Two new positive COVID-19 cases and no additional patient recoveries were reported for Hopkins County at 5 p.m. Sunday, August 2nd, after one day in which no new cases were reported.
Seven patients were also reported to be in the COVID-19 unit at CHRISTUS Mother Frances Hospital-Sulphur Springs on August 2. No other information was known of the patients in the CMFH-SS COVID-19 unit at this time.
Of the 154 Hopkins County residents who have tested positive for COVID-19 since mid-March, 98 have recovered, leaving 56 active cases of COVID-19 in Hopkins County on August 2nd.
When Texas Department of State Health Services and Texas Health and Human Services Commission last updated their COVID-19 fatality data dashboard at 3.20 p.m. Aug. 1, it still showed one COVID-19 fatality for Hopkins County. The DSHS “COVID-19 Total Fatalities by County” spreadsheet shows the fatality to have been assigned to Hopkins County on July 23.
Hopkins County Emergency Management officials continue to report that neither local emergency management officials nor regional DSHS officials have received any information regarding any COVID-19 deaths of Hopkins County residents.
DSHS on July 30 reported a manual check revealed an “automation error” Wednesday, which caused 229 fatalities that did not list COVID-19 as the direct cause of death to be counted in the state data. This follows DSHS’ shift in the way COVID-19 deaths are determined; death certificate data is now used to count fatalities as of Monday.
The Aug. 1 report stated that the cumulative fatality counts for July 27-29 were corrected, but DHSH reports numbers could rise as more death certificates are filed daily across the state. No new data was posted Aug. 2 on the DSHS/HHS COVID-19 dashboard “due to a scheduled upgrade to the system that processes electronic lab reports.” Sunday’s data will be posted along with Monday’s data in the files on the “Additional Data tab” at the bottom of the COVID-19 dashboard.
HHS’ COVID-19 page also continues to show only one worker at one Sulphur Springs nursing home facility as having tested positive for COVID-19 as of July 17; that was an active case on July 13 and continued to be an active case on July 17, according to the HHS report. All data in this report is 2 weeks behind so that information self-reported by these facilities can be entered and error-checked.
No nursing home or assisted living facility in Hopkins County has reported having any residents test positive for COVID-19 either in the past or through July 17, according to the HHS reports. Data for nursing homes and assisted living facilities will only be posted Monday-Friday.
Those who check the DSHS/HHS site regularly for case counts will want to note DSHS will not be posting any new data on the COVID-19 dashboard on Sunday, Aug. 2, “due to a scheduled upgrade to the system that processes electronic lab reports.” The upgrade should “enable incoming lab results to be processed faster and maintain compatibility with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.” Sunday’s data will be posted along with Monday’s data in the files on the “Additional Data tab” at the bottom of the COVID-19 dashboard.
