The seven-day positivity rate on campus continues to trend downward, going from 0.9 to 0.7 percent Friday after numbers from Wednesday and Thursday were tallied Friday.
Of 11,993 new tests on Wednesday, 47 came back positive, a rate of 0.4 percent.
Of 6,626 new tests on Thursday, 34 came back positive, a rate of 0.5 percent.
Those are the lowest positivity rates on back-to-back days on campus since Aug. 27-28, when the UI had consecutive days of 0.4 percent.
Since Aug. 24, when classes began, there have been 1,547 unique cases of COVID-19 on campus.
Since Aug. 16, when move-in week kicked off, there have been 1,829 cases.
Here’s a daily breakdown of tests and unique cases since students began reporting to campus in mid-August, according to the UI’s COVID-19 dashboard:
- Thursday, Sept. 10: 6,626 new tests, 34 new cases
- Wednesday, Sept. 9: 11,993 new tests, 47 new cases
- Tuesday, Sept. 8: 11,621 new tests, 81 new cases
- Monday, Sept. 7: 6,299 new tests, 69 new cases
- Sunday, Sept. 6: 2,987 new tests, 37 new cases
- Saturday, Sept. 5: 2,609 new tests, 37 new cases
- Friday, Sept. 4: 14,204 new tests, 104 new cases
- Thursday, Sept. 3: 14,841 new tests, 88 new cases
- Wednesday, Sept. 2: 7,089 new tests, 120 new cases
- Tuesday, Sept. 1: 14,367 new tests, 199 new cases
- Monday, Aug. 31: 17,227 new tests, 230 new cases
- Sunday, Aug. 30: 3,640 new tests, 104 new cases
- Saturday, Aug. 29: 2,895 new tests, 50 new cases
- Friday, Aug. 28: 15,030 new tests, 65 new cases
- Thursday, Aug. 27: 15,123 new tests, 60 new cases
- Wednesday, Aug. 26: 6,812 new tests, 54 new cases
- Tuesday, Aug. 25: 15,850 new tests, 89 new cases
- Monday, Aug. 24: 17,656 new tests, 79 new cases
- Sunday, Aug. 23: 4,474 new tests, 53 new cases
- Saturday, Aug. 22: 3,326 new tests, 43 new cases
- Friday, Aug. 21: 10,877 new tests, 54 new cases
- Thursday, Aug. 20: 10,742 new tests, 52 new cases
- Wednesday, Aug. 19: 6,300 new tests, 29 new cases
- Tuesday, Aug. 18: 6,162 new tests, 20 new cases
- Monday, Aug. 17: 9,064 new tests, 24 new cases
- Sunday, Aug. 16: 2,453 new tests, 7 new cases
After recording four positive tests for COVID-19 this week, the Blue Ridge school district will shift to all-remote learning through at least Sept. 25, Piatt County Journal-Republican Editor Steve Hoffman reports.
Blue Ridge becomes the first entire district in the area to shift to all-remote learning; over the past three weeks, similar action was taken at two high schools, Cerro Gordo and Salt Fork.
The positive tests involved two staff members, a student at Schneider Elementary and a student at Blue Ridge High School.
Stanifer
“We are coordinating our efforts with the DeWitt/Piatt Bi-County Health Department to promptly identify and monitor individuals who have had recent contact with the COVID-19 individuals to prevent further spread within our school and community,” Superintendent Hillary Stanifer said. “We are following guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention as well as state and local health departments for best practices and procedures to protect everyone’s health.”
Monday will be a remote planning day for staff with no work assigned to students who had been attending two days per week in person. Remote instruction for all students will begin the next day.
Staff members and students who were in close contact with the COVID-19 cases will be in quarantine for 14 days. A deep clean of district buildings is also planned.
The number of new cases in Ford County grew by five Friday, to 125.
Of those, 19 are classified as active and one resident has been hospitalized, according to the county health department.
The 20-to-29 age group has had the most cases (22), followed by 30-to-39 (19).
Counties colored in orange are on the state’s warning zone.
