‘Spread is low and stable.’ Few new COVID-19 cases in Charlotte senior facilities
This week, Mecklenburg County identified a small number of new coronavirus cases at two senior living facilities.
Other COVID-19 metrics — like hospitalizations, the local positivity rate from tests and the number of new infections — have continued to improve.
“Our numbers continue to rise but at a slower rate,” county Health Director Gibbie Harris said at a news conference Friday.
“Our spread is low and stable ... We have to continue with the preventative measures and get tested if you need it.”
In a statement Friday, county health officials reported one case in a resident at Walton-Woods in Cotswold and two cases in residents at The Citadel nursing home in Myers Park. According to the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services, a coronavirus outbreak in a congregate living setting is defined as two or more cases within a 28-day period.
Mecklenburg health officials reported on Friday a total of 32 outbreaks locally in congregate living facilities and 3 in daycare centers.
There have been 23 deaths in the county in the last week attributed to the coronavirus. That’s the same number of deaths reported the week prior.
So far in August, the county has experienced nearly the same number of coronavirus-related deaths (62, as of late Thursday) as was reported in all of July (64).
Health officials say deaths are a lagging metric — meaning the number of people dying with the virus will be the last indicator to show improvement even as overall COVID-19 trends improve.
The latest data in Mecklenburg County shows daily new cases, hospitalizations and the percent of tests that are positive continue to decrease.
State health officials reported 216 new coronavirus cases in Mecklenburg on Friday — the largest number of new cases reported in a single day in the county since the beginning of August. However, the seven-day average of new cases has been falling since mid-July. Over the past week, the average number of new cases per day in the county is 137, compared to 265 at the end of July and 372 nearly one month ago.
The number of people hospitalized for coronavirus has also declined. In the last two weeks, the number of patients decreased from 184 to 158 people.
The positivity rate of COVID-19 tests in Mecklenburg over the last week is 7.1% — a figure which has been steadily dropping since early July when the positivity rate was around 11%.
North Carolina reported 2,008 new cases on Friday for a total of 151,912 cases total since March. There have been 2,494 deaths statewide.
DHHS reports a total of 23,809 lab-confirmed cases in Mecklenburg since the first case was detected on March 11. A total of 276 people have died in the county with COVID-19, local officials report.
