BREAKING – EXCLUSIVE: Another COVID-19 fatality, surges in cases among students at Alfred colleges which appear to be spilling over into Allegany County communities, and continuing high levels of positives as people move indoors during cooler weather are being identified among data so far this week.
The State Health Department reports the death of an Allegany County resident yesterday at a licensed facility, such as a hospital, outside the county, bringing the total to 160 since the start of the pandemic and the first since July 18, nearly two months ago.
The state provides no additional information.
The localized data comes from our daily Freedom of Information Law (FOIL) requests to Allegany County, NY, government, combined with information from college websites.
Information provided is inconsistent, requiring our piecing together of data to try to determine trends.
This week, through yesterday, there were 71 new COVID cases reported by the Allegany County Department of Health, which records an unknown portion of those actually occurring due to unreported home test results. A portion of those results is collected by the county due to its voluntary online reporting system.
The total compares with 72 new cases for the first five days and 106 for all of last week.
Of the totals, a dozen cases are reported by the county in the Alfred zip code and 16 at Wellsville, where there is a Alfred State College campus. The college doesn’t provide specific numbers for the Wellsville facility.
Alfred University is reporting 10 active student cases, with six being on campus and four outside, 23 more than we reported previously from August 1 through Monday.
Two current employee positives, along with 13 which have been resolved during the same time period, is three more than we reported as of Monday.
College-associated positives only are reported by the county for persons living within its borders and are based on zip codes of residence.
At Alfred State College, 21 new student cases were reported for Monday and the weekend, with 16 being off campus students.
The college then reports an additional 13 on-campus student positives, and 30 off-campus for the period through yesterday.
It is unknown whether and how many positives might be associated with the Wellsville campus, with 14 of the total reported currently being isolated on-campus and 26 off-campus.
There were 29 new cases reported county-wide on Tuesday, the highest one-day total since 31 were recorded on May 24. Among that total, five were from the Friendship zip code and three from Canaseraga, along with five from Alfred and three Wellsville cases.
Another five Alfred cases and seven from Wellsville were reported on Wednesday.
There have been two new cases reported in the Houghton zip code but any relationship to the university there isn’t known due to the facility no longer appearing to post cases information.
Data for today and the weekend won’t be available until at least Monday.
On the hospitalization front, Jones Memorial Hospital is reporting one patient with COVID as of yesterday, with Cuba Memorial Hospital Inc., also having one after two additional discharges on Monday.
Olean General Hospital has 15 individuals with COVID, although only four were admitted with the disease. St. James Hospital in Hornell has had no COVID patients since Tuesday.
The chart accompanying this story comes from the State Health Department.
Although it is an indicator of the sharp increase in cases which has been occurring in Allegany County, compared with all of the Western New York Region, it only records results from actual lab tests.
As of today, divergence between county and state numbers is 12,897 versus 10,052, or a 2,845-case difference.
Allegany County is continuing to request that those testing positive through self or home tests enter the information at https://bit.ly/3zymEWF to aid in better determination as to the number of cases in the county and their general locations.
Various online COVID-19 Trackers, information from which may not agree with each other due to different reporting time frames, are available at:
– Allegany County Daily Cases – Under COVID-19 Updates: https://bit.ly/3ndrbZJ.
– New York State Department of Health COVID Tracker: https://on.ny.gov/31K0u7f.
– CDC Counties COVID Tracker: https://bit.ly/3GrWqHx.
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Public health and effective crisis management response, along with open government practices, are among several current focuses of Allegany Hope as we pursue efforts for Building Healthy Communities Through Health FamiliesTM.
We are seeking volunteer Ambassadors for various areas of need which you, yourself, may have identified and have a passion for as they relate to greater community awareness, education and action that leads to positive impact.
Learn more at https://bit.ly/3IHm3FY or by contacting us at AlleganyHopeWNY@outlook.com or (484) 435-0503.