12 more people test positive for coronavirus in Fresno County, officials say. Valley passes 200
Positive tests for the new coronavirus continue to rise in the central San Joaquin Valley as experts continue to implore people to stay home to slow the spread of the respiratory illness.
There have been 217 cases of the virus discovered in the five-county region that includes Fresno, Tulare, Madera, Merced and Kings. That is 79 news cases on Thursday compared to the day before.
Fresno County said 12 more people tested positive through Thursday for the COVID-19 virus that has been determined to be a pandemic. That tallies 94 cases for the county.
No deaths have been reported in Fresno County, according to the Fresno County Health Department.
Also on Thursday, Fresno City Manager Wilma Quan signed an emergency order to allow essential service workers to park RVs in front of their houses or on surfaces around their homes.
The idea is to allow those who may be exposed to coronavirus at work to isolate themselves from their families. Those workers should be prepared to show proof they are working an essential job if requested by an officer, according to city staffers.
In a morning online video briefing, the Tulare County Health and Human Services Agency announced 15 new cases of the virus, bringing the total number of positive cases in the county to 74. Included in that number are several residents of Redwood Springs Healthcare Center, a 176-bed skilled nursing facility.
On Wednesday, the facility announced that six residents and two staff members had tested positive for COVID-19.
So far, the Tulare County Public Health Lab has tested 860 people. Of those 704 are from Tulare County. The remaining are from surrounding counties, according to public information officer Tammie Weyker-Adkins. The total number of tests in the county could be higher now that several commercial labs have and are doing testing.
Two people in Tulare County have died of the virus.
Updates in Madera, Kings, Merced
Three new cases of coronavirus were reported in Madera County, health officials said. That’s a total of 28. One person in the county died from it.
Health officials in Kings County have reported five positive cases.
Merced County reported four new cases, bringing the total to 16, according to officials. The vast majority of those residents came from the east side, which has a higher concentration of residents and more urban space.
Half of the positive cases were travel-related, the Merced County Health Department said.
Toward the southern end of the San Joaquin Valley, Kern County reported 139 positive test, an increase of 32 from a day earlier. The county has confirmed a single death.
More than 3,800 people have been tested and 1,473 are pending, Kern health officials said.
Mariposa County reported 41 negative tests and 10 pending as of 9 a.m. Thursday.
Fresno Bee reporter Joshua Tehee contributed to this report.
This story was originally published April 2, 2020 at 4:35 PM.
