By NewsDesk  @infectiousdiseasenews

On Jan. 21, Washington State became the first state to report a coronavirus disease case in the United States.

As of April 9, state officials have reported nearly 10,000 cases and 475 deaths. King and Snohomish counties have reported the most cases with 4047 and 1743, respectively.

Earlier this week, Gov. Jay Inslee announced that after consultation with local, state and federal leaders, the Department of Defense field hospital currently stationed at the Century Link Field Event Center will be returned to the Federal Emergency Management Agency so it can be deployed to another state facing a more significant need.

Giardia in Black and White

“Don’t let this decision give you the impression that we are out of the woods. We have to keep our guard up and continue to stay home unless conducting essential activities to keep everyone healthy,” Inslee said. “We requested this resource before our physical distancing strategies were fully implemented and we had considerable concerns that our hospitals would be overloaded with Covid-19 cases. But we haven’t beat this virus yet, and until we do, it has the potential to spread rapidly if we don’t continue the measures we’ve put in place.”

“Our community mitigation measures, combined with the amazing work of our hospitals and health care providers throughout the region, as well as our procurement of various hospital supplies, lends us to believe that at this point, our hospitals should have enough capacity to support a surge in patients,” Inslee added.