Sept. 21 update on COVID-19 in MN: Cases hit record high amid strong testing
Updated: 3:14 p.m.
Monday’s COVID-19 numbers showed another big jump in new confirmed infections, with rising numbers of Minnesotans in the hospital and intensive care.
State officials have been on the lookout for a possible spike in cases tied to Labor Day weekend gatherings two weeks ago, although it’s not clear if the latest numbers are evidence of that.
At least part of the increase is driven by the highest testing volumes Minnesota has yet reported in the outbreak, including a single-day record on Friday. Active, confirmed cases in the state have reached a record high.
Total current hospitalizations (255) and those patients needing intensive care (128) rose modestly from Sunday. Those closely watched metrics had been trending down during the first 10 days in September. They’ve been trending back up in the past week, although they remain below August levels and far below their late-May peak.
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While the state is seeing “positive trends” in hospitalizations and deaths, Minnesotans should not start thinking that COVID-19 isn’t serious, Kris Ehresmann, the state’s infectious disease director, told reporters Monday.
Experts are just now learning about the long-term health consequences among who were infected even with mild symptoms, she noted.
Of the 90,942 confirmed cases of the disease in the pandemic to date, about 90 percent of those infected have recovered to the point they no longer need to be isolated.
Four more deaths reported Monday bring Minnesota’s toll to 1,969. Among those who’ve died, about 72 percent had been living in long-term care or assisted living facilities; nearly all had underlying health problems.
College campus worries rise
People in their 20s make up the age bracket with the state’s largest number of confirmed cases — topping 21,000 since the pandemic began, including more than 12,000 infections among people ages 20-24.
The numbers help explain why experts remain particularly concerned about young adults as spreaders of the virus.
While less likely to feel the worst effects of the disease and end up hospitalized, experts worry youth and young adults will spread it to grandparents and other vulnerable populations and could also hamper attempts to reopen campuses completely to in-person teaching.
They’ve been driving the recent outbreaks, although the number of high school-age children confirmed with the disease has also grown, with 8,500 total cases among children 15 to 19 years old since the pandemic began.
Winona State University is in the middle of a 14-day campus quarantine that will limit all nonessential activities on campus to slow the spread of COVID-19. Winona State on Wednesday reported a current total of 125 active positive cases and 294 since late August.
Regionally, southern and central Minnesota and the Twin Cities suburbs have driven much of the increase in new cases while Hennepin and Ramsey counties show some of the slowest case growth in the state.
Hot spots have included southwestern Minnesota, where 75 cases have been traced to a late-August wedding in Lyon County that officials describe now as the state’s largest single social spreader event.
Schools and sports
With many schools in Minnesota returning to in-person instruction in school buildings, officials have been keeping close watch on caseloads reported by schools.
Ehresmann on Monday said there are 351 schools in Minnesota currently affected by at least one case: 263 have one; 81 with 2-4 cases; seven are dealing with five cases.
She also expressed concern about reports of “apparent reluctance” among adults to disclose that they or their children have been confirmed with COVID-19 and not cooperating with health investigators trying to trace the disease.
“It boosts the risk of spreading COVID in schools, churches, workplaces,” she said. “The sooner we identify cases, the sooner we can take action.”
The Health Department is receiving more than 60 reports daily of new cases affecting schools, although that doesn’t mean the spread is taking place at the school, Health Commissioner Jan Malcolm said.
Separately, asked about the Minnesota State High School League’s decision to allow fall football and volleyball seasons despite the pandemic, Malcolm said that while the league took a “thoughtful approach” to the matter, “I think they’re aware that there is some risk. I think that we all expect how the season looks will be influenced by what direction the pandemic takes from here.”
Developments around the state
Minnesota ramping up free saliva testing sites
State health officials on Monday said they would be setting up a walkup saliva testing facility soon at the Duluth Entertainment Convention Center, part of system of sites around the state publicly available saliva testing around the state.
“Testing is free and you will not be required to have an ID or insurance. It is open to anyone who feels they need to be tested, whether or not you have symptoms, but especially if you have been exposed to someone who tested positive for COVID,” Dan Huff, an assistant state health commissioner, told reporters Monday.
Results are expected to be back within 48 hours, although there will initially be some delays as samples are shipped to New Jersey. The state is opening its own saliva testing lab in the St. Paul suburbs in mid-October to speed the process and handle as many as 30,000 tests a day.
— Tim Nelson | MPR News
Health officials confirm armed group confronted COVID-19 testing team
State officials on Monday confirmed a report that health workers conducting random COVID-19 testing were recently confronted by armed residents in a Minnesota neighborhood.
The Health Department hasn’t said when or where the incident occurred.
The department, though, did report the incident to the Minnesota Department of Public Safety, Dan Huff, an assistant health commissioner, told reporters.
The survey team, he said, was confronted by three men, one of them armed. Surveyors “left the situation as soon as they could,” he added.
Virus spread shifts the school guidance map
The evolving COVID-19 pandemic in Minnesota continues to change school reopening recommendations around the state.
The most recent batch of recommendations, released Thursday, cover cases from Aug. 23 to Sept. 5 — a period that happened to see a late-August spike in new COVID-19 cases.
The result? A full 25 counties saw their COVID-19 case counts slip past one of the Health Department’s thresholds, changing their recommendation toward more distance learning for more students.
In the most recent update, six counties are recommended to have all students do full-time distance learning: Blue Earth, Lyon, Stevens, Waseca, Winona and Yellow Medicine counties. All but Waseca County were previously recommended to allow at least some in-person learning.
Not every county got worse. Eleven counties saw their case rates improve compared to last week’s results, and saw their recommendation shift to more in-person learning.
Overall, 24 largely rural counties have a recommendation of in-person for all students.
A formula produced by the Health Department generates the guidance for districts to help decide whether to have in-person learning, distance learning, or a mix, based on the rate of COVID-19 cases in that district’s county over a two-week period.
These recommendations are only considered the starting point for school districts, which make their own learning plans in cooperation with the Health Department.
Minnesota’s yo-yoing COVID-19 case numbers in recent weeks have meant some drastic swings in school districts’ safe learning recommendations, but state health officials say they’re taking the data irregularities into account when working with schools to set learning plans.
Because Minnesota’s calculation uses weeks-old data and calculates cases by the day a person got tested rather than the day the tests were reported, this update is not affected by recent reporting delays caused by the Labor Day weekend.
— David H. Montgomery | MPR News
Free testing planned in several communities
The Minnesota Department of Health is offering free COVID-19 testing in several communities across Minnesota later this week.
You don't need insurance or identification to get tested; it's open to anyone, though officials said it's intended to serve the local community.
Testing takes place Wednesday in Grand Rapids, Wednesday and Thursday in Pine City and Waseca, and Thursday and Friday at Mount Olivet Baptist Church in St. Paul.
Pre-registration is encouraged. Find more information online on the Health Department's COVID-19 community testing page.
— MPR News Staff
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COVID-19 in Minnesota
Data in these graphs are based on the Minnesota Department of Health's cumulative totals released at 11 a.m. daily. You can find more detailed statistics on COVID-19 at the Health Department website.