Five southwestern Illinois counties among the 30 on state warning list for COVID spread
Thirty counties in Illinois are now at the warning level for a resurgence of COVID-19 infections, the Illinois Department of Public Health announced Friday, more than double the number listed at that level two weeks ago.
Five of eight counties on the full warning list — Clinton, Madison, Monroe, Randolph and St. Clair —are in the metro-east Region 4, which is facing additional restrictions Sept. 2 if its coronavirus testing rate doesn’t fall below 8.5%. As of Thursday, 10% of tests administered came back positive. Perry, Union, and White counties in the Southern Illinois Region 5 also have reached warning status.
IDPH issues a warning when a county crosses certain targets for two or more risk indicators that measure the amount of COVID-19 increase. Those include things such as the daily number of new cases per 100,000 population, the county’s test positivity rate and new hospital admissions for COVID-19.
As of Friday, the other counties now on the warning list include Bureau, Carroll, Cass, Cook, Cumberland, Effingham, Fayette, Greene, Grundy, Henderson, Henry, Jasper, Jersey, Jo Daviess, Johnson, Morgan, Pike, Sangamon, Shelby, Warren, and Will.
IDPH released that list the same day it announced 2,149 new cases of the disease over the previous 24 hours and 20 additional virus-related deaths. That brings the statewide totals since the pandemic began in Illinois to 229,483 cases, and 7,997 deaths.
Laboratories in Illinois reported processing 48,383 tests during the 24-hour period, making for a single-day positivity rate of 4.4 percent. The statewide rolling seven-day average positivity rate for Aug. 21-27 stood at 4.1 percent.
As of Thursday night, 1,546 people in Illinois were reported hospitalized with COVID-19. Of those, 352 patients were in the ICU and 132 patients with COVID-19 were on ventilators. Those were all decreases from the numbers reported Thursday.
This story was originally published August 28, 2020 at 1:53 PM.