Vermilion was among 30 counties statewide added to the COVID-19 warning level list Friday, the Illinois Department of Public Health announced.
County metrics are assessed every Friday; any county with two or more risk indicators, as defined by the state, is added.
Of concern in Vermilion, according to IDPH:
— New cases per 100,000: Vermilion is at 96, considerably higher than the target rate of 50 or less.
— Emergency department visits for COVID-19-like illnesses: Vermilion’s number rose by 1.5 percent in the last week; the target is “decreasing or stable” over seven days.
“This is a warning, and an opportunity for us to remind and encourage businesses and residents to be thoughtful,” Vermilion County Public Health Administrator Doug Toole said. “If we remain on the warning list, and other counties in our region do, as well, the state might temporarily tighten up some of the guidelines to aid in social distancing and help us to return to a lower risk situation.”
The 30 counties at a warning level:
- Bond
- Bureau
- Cass
- Clinton
- Coles
- Crawford
- DeKalb
- DuPage
- Effingham
- Greene
- Grundy
- Hancock
- Henderson
- Jackson
- Jasper
- Jersey
- Lawrence
- Madison
- McLean
- Monroe
- Morgan
- Pulaski
- Schuyler
- Shelby
- Stark
- St. Clair
- Tazewell
- Vermilion
- Washington
- Williamson
Although the reasons for counties reaching a warning level vary, some of the common factors include: an increase in cases and outbreaks are associated with college parties, weddings, large gatherings, bars and clubs, long-term care facilities and other congregate settings, travel to neighboring states, and spread among members of the same household who are not isolating at home.
Later Friday, Toole announced the county had 13 new cases, including a toddler, pushing its total to 418. Also contracting the virus: four residents in their 20s, four in their 50s and two in their 70s, as well as one person each in their 30s and 60s.
Three of the new cases are in the same family, two others are in another family, and one recently traveled to a theme park, Toole said.
Of 738 Champaign County residents with active cases of COVID-19, only one is hospitalized.
(As Deb Pressey reported Thursday, that doesn’t mean local hospitals have just one COVID patient — Carle, which draws from a 41-county region, had 20 patients at its hospital in Urbana this week).
Of 22,293 new tests over the past two days in Champaign County, 356 came back positive, a rate of 1.6 percent, C-U Public Health reported Friday.
The county’s seven-day positivity rate is 1.0 percent, up slightly from Wednesday’s 0.7 percent but well under the state’s rate of 3.9 percent.
Other numbers of note from Friday’s case data, which spans two days because CUPHD was prioritizing case investigations Thursday and didn’t update totals:
- Of the 356 new cases, 304 involved residents of Campustown’s two ZIP codes — 61820 (up 255) and 61801 (up 49).
- Of 738 active cases, 601 are from those two ZIP codes.
- Active cases rose by 108 since Wednesday.
- Recovered cases were up 248 (to 2,662).
- A 28th county ZIP code was added to the confirmed case list Friday — Allerton’s 61810, which straddles both Champaign and Vermilion counties.
- Over the course of the pandemic, 347,668 tests have now produced 3,420 cases. The number of coronavirus-related deaths remains 20.
Here’s an updated rundown of county ZIP codes with active cases followed by their total number of cases, according to C-U Public Health District data. (Note that the changes cover two days’ worth of data, as no cases were updated on Thursday).
- 61820/Champaign: 521 active (up 58 from Wednesday), 1,482 total (up 255)
- 61801/Urbana: 80 active (up 20 from Wednesday), 310 total (up 49)
- 61822/Champaign: 26 active (up eight from Wednesday), 236 total (up 13)
- 61821/Champaign: 22 active (up four from Wednesday), 368 total (up 10)
- 61802/Urbana: 19 active (up five from Wednesday), 285 total (up seven)
- 61873/St. Joseph: 15 active (down two from Wednesday), 57 total (up three)
- 61853/Mahomet: 12 active (up three from Wednesday), 118 total (up four)
- 61874/Savoy: 12 active (up four from Wednesday), 88 total (up four)
- 61866/Rantoul: 8 active (up one from Wednesday), 285 total (up one)
- 61880/Tolono: 7 active (up one from Wednesday), 46 total (up one)
- 61863/Pesotum: 3 active (up one from Wednesday), 12 total (up two)
- 61878/Thomasboro: 3 active (up one from Wednesday), 9 total (up one)
- 61877/Sidney: 2 active (up one from Wednesday), 17 total (up one)
- 61859/Ogden: 2 active (up one from Wednesday), 6 total (up one)
- 61843/Fisher: 1 active (down one from Wednesday), 33 total (up one)
- 61864/Philo: 1 active (up one from Wednesday), 12 total (up one)
- 61847/Gifford: 1 active (unchanged from Wednesday), 8 total (unchanged)
- 61872/Sadorus: 1 active (unchanged from Wednesday), 4 total (unchanged)
- 61810/Allerton: 1 active (up one from Wednesday), 1 total (up one)
- 61845/Foosland: 0 active (unchanged from Wednesday), 10 total (unchanged)
- 61875/Seymour: 0 active (unchanged from Wednesday), 6 total (unchanged)
- 61849/Homer: 0 active (unchanged from Wednesday), 6 total (unchanged)
- 60949/Ludlow: 0 active (unchanged from Wednesday), 6 total (unchanged)
- 61840/Dewey: 0 active (unchanged from Wednesday), 5 total (unchanged)
- 61871/Royal: 0 active (unchanged from Wednesday), 5 total (unchanged)
- 61816/Broadlands: 0 active (unchanged from Wednesday), 1 total (unchanged)
- 61851/Ivesdale: 0 active (unchanged from Wednesday), 1 total (unchanged)
- 61862/Penfield: 0 active (unchanged from Wednesday), 1 total (unchanged)
Here’s an updated breakdown of confirmed county cases by age group, according to CUPHD data:
- 11 to 20: 1,331 cases (up 231 from Wednesday); 30.1 percent of all tests in Champaign County
- 21 to 30: 870 cases (up 98 from Wednesday); 31.2 percent of tests
- 31 to 40: 381 cases (up nine from Wednesday); 11.1 percent of tests
- 41 to 50: 271 cases (up eight from Wednesday); 8.9 percent of tests
- 51 to 60: 220 cases (up six from Wednesday); 8.2 percent of tests
- 10 and under: 136 cases (up two from Wednesday); 1.8 percent of tests
- 61 to 70: 114 cases (up two from Wednesday); 5.1 percent of tests
- 71 to 80: 54 cases (up one from Wednesday); 2.1 percent of tests
- 81 to 90: 32 cases (unchanged from Wednesday); 1.0 percent of tests
- 91 to 100: 11 cases (unchanged from Wednesday); 0.4 percent of tests
Of 56,661 new tests statewide, 2,145 came back positive Friday, a rate of 3.8 percent.
The state’s seven-day positivity rate was up slightly, from 3.8 to 3.9 percent.
The Illinois Department of Public Health also reported 32 lives lost to COVID-19 on Friday:
- Coles County: 1 male 80s
- Cook County: 1 female 50s, 1 male 60s, 2 females 70s, 4 females 80s, 1 female 90s
- DuPage County: 1 female 60s, 1 female 70s, 1 male 70s, 1 male 80s
- Greene County: 1 male 60s
- Jersey County: 1 female 80s
- Kane County: 1 female 60s, 1 female 90s
- Lake County: 1 male 70s
- Macon County: 1 female 90s
- Madison County: 1 female 70s, 1 female 90s
- Peoria County: 1 female 90s
- Rock Island County: 1 female 80s
- St. Clair County: 1 male 70s, 1 male 90s
- Tazewell County: 1 female 70s
- Wayne County: 1 female 70s
- Will County: 1 female 70s, 1 female 90s
- Williamson County: 1 female 70s, 1 male 80s
Pandemic totals, according to IDPH: 4,632,382 tests, 257,788 cases, 8,273 deaths.