Seattle reaches 70 percent vaccination rate

The city of Seattle has reached a 70% full vaccination rate for residents aged 12 and up. City officials say the city hit that milestone this week. Now, the city is dismantling a couple of the mass vaccination sites as it shifts focused on more targeted vaccination efforts at farmer's markets, sporting event and schools.

Acting Captain, Seattle Fire Department, Brian Wallace said "Seventy percent means that we can start relaxing some of the guidelines that we've had in place for the last year and a half, it means we can start to achieve a level of normalcy, normalcy that we haven't had since the beginning of the pandemic, means our kids can be back in school, hopefully without masks, with lots of in-person instruction, means our businesses can be open at full capacity. Means everybody can go back to work. So there's a lot bundled up in that, actually."

The first confirmed case of COVID-19 in the United States was north of Seattle in Washington in January 2020. The state also saw the nation's first deadly outbreak at a nursing home. There have been more than 440,000 confirmed COVID-19 cases in Washington State and more than 5,700 deaths.