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Madison County health director: 411 cases, long-term care clusters and strained staff underscore caution on reopening
Summary
Health Department Director Toni Corona told the Madison County Board of Health May 8 that the county had 411 confirmed COVID-19 cases and 30 deaths (about 80% tied to long-term care facilities), that the department is a 37-person staff managing contact tracing and monitoring over 600 contacts, and that evaluating reopening plans would add substantial work.
Madison County Health Department Director Toni Corona told the County Board of Health on May 8 that the county was still seeing active COVID-19 cases, that most deaths reported to date were tied to long-term care facilities, and that the department is operating with limited staff while handling testing and contact-tracing responsibilities.
At the telephonic special session, Corona said the department was reporting 411 confirmed cases in Madison County residents and 30 deaths; about 80% of those deaths were associated with residents of long-term care facilities. She described two significant long-term-care outbreaks and said the department had monitored or quarantined more than 600 contacts tied to confirmed cases.
"We have a small staff of 37 individuals," Corona said, describing an intensive, multi-disciplinary response that includes environmental health, nursing and coordination with the Illinois Department of Public Health for congregate settings. She cautioned that asking the Health Department to evaluate reopening plans for many businesses would place substantial additional burden on an already stretched team.
Corona also said that public reporting of total test counts is incomplete at the county level because labs are required to report positive results but not always the overall number of tests performed; that makes local calculation of test positivity rates difficult. She noted a recovered/monitored figure of about 121 individuals who were no longer under active monitoring at the time but warned that "no longer being monitored" does not necessarily mean full clinical recovery.
The Director urged board members to include Health Department staff in any working group tasked with drafting reopening guidance so the county can anticipate operational needs, enforcement implications and the potential for increased case clusters if reopenings are not accompanied by adequate testing and tracing capacity. The Board agreed to include department input as part of the committee's work and set a reconvening date of May 12 for the revised proposal.
