The National Nuclear Security Administration reported only 13 new confirmed, positive COVID-19 cases this week, which was well below the mean average for the last two months and, individually, one of the lowest week-to-week increases since the disease reached the U.S.
Across the semiautonomous Department of Energy agency’s nuclear security enterprise, vaccinations continued at the sites. The three nuclear weapons labs reported a trickle of new cases, relative to the totals reported earlier this year, before the labs started vaccinating.
Including civil servants and contractors at the seven major National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) sites and Washington headquarters, there had been as of Friday 5,306 confirmed positive COVID-19 cases at the agency, a spokesperson from headquarters said Friday. Of these, 16 were fatal. There were 162 active cases confirmed at deadline Friday, the NNSA spokesperson said, the lowest weekly total since mid-October.
Meanwhile, vaccinations across the NNSA Production Office continued, though the pace appeared to slow somewhat compared with prior weeks. NNSA sites were among the earliest beneficiaries of the first doses of COVID-19 vaccines in the U.S.
A spokesperson for NNSA contractor Consolidated Nuclear Security said that 2,600 people at the Pantex Plant in Amarillo, Texas, and the Y-12 National Security Complex in Oak Ridge, Tenn., had received two vaccine doses by Friday: 1,600 at Pantex and 1,000 at Y-12. That’s flat, compared with last week.
According to the data Consolidated Nuclear Security provided last week, there could still be thousands of personnel at the two sites awaiting a second dose, which is typically given no sooner than two weeks after the first.
Meanwhile, at the Nevada National Security Site, about 1,900 people had gotten at least one dose, up 100 compared with last week, while 1,700 had received a second dose, also about 100 more than last week, a spokesperson said Thursday in an email. About half the people at the site were still teleworking.
National Laboratories Cases
Following are the reported numbers of confirmed COVID-19 cases at NNSA nuclear weapons laboratories, along with increases relative to the prior week and the number of people vaccinated, as provided Friday by the labs.
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory:
Cases: 326 (+8)
At deadline Friday, Livermore had given out some 2,300 first doses of a COVID-19 vaccine, a spokesperson wrote in an email.
“We are now beginning the second round of doses for those employees who received the first round,” the spokesperson wrote.
Livermore is a designated point of distribution for the vaccine in California and in March received its stockpile of doses from DOE and NNSA in collaboration with the Pentagon, the Livermore spokesperson said.
Those doses administered so far covered “about one quarter of our population,” the lab spokesperson has said.
Los Alamos National Laboratory:
Cases: 822 (+8. 760 people who got sick had recovered, as of deadline, while four had died). Los Alamos has started vaccinations, but a spokesperson declined to say how many personnel there had received doses. Lab Director Thomas Mason said in April that the lab gave out 2,000 doses during the week of March 29, the local Los Alamos Daily Post reported.
Internal tests: 18,066 (+50. A lab spokesperson said Friday these on-site tests have resulted in 258 positive results: three more than last week, when the lab recorded its first positive test in two weeks).
Teleworking: Roughly 60% of all employees. Flat compared with last week, the spokesperson said.
Sandia National Laboratories:
In March, Sandia National Laboratories instituted a one-week lag time reporting COVID data to the public because of “a shift in when our numbers are being updated internally,” a spokesperson said.
Here are the most recent numbers available for Sandia at deadline, which were current as of April 9.
Cases: 840 (+12).
Internal tests: 11,430 (+148).
Sandia started vaccinations the week of Jan. 11. Since then, a labs spokesperson said, 1,680 people had been fully vaccinated at Sandia’s New Mexico site through the onsite clinic, flat compared with the prior week.
Another 2,393 Sandia people had been fully vaccinated at offsite locations, up 523 from the prior week. At Sandia’s California site, 336 people had been fully vaccinated at offsite locations, up 112 from the prior week.
Sandia had knowledge of 4,409 fully vaccinated employees as of April 9, up 635 from the prior week.
Teleworking: Roughly 65% of all employees, flat compared with the prior week.
