Backlog In Texas Impacting COVID-19 Reporting
According to Dallas County Judge Jenkins, today’s numbers include a backlog from June. However, unlike yesterday we don’t know the exact breakdown of which cases are old and how many are new.
Dallas County Health and Human Services reports 1,850 additional confirmed cases of 2019 novel coronavirus (COVID-19). This brings the total confirmed case count in Dallas County to 65,278, including 829 confirmed deaths. The total probable case count in Dallas is 2,519, including 7 probable deaths from COVID-19.
“Once again we have a high number of cases coming in, this time from June, due to a coding error in the State’s electronic laboratory reporting system. While at this point it is reasonable and understandable for people to be skeptical of the State’s reporting system, it is not reasonable to be skeptical of the science that is proving to be effective throughout the world in controlling the spread of COVID-19, namely wearing a mask, six-foot distancing, hand-washing, deferring unnecessary trips until the numbers are lower, and avoiding any indoor activity where people outside your home cannot wear a mask one hundred percent of the time. The State is working to fix the coding error but we expect to have several more days of discovered backlogged cases where the patient was tested, received their results from the lab, but the information was lost in the State’s system and therefore no tracing was done.
Given this situation, we ask that the public do two things: one, as always, if you have reason to believe that you have COVID-19 and get a test for that, we ask that you follow the CDC guidelines, isolate from everyone, including your own family, and mask at home until your results come back. Second given there’s a possibility that your results may not make it back to the tracing team, we ask that you let your known close contacts know that they may have been exposed through you to COVID-19. A close contact is anyone that you are around, within six feet, for more than 15 minutes from 48 hours before the onset of symptoms throughout the course of your sickness.
We will get through this by making our very best decisions and not losing our resolve or letting our guard down. That’s the best way to have less people get sick, have more businesses stay open and get our kids back to school sooner rather than later,” said Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins.
The additional 4 deaths being reported today are the following:
- A woman in her 40’s who was a resident of the City of Dallas. She had been critically ill in an area hospital, and had underlying high risk health conditions.
- A woman in her 70’s who was a resident of the City of Dallas. She had been critically ill in an area hospital, and had underlying high risk health conditions.
- A man in his 70’s who was a resident of the City of Dallas. He had been hospitalized, and had underlying high risk health conditions.
- A woman in her 70’s who was a resident of the City of Richardson. She had been critically ill in an area hospital, and had underlying high risk health conditions.
Over 2,925 children under 18 years of age have been diagnosed with confirmed COVID-19 since July 1st, including 66 children who have been hospitalized for COVID-19.
