Lowndes County saw the Golden Triangle’s largest spike in positive COVID-19 cases in a week’s time since the pandemic began, with 283 from Nov. 25 to Wednesday, according to Mississippi Department of Health data.
As of Wednesday at 6 p.m., the most recent update to the MSDH website by press time, Lowndes County had 2,611 confirmed cases of COVID-19, Oktibbeha County had 2,599, Clay County had 971 and Noxubee County had 742.
Oktibbeha County had 164 new cases in the past week, Clay County had 72 and Noxubee County had 42. Mississippi as a whole saw 11,654 new cases in the same time period.
The most recent case numbers from local school districts vary since not all districts collected data during the week of Thanksgiving, but some schools reported their cases to MSDH during that time.
School districts are required to report the number of COVID-19 cases among staff and students to MSDH weekly. When schools report fewer than five confirmed COVID-19 cases in a week, MSDH lists the number as between one and five.
Starkville-Oktibbeha Consolidated School District had five positive student cases and seven positive staff cases as of Nov. 20, according to its weekly reporting at https://www.starkvillesd.com/covid19/numbers/index/. SOCSD also had between one and five cases at Partnership Middle School, according to MSDH data from Nov. 23 to Nov. 27.
Lowndes County School District had 29 total student and staff cases during the week of Nov. 16 to Nov. 20, according to its weekly reporting at https://www.lowndes.k12.ms.us/. There were also between one and five cases each at two LCSD schools — therefore ranging from two to 10 new cases — from Nov. 23 to Nov. 27, according to MSDH data.
Columbus Municipal School District collected data during the holiday week and had seven positive student cases and eight positive staff cases as of Nov. 27, Superintendent Cherie Labat told The Dispatch.
West Point Consolidated School District reported one to five new cases in two buildings — two to 10 new cases — from Nov. 23 through Nov. 27, according to the MSDH website.
Noxubee County School District currently has two positive COVID cases, Superintendent Rodriguez Broadnax told The Dispatch.
The only private schools in the region to report case data to MSDH during the holiday week were Magnolia Christian School and South Haven Mennonite School in Noxubee County. Magnolia had between one and five new cases.
Mississippi State University had 97 positive cases, 84 among students and 13 among employees, as of Thursday, according to data updated on its website daily. MSU had 109 student cases and five employee cases Nov. 25.
Mississippi University for Women has seen eight new cases since Nov. 20, five students and three employees, according to the daily case update on its website. None of the COVID-positive individuals were on campus within a week before being diagnosed.
Mississippi has had 159,036 cases as of Wednesday, with 2,168 new cases between Tuesday and Wednesday alone, the second consecutive day of more than 2,000 new cases. The 2,457 new cases from Monday to Tuesday broke the state’s previous one-day record of 1,972 from Nov. 19 to Nov. 20.
Additionally, the state reported 1,040 hospitalizations Tuesday, the second time that the number of hospitalizations has exceeded 1,000 since the pandemic began in March.
Tess Vrbin was previously a reporter for The Dispatch.
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