Majority of coronavirus deaths in Madison County have been at long-term facilities
Health officials said Wednesday that nearly 82% of COVID-19 deaths in Madison County have been from long-term care facilities.
At a meeting of the Madison County Health Advisory Committee, Director of Public Health Toni Corona said of the county’s 65 deaths, approximately 53 have been patients who were living in a long-term care facility.
Including two additional facilities reporting an upsurge in cases — the details of which are expected to be announced Friday — there are now seven COVID-19 outbreaks in the county.
“That’s in line with the information we’re seeing across the county,” Corona said. “The majority of the outbreaks we’re experiencing are from long-term care facilities and about 82% of our deaths are individuals who were residents in long-term facilities at the time of their death.”
Also on Wednesday, St. Clair County reported that 60% of its 101 coronavirus deaths were from long-term care centers.
When asked about the percentage of patients who died with comorbidities, Corona said she didn’t have statistics but said it was “safe to assume” that, more often than not, patients from long-term care facilities have underlying health issues.
Corona also gave members of the committee an update on where the county stands statistically. Overall, she said, the important COVID-19 outlook is trending in the right direction.
“Everything is trending down,” Corona said. “We are well below the med/surge capacity, the ICU capacity. We’re in really good shape as far as that goes.
“The idea is to be keeping all of these percentage points to manageable levels where we have capacity and no significant increase in positivity to help us continue to the next stages and focus on reopening.”
Corona said there isn’t any way for the health department to determine if actual COVID-19 cases are decreasing, but said the Illinois Department of Health may be able to help her. She stressed that while some statistics were looking better in Madison County, the virus is still a threat to people’s health. She said the county will need to learn to “coexist” with the virus for the foreseeable future.
While cases may look as if they’re improving, she added, it’s important to remember that testing isn’t where it should be.
“We’re not doing as much testing as we hope to be doing,” she said. “We’re doing more than we were doing last month but there is always room to do more testing.”
This story was originally published June 4, 2020 at 1:44 PM.