Washington County stayed in the “Orange” category of Covid positivity rate for the second week in a row as the positivity rate declined to 10.65.
A week ago, the county moved to Orange from Yellow, and had a total positivity rate of 14.92 which was dangerously close to being in the “Red” category.
The 7-day positivity rate was 12.2 percent with 12 new cases reported Wednesday and a total case count of 602.
This is an increase of 169 cases since November 1.
The Indiana State Health Department designates a Red county that has a 15 percent positivity rate or greater.
Washington County Health Officer Dr. Jeff Morgan issued strict guidelines for county schools to go online for junior and high school students and a limit of 50 attendees of extracurricular events.
He said if the county moved into the “Red” zone, he would recommend all students go online and all sports be shut down.
Indiana reported 6,143 new cases of the coronavirus Wednesday and an additional 60 deaths as the state map detailing viral spread shaded ever darker.
Only one county in this week’s update, Putnam County, appears as yellow.
The rest are either orange, the second-highest level of spread, or red. This week more than 21 counties around the state fall into the red or highest category of spread.
Nine counties were Red last week:
- Clay
- Decatur
- Fayette
- Fountain
- Lagrange
- Newton
- Perry
- Union
- Warren
Twelve more counties turned Red this week:
- Lake
- Porter
- Elkhart
- Steuben
- Dekalb
- Whitley
- Allen
- Wells
- White
- Sullivan
- Brown
- Ripley
- Dearborn
- Franklin
- Spencer
A total of 4,830 Hoosiers are confirmed to have died from COVID-19, an increase of 60 from the previous day.
Another 254 probable deaths have been reported based on clinical diagnoses in patients for whom no positive test is on record.
Deaths are reported based on when data are received by the state and occurred over multiple days.
To date, 1,989,456 unique individuals have been tested in Indiana, up from 1,969,088 on Tuesday.
A total of 3,668,049 tests, including repeat tests for unique individuals, have been reported to the state Department of Health since Feb. 26.
The state Department of Health will offer free drive-thru clinics at the following locations today through Saturday this week:
Lake County
St. Timothy Church
1600 W. 25th Ave., Gary
Clay County
Clay County Testing
911 Bonnie Geyne Miller Dr., Brazil
Spencer County
Spencer County Community Center
1101 E. CR 800 North, Chrisney
Jasper County
Kankakee Fire Station
12161 N. County Road 200 East, Wheatfield
To find other testing sites around the state, visit www.coronavirus.in.gov and click on the COVID-19 testing information link.
