Case numbers drop, one death reported

Posted February 25, 2021 at 12:35 pm

Suggesting that the worst of the COVID-19 pandemic for Clinton County might be over (knock on wood), the case numbers here again dipped to a level that hasn’t been seen for several months.

On Tuesday morning, after another week that saw more COVID-19 cases being released as no longer contagious than new cases that were added to the roll, Clinton County’s total number of cases was listed at 15, according to the latest Public Information Brief issued by the Lake Cumberland District Health Department.

The number of active COVID-19 cases in Clinton County hasn’t been that low since September 29, 2020, when the number of cases was listed at 16.

During the past seven days of collecting COVID-19 data, LCDHD added only 14 new cases to the Clinton County total, while releasing more than twice that number from the totals, 35.

Adding to the positive news during the past week, LCDHD also reported that of those 17 active cases among Clinton County residents, none were currently hospitalized.

LCDHD also reported no new deaths among Clinton County patients who were suffering from COVID-19 as of Tuesday morning.

Clinton County has currently lost 27 residents to the COVID-19 disease since the pandemic first reached Kentucky in March, 2020.

Perhaps the highlight in the good news category for Clinton County concerning the COVID-19 pandemic, is that The Medical Center at Albany was selected last week to be one of more than 200 regional vaccination sites in Kentucky.

A separate article detailing how local and area residents can make an appointment to receive the COVID-19 vaccinations begins this week on page 1.

Also, after 133 consecutive days of being in the most critical spread level for COVID-19, the “red” zone, Clinton Count also moved out of that level, falling below the 25 cases per 100,000 residents in a seven day period.

Clinton County’s seven day spread rate, as of Tuesday morning, was listed as 19.57 cases, which fell almost exactly in the middle of the 10 LCDHD counties.

Although all 10 counties had been shown to be in the “red” zone, or the highest level of case spread for several weeks, as of Tuesday morning five of the 10 counties, or one half of the LCDHD have dropped out of that critical spread level, or “red” zone and have moved into the next highest category of spread rate, the accelerated spread rate of more than 10 to 25 cases per 100,000 residents.

Clinton County’s spread rate is based on a population of 10,218 residents.

Neighboring Cumberland County, which for a brief few days last week moved out of the critical spread category, moved back into that level of spread during the past week, with a spread rate on Tuesday morning of 30.24 cases per 100,000 residents.

The other eight counties, and the respective spread rate for each as of Tuesday morning was: Taylor 56.55, Russell 45.43, Green 32.64, Adair 29.76, McCreary 19.07, Casey 17.68, Pulaski 17.37, Wayne 14.05.

Total number of cases among the LCDHD counties in addition to Clinton County’s current 36 positive cases, the current case numbers and the number of hospitalized patients listed in parenthesis are: Adair 39 (4), Casey 14 (2), Clinton 15 (0), Cumberland 14 (0), Green 19 (1), McCreary 33 (8), Pulaski 89 (15), Russell 67 (6), Taylor 77 (6), Wayne 23 (3).

Since the pandemic began, there have been 1,380 confirmed cases in Clinton County.

Across the 10 county district, there have been 19,976 confirmed cases of COVID-19 and 352 deaths.