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Essex Center nursing home loses two more to COVID

Post-Star - 9/26/2020

Sep. 26--Two more people have died of coronavirus, the Essex County Department of Health reported.

Both people were Essex Center nursing home residents. An outbreak there has killed 13 people. Four are now hospitalized, up from three Thursday. In addition, another resident of the nursing home tested positive.

Cases are increasing in the region now that schools have reopened, but policies limiting students' time together in school have slowed the spread.

Two baseball players, including one in Washington County and one in Warren County, have been infected with coronavirus after playing together at games over the weekend.

But the player who tested positive first, a Hudson Falls High School student, had not been in school for six days because the school divided students into Group A and Group B. That gave him enough time to develop symptoms, get tested and get the results back before his next day of in-person school.

A second student at Hadley-Luzerne's Stuart M. Townsend Elementary School tested positive for coronavirus, but had not been in school "in a couple days," said Superintendent Beecher Baker.

Since the classroom had complied well with rules about masks and keeping windows open to circulate the air, only a couple of students had close contact and had to be quarantined, he said.

Having some students take class from home has kept numerous other cases out of local schools. At Queensbury High School, a virtual-only student tested positive for the virus. At Saratoga Springs High School, three students have caught the virus, but all of them were taking classes from home. An additional student was identified based on lab reports as testing positive more than a week ago.

Lab data on the state's new school COVID database online also shows that two students in the Schuylerville school district tested positive more than two weeks ago. One student in the South Glens Falls school district also tested positive more than two weeks ago. In those cases, the children tested positive before school started.

Also on Friday:

* Warren County reported four more people tested positive, for a total of 345 confirmed cases since March. Two people recovered, for a total of 286 recoveries among confirmed cases. There are 24 people currently ill, one of whom is hospitalized with "moderate" illness.

* The new Warren County cases include the Hadley-Luzerne student, the baseball player, a person who worked as a caregiver in another county for a person who has the virus, and a person who was exposed to the virus at work in another county.

* Washington County reported one person tested positive, for a total of 281 confirmed cases since March. Nine people are currently ill, and none are hospitalized.

* Saratoga County reported 13 people tested positive, for a total of 1,036 confirmed cases since March. Also, 11 people recovered, for a total of 956 recoveries. There are 63 people currently sick, three of whom are hospitalized.

* In the northern Saratoga County towns, one more Moreau resident and two more Wilton residents tested positive.

* Still ill are: one Corinth resident, four Hadley residents, five Moreau residents, three town of Saratoga residents, three South Glens Falls resident and one Wilton resident.

* Recovered: one town of Saratoga resident.

* Essex County reported one new case, a resident at Essex Center. The county also reported two more deaths, both Essex Center residents, for a total of 13 deaths in the Essex Center outbreak.

* Saratoga Hospital reported one coronavirus patient Friday, and Glens Falls Hospital also reported one.

The Capital Region reported 35 cases Thursday, the most recent day for which data was available. That was a 0.7% positive test rate.

The only county in the region with a positive test rate higher than 1% was Saratoga, at 1.3%. The goal is to stay under 1% to keep the virus under control.

Statewide, 908 people tested positive Thursday, the most recent day for which data was available. That was a positive test rate of 0.95%.

The number of cases is increasing, but testing is increasing as well to help Public Health departments quarantine people quickly to keep the virus from spreading. There were 511 people hospitalized Thursday with coronavirus, a slow but steady increase from last week, and seven people died.

You can reach Kathleen Moore at 742-3247 or kmoore@poststar.com. Follow her on Twitter @ByKathleenMoore or at her blog on www.poststar.com.

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