've had a shortened time to sign up exhibitors and that sort of thing.

But the auto show, piston power is gonna be back, the home and garden show.

The only one I didn't see on the list as of now is they have the bridal show.

I haven't seen that listed yet, but I imagine maybe not for this year, then next year.

So the schedule looks as far as operationally, kind of what we were used to seeing from I-X Center for the last 35 years or so.

- And yet what contributed to the shuttering of the I-X Center was the pandemic last year and the idea that events were canceled.

Now we're seeing this rise in cases.

We mentioned 7,000 yesterday, 7,000 the day before, how much worry is there that while we are talking about someone else managing it and events coming back, we could be in the same boat we were last year.

- Yeah, you do not wanna reopen this building with great fanfare and then make it a super spreader.

So I have to think that just like music venues and some movie theaters and a lot of these public places where you go for entertainment, everyone goes together.

There is probably gonna be some sort of mandate for showing your vaccine card or temperature checks at least, possibly masks, maybe at least the staff or the food prep staff.

So that remains to be seen.

And of course, if things continue on the upwards trajectory that we've seen, I have to think that they might start canceling events again.

But I don't wanna speak, of course, for the company we don't know where that's headed and we don't know what's going to be happening early next year when the auto show, for example, will be back in town.

- Coming up Monday on the sound of ideas on 90.3 WCPN on the Labor Day holiday.

We'll bring you a marketplace special, The Uncertain Hour.

marketplace explores the origins of the federal minimum wage.

I'm Mike McIntyre, thanks so much for listening and stay safe.

(bright music) - [Announcer] Brought to you by Westfield, offering insurance to protect what's yours, grow your business and achieve your dreams.