How is COVID-19 impacting Kirkland?

King County has released city-specific data on case rates, unemployment filings and more.

By Blake Peterson • May 30, 2020 7:00 pm
Downtown Kirkland. Blake Peterson/staff photo
Downtown Kirkland. Blake Peterson/staff photo

A new data dashboard released by Public Health — Seattle & King County confirmed this week that as of May 28, there were 318 positive cases of COVID-19 (coronavirus) in the city of Kirkland.

According to the data, 17.3 percent of people who have tested positive have died from the illness in the city. This brings the death rate to 61.8 per 100,000 residents in Kirkland.

In King County overall, there are, as of May 28, 7,931 positive cases of COVID-19, with 549 deaths from the virus.

The updated data dashboard also provides a breakdown of how COVID-19 has impacted long-term care facilities. It also provides statistics around the economic, social and health changes that have occurred since the onset of the outbreak in King County.

There is an additional race and ethnicity dashboard that shows how COVID-19 has affected communities of color compared to whites.

In King County, there have been 344 deaths at long-term care facilities, with 64.4 percent of them related to COVID-19, as of May 28. In Kirkland, five nursing facilities have at least one positive case of COVID-19.

Notably, the Life Care Center of Kirkland has seen a total of 45 deaths as of May 28.

Data shows that 358,215 King County residents filed new unemployment claims between March 1 and May 16. In the Kirkland area, the number of residents who filed initial claims for unemployment during the week of May 10-16 can be broken down by zip code:

98033: 926 filings (rate of 19.4 percent claims per capita)

98034: 1,044 (21.5 percent claims per capita)

98083: 15

COVID-19 is disproportionately affecting communities of color, the race and ethnicity dashboard shows.

Of the 7,695 confirmed (on May 22) cases of COVID-19 in the county, rates for communities of color have been much higher than rates for whites. Compared to the 174.2 per 100,000 rate for whites, the case rate for Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islanders was 995.9 per 100,000 and 858 per 100,000 for the Latinx/Hispanic population.

The Black population, according to May 22 findings, has seen a case rate of 469.8 per 100,000. The case rate for American Indians/Alaska Natives is 271.7 per 100,000; for the Asian population, it is 195.7 per 100,000.

For more information on King County and Kirkland-specific COVID-19 data, go to the county’s updated data dashboard page.