With COVID-19 numbers still doing well, West Virginia authorities on high alert for UK variant

Marsh also acknowledged that the response to the pandemic needs to be fluid, because the virus basically is as it continually mutates.

"The good news about the United Kingdom variant is the fact that the vaccines we have appear to be effective against this variant," Marsh said. "We know that masks and physical distancing work just as well, to reduce the spread of this variant as it does other forms of COVID-19, and it is also good news that we have been able to put together a team that has worked together to facilitate, and help us have the ability to do whole genome sequencing."

The genome sequencing, done in partnership with experts from across the state, allows experts to "not only detect the United Kingdom variant, which is made up of a number of identified mutations, or the South African variant or the Brazilian variant, but we can look for any kind of mutation any kind of genetic change, and we can start to link that then to any kind of outbreaks that we might see that may be a bit unusual, people may be reinfected who have previously been infected with COVID-19 or larger outbreaks," Marsh said.

He added, "and we'll just do surveillance on a certain number of viruses, but also we'll be armed in a different way than we have been in the past, to be able to really specifically identify what is the virus that's causing a particular set of clinical observations — perhaps, as I said, an outbreak — and be able to do that in a way where we can track it."

"We can then identify the people that might be infected with it, and we can really very quickly isolate those people and prevent the spread. So this is a really great capability, and we owe a tremendous amount of gratitude to our great scientists and universities who are leading this," Marsh said.

Marsh added that it's paramount for West Virginians over age 65 to get registered to be vaccinated. He also urged all state residents to "please, please, please continue to wear a mask and physically distance."

The Mountain State also continues to lead the country in its vaccination regime. The state has administered 435,942 doses in all, counting first- and second-round doses. That's a rate of 101.3% that includes extra doses taken from vials.

West Virginia had about 166,000 fully vaccinated residents, who are part of the total of 270,000 who have received a first-round vaccine. 

Retired Maj. Gen. James Hoyer, head of the state's vaccination effort, said the state had a good week last week, but will be "cleaning up challenges that we encountered" due to the inclement weather. Hoyer said the state will receive twice its normal amount of Walgreens doses this week due to a holdup last week due to the weather. 

Hoyer acknowledged that some states haven't received the same percentage of total doses to administer as others have.

"The governor has given us the guidance and the direction in the challenge that we are all going to cross the finish line at the same time," Hoyer said. "So this week, we have 28 counties that we will be balancing loads out on to make sure that we're [equalizing] our distributions across the state."

Hoyer said the state's timeline for vaccinating the general population, beyond the elderly and essential workers, would be March through October. That could change if more vaccine, or less, becomes available, he indicated.

Hoyer added that the state has the capability to administer 135,000 vaccines a week, or several times what's being done now.

Marsh, meanwhile, said reaching herd immunity will be tough without no vaccine being available to children. But he added that the combination of vaccine administration, mask wearing and distancing likely is what's slowing the virus's spread.

About 280,000 residents have registered to be vaccinated through the state's database. However, Justice urged more residents in Mercer, Mingo, Wayne, Mason, Jackson, Monongalia, Mineral, Berkeley and Jefferson counties to participate in the database at https://member.everbridge.net/747122446041089/login

Gov. Jim Justice referenced the state's virus numbers, including active cases having fallen 36 straight days, to 8,795; the last time the state was below 9,000 was in early November, Justice noted.

West Virginia also doesn't have any counties in the red metric in the County Alert System. West Virginia's hospital numbers are about the same — 294 hospitalized, 80 in ICU and 33 on ventilators — but still much better than in January or December.

There are 19 long-term care outbreaks and two church outbreaks, Justice said. There are six inmates and 11 staff with COVID-19 in corrections, the government added.

Justice began the pandemic briefing by acknowledging the 15 pandemic deaths since Friday's press conference.