When Oregon Governor Kate Brown first issued a statewide stay-at-home order on March 23rd, 2020, the fear was that severe cases of coronavirus would overwhelm our healthcare system. You can read here how multiple forests in Oregon, including trails and more have been closed in light of COVID-19. Today, on April 3rd, health officials say we’re seeing positive results from social distancing and that transmission of coronavirus cases in Oregon has been cut by up to 70 percent.

Flattening The Curve In Oregon

Oregon is currently one of only 23 states in the US that still have under 1,000 confirmed cases of coronavirus (currently at 826 cases with over 16 thousand people tested). Oregon is one of 40 states at this time that have issued a stay-at-home order.

Health officials such as Dean Sidelinger now believe that the cases of coronavirus in Oregon will rise slowly enough that they will not overwhelm our health care system, though this is contingent on people continuing to stay at home and practice social distancing. Sidelinger noted that while there were 90 new confirmed cases in Oregon on Thursday April 2nd that the case numbers will likely stay up for a short while before they come back down.

Data compiled from the Institute For Disease Modeling in Bellevue Washington have been used to show that transmission rates in Oregon have been cut by 50 to 70 percent.