Niagara County reports 5 new coronavirus cases
Press Release, Niagara County Health Department
LOCKPORT – Niagara County Public Health Director Daniel J. Stapleton today said that since last night the county has received five new positive test results from the New York State Department of Health.
As of this morning, Niagara County now has 9 positive results 61 people quarantined, 10 in isolation and still 5 pending test results. It is believed all new cases were via community spread.
“This shows how rapidly the situation changes. As of 5 p.m. yesterday, we had not received any new positives from DOH and within a couple of hours, we had five,” said Stapleton. “I have heard some say that our numbers are merely a function of our testing and if we could do testing at the rate we would like, there would be many, many more positives. To that, I say, I absolutely agree. The community needs to act as if COVID-19 is everywhere because in all likelihood, it is.”
The five new positives are:
• 33-year-old male in North Tonawanda who is in ICU at a local health care facility
• 51-year-old female in North Tonawanda who is in home isolation
• 43-year-old female in North Tonawanda who is in home isolation
• 64-year-old male in North Tonawanda who is in home isolation
(Note: these four North Tonawanda cases have no apparent connection to each other)
• 29-year-old female from City of Lockport who is in home isolation
Stapleton also released contact tracing information for the previous positive cases that the county was already investigating. This means the times and locations these folks were several days prior to showing symptoms. To be clear, this information is not related to the five new positive results.
“In these cases, the length of time that has passed and the fact these individuals self-quarantined quickly after feeling symptomatic worked in our favor,” said Stapleton. “Plus, we have unique circumstances in which some positives were mainly in health care facilities or in their homes for non-COVID-19 related issues. We reviewed these findings with the New York State Department of Health and they determined the chance of community spread from these individuals is minimal.
“But that is not meant to make the public take this any less lightly,” he said. “As we see today with five new positives, the virus is continuing to spread and will continue.”
