Coronavirus: County declines naming second nursing home on state report

ELIZABETHTOWN — The name of a second nursing home with a coronavirus remained a mystery, with Bladen County’s Health Department on Sunday refusing to name it.

Two nursing homes are listed in the aggregate outbreak report from the state Department of Health and Human Services. The county Health Department gives information on local outbreaks and clusters to the state for its report. Bladen East Health and Rehab appeared on the aggregate outbreak report July 22.

Asked Saturday through email for the name of the facility, Dr. Terri Duncan wrote back Sunday morning, “We are working with NCDHHS to validate the report.”

In April, DHHS reversed its stance on releasing the names of facilities and issued new instructions to county health departments. The state releases a detailed list on Tuesdays and Fridays. The move came after threat of a public records lawsuit by a media coalition and several advocacy groups, all of whom cited the interest of public health.

Sunday’s report from DHHS and the county included six more lab-confirmed cases in the county, pushing to 708 the total since the pandemic began. There have been 10 deaths, 641 recoveries and 57 cases are considered active.

The postal ZIP code report from DHHS lists 190 cases in Elizabethtown and White Lake since the pandemic began; 82 in Bladenboro; 69 in East Arcadia; 66 in Clarkton; 62 in White Oak; 51 in Tar Heel; 16 in Kelly; 13 in Council; and seven in Dublin. Deaths number two in the ZIP for Elizabethtown and White Lake, and one each in Dublin, Bladenboro, Tar Heel, White Oak and Kelly. The other three are not linked to a ZIP code unique to Bladen County.

The numbers do not match the state’s county total because not all communities are represented.

Sunday’s totals from the state included:

• 2,692 deaths, up nine from Saturday’s noon report. Six were in congregate living settings.

• 166,127 cases, up 1,051. The increase was nearly 60 percent lower than Saturday’s 2,585, which was the largest single-day increase. There were a combined 4,000 cases added in Friday and Saturday reports, and 5,051 in the three days.

• 917 hospitalized, down 48.

• 2,243,273 tests, up 25,124. In the last three reports, tests have risen 90,548.

In the Friday-Saturday reports, there was a 6.1 percent rate of positive return. Over the three days, the rate is 5.6 percent. The trend has been only people thinking they may be sick or have been exposed to the virus get tested, which arguably lessens the meaningfulness of the statistic to the population as a whole.

For most people, the coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms, such as fever and cough. But for others, especially older adults and people with existing health problems, the highly contagious virus can cause severe symptoms and be fatal.

In adjacent counties to Bladen, there have been 202 deaths and 10,997 cases. Cumberland has 66 deaths and 4,016 cases; Robeson has 60 deaths and 3,511 cases; Columbus has 51 deaths and 1,096 cases; Sampson has 21 deaths and 1,607 cases; and Pender has four deaths and 767 cases.

Congregate living settings in North Carolina have totaled 1,366 deaths and 16,561 positive cases. Outbreaks have been identified and are active at 196 nursing homes, 104 residential care facilities, 46 correctional institutions and eight other facilities. Of those, eight are in Cumberland, three in Pender, two in Bladen, Sampson and Columbus, and one in Robeson.

Cumberland also has two clusters, and Bladen and Sampson have one each.

With 88 percent of the state’s hospitals reporting, DHHS says there is availability of 73 percent of the ventilators, 28 percent of the intensive care unit beds and 30 percent of all hospital beds.

In the personal protective equipment category, the supply of gloves is at a 93 days supply; all other categories are at least nine months.

A combined 13 metropolitan counties have the state’s three largest cities and account for 44.9 percent of the deaths (1,210) and 50.8 percent of the cases (84,410).

In the Charlotte area, Mecklenburg County has 284 deaths and 25,198 positive cases, Gaston County has 63 deaths and 4,068 cases, Rowan County has 60 deaths and 2,777 cases, Cabarrus County has 53 deaths and 3,142 cases, and Union County has 48 deaths and 3,908 cases — a total of 508 deaths and 39,093 cases.

In and near the Triangle area, Wake County has 199 deaths and 14,868 cases, Durham County has 84 deaths and 6,878 cases, Johnston County has 50 deaths and 3,793 cases, and Orange County has 50 deaths and 2,255 cases — a total of 383 deaths and 27,794 cases.

In the interior of the 12-county Piedmont Triad, Guilford County has 170 deaths and 6,810 cases, Forsyth County has 74 deaths and 6,141 cases, Randolph County has 43 deaths and 2,413 cases, and Davidson County has 32 deaths and 2,159 cases — a total of 319 deaths and 17,523 cases.

According to the coronavirus tracker of Johns Hopkins University, available on BladenJournal.com, more than 5.9 million confirmed cases and 182,000 deaths are counted in the U.S. The second-highest case total is in Brazil, with more than 3.8 million.

There are more than 25 million cases worldwide, with more than 843,000 deaths.