By Ray King
An additional 276 cases of COVID-19 were reported within the past 24 hours and 198 of them were from Cummins Prison.
During Governor Asa Hutchinson’s daily press conference on COVID-19, State Health Officer Dr. Nate Smith said that a total of 690 inmates and 30 staff members tested positive for the virus, and said additional testing is still being conducted so those numbers may increase over the next few days.
He said prison staff have worked to divide inmates by their test results and level of exposure and has set up what he called a “field hospital” where inmates with lower levels of exposure are receiving treatment. The more serious cases are being sent to hospitals.
On Thursday, a total of 2,465 people tested positive for COVID-19 and that number has increased to 2,741. Excluding the cases from the prison, another 78 people tested positive.
Hutchinson said there has been one additional death, raising the state’s total to 46, and there are now 104 patients hospitalized, three more than there were on Thursday.
As the two-day Surge in an effort to increase testing begins Friday, the Governor said there were 2,808 test results reported, most from commercial labs in the past 24 hours, the most ever.
He also announced that some dental procedures will be allowed starting May 18 and in the interim, the State Health Department will issue a series of guidelines on how dentists are to proceed and what will be acceptable initially and what will not.
During the question and answer portion of the press conference, Smith said the state health department has seen an uptick in reported cases in both Northeast and Northwest Arkansas.
Asked if the uptick could be the result of out-of-town and out-of-state contractors in Jonesboro to work following the March 28 tornado, Smith said there was always a risk of people coming from other states but the greatest number of cases were reported in Crittenden County, which is located next to Shelby County, Tennessee, or the City of Memhis.
