Record spike in COVID-19 continues
Staff writer
Twenty-five new cases of COVID-19 identified in the past seven days, including four Monday, represent the third and most serious outbreak of the virus in the county.
Monday’s new cases pushed the county’s total to 151 and boosted its infection rate to 12.7 per 1,000 people.
This past week’s soaring rate is enough to classify the county as a “red zone,” meaning some regions automatically will quarantine anyone who visits Marion County.
Monday’s new cases were reported just days after 12 new cases Friday shattered a record for the county’s largest single-day increase.
The latest cases include two women in their 70s and two men in their 20s. One person with the virus has been hospitalized.
Friday’s new cases included four teens — one boy and three girls. County health nurse Diedre Serene said she did not know whether cases of the four teens were school related.
One presumably is a Goessel High School student. The school canceled its Friday football game because of a positive COVID test. Hillsboro also canceled its Friday game but did not say it was because of an outbreak of the virurs.
The county health department has been sending lists of all non-household cases of COVID-19 to Kansas Department of Health and Environment for contact tracing since Oct. 8 because of staffing shortages.
“We only have two part-time nurses doing this,” she said. “One part timer is working pretty much full time.”
Additional cases reported Friday include a woman in her 20s, two women in their 50s, a man in his 70s, two women in their 70s, a man in his 80s, and a woman in her 90s. All are in isolation.
A woman in her 50s was reported as a COVID victim Wednesday.
