Officials at Freeman Health System in Joplin Wednesday were more upbeat at their weekly COVID-19 update. Director of COVID Services at Freeman Dr. Robert McNab is encouraged by the news that 75% of Americans have received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine and that Joplin continues to lead the state of Missouri in the number of residents initiating or completing their vaccinations. McNab says those people who are vaccinated are reaping the benefits of doing so.

“We can look at this information and say that the original vaccinations are still very effective against original COVID, but also really mounts a great response against the Delta variant as well. Which really corroborates what were seeing in the hospital with patients that are coming with Delta that are unvaccinated”.

Dr. Robert McNab

McNab also shared that since the pandemic arrived in Southwest Missouri from last March to May of this year, 203 people died of COVID-19 at Freeman. To compare, in just the three months of June, July, and August this year 293 additional people have died of the virus at Freeman in Joplin.