Thread by @CathJSweeney

Tulsa is giving its coronavirus update. Health Department Executive Director Bruce Dart calls the county's case rate astounding. Watch here. facebook.com/cityoftulsa/vi…

The link didn't work for me but here is FOX23's fox23.com/video/live-str…

Dart: We all know how important family is in the holidays, but family gatherings are one of the most common transmission sites. "Celebrating virtually or with members of your household poses the lowest risk of spread."

Dart: I'm encouraged by the recent news this week on vaccine progress. We've been working with our partners statewide on a distribution plan. It has to be fluid because of so many unknowns. We have a tiered system to distribute the limited initial doses.

Adam Paluka of EMSA, speaking about Regional Medical Response System. okrmrs.com

Jeff Nowlin, CEO Ascension St. John (hospital system in Tulsa): We understand the community might be experiencing pandemic fatigue, but we need you to remain vigilant. As the temperatures drop and holidays approach, remember indoor gatherings are risky.

Nowlin: It's important to ask your friends, family and loved ones how they're doing and remind them to get their regular health care. If you have an emergency, don't wait. Our doctors, nurses and staff are ready.

Dr. Anuj Malik, Ascension St. John's medical director of infection control: In a pandemic there will be a resource strain, but we are fine. "We do have the staffing. There is no problem with PPE." We haven't had medication shortages. We have what we need for tests.

Malik: "I want to reassure the public that regardless of the strains that will come and go, I don't want you to be alarmed." We are committed to effective, safe and humane care. We will continue to fight.

Malik: I like to ask my covid patients what they've been doing the week before they got infected. Invariably it's indoor dining, attending a religious service of some kind, going to the gym or a family gathering.

Mayor GT Bynum: It's important to remember that Tulsa's hospital system is regional. And they all have their own internal surge plans. I think it's important to not just talk about capacity and deaths. We don't talk about the experience of being infected and being sick with it.

Bynum: We saw Gov. Stitt get the virus. He's healthy, recovered quickly. President Trump got it and got access to the best health care the world has to offer. "Those are not necessarily typical situations."

Bynum: We had a city employee who had a sustained 106 degree fever but got turned away from two hospitals because his respiratory function was too good. Another, the same, until he got pneumonia. "That's the threshold that our community is facing right now."

Bynum: Functional airways mean you can't get into the hospital. Discomfort, agony aren't enough.

We had a 40-year-old public servant who died from it this month. His children don't have a dad. "This was a vibrant young man." It's not just killing older people.

Bynum: I love personal responsibility and freedom. I spent months encouraging people to do this before we found that it was necessary to have a mask mandate. "Everything we have an ordinance for in Tulsa you should be doing anyway." But sometimes you need the law behind it.

Bynum: 61 percent of hospitalizations in Tulsa have been patients from cities without a mask order.

Bynum: I'm hearing from Tulsans who want even stronger restrictions in Tulsa. But how effective could that be when communities around us can't even require masks? We can't do this all on our own.

Dart: As far as school exposures, fewer infections are taking place in the classroom than in extra-curricular activities like band and cheerleading.

Malik responding to @ChrisKPolansky's question on whether it's hospitals' responsibility to reassure the public, per statements in an interim study yesterday: You can't divorce yourself from reality, but I think we can have an optimistic outlook.

Malik: The system is strained, but it's not at a breaking point or crisis.

Nowlin: "Capacity does ebb and flow." We've got 34 available med-surge beds in our system. ICUs are full, but we have about 12 covid patients in them and 68 ICU beds. We're seeing fewer covid patients in the ICU than we did at first because covid care is improving.