ISDH: Nearly 1,000 more positive COVID-19 cases

INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — On Monday morning, the Indiana State Department of Health announced 963 more COVID-19 cases and 31 more deaths related to the virus.

Currently, Indiana stands at 15,961 cases and 844 total related deaths.

The department says 84,476 tests have been administered in the state of Indiana.

ISDH has been providing daily updates here.

Officials in Indiana are not yet providing information on recoveries. Dr. Kris Box has said that information will be available as soon as medical codes are created that will offer COVID-19 recovery information, which the state does not currently have.

According to the Center for Systems Science and Engineering at Johns Hopkins University, there have been more than 2,992,000 confirmed cases worldwide, with more than 876,000 recoveries and more than 207,000 deaths.

On Monday, the City of Logansport, implemented a local health emergency declaration. Cass County, on Monday, reported 439 cases of COVID-19, the most in the state.

The declaration, which went into effect at noon at April, 27, says:

• All essential retail establishments must not allow more than 2 people per 1,000 feet of retail space
• Any essential retail establishment bigger than 62,000 square feet will be capped at 125 people at a time.
• Families are limited to 1 person while shopping at essential retail establishments in the City of Logansport

In a Monday press conference held virtually, Gov. Eric Holcomb and other state officials provided updates on the virus. Indiana health commissioner Dr. Kristina Box was not at the press conference on Monday, due to a family emergency not related to COVID-19, Holcomb said.

• On Monday, Indiana reported 963 new cases, the single largest number of positive cases the state has recorded in one day, Dr. Daniel Rusyniak with the Family and Social Services Administration, said. He said the majority of those cases were related to an outbreak of the virus in Cass County at a Tyson meatpacking facility. Rusyniak said the state knows about that outbreak because of the strike teams that go into potential outbreak locations and conduct testing.
• About 44% of ICU beds in Indiana are available, and about 79% of ventilators are available, Rusyniak said. He said those numbers likely reflect both the abilities of our hospitals to make supplies available and a decreased number of critically ill patients with COVID-19.
• The state, in conjunction with IU Fairbanks School of Public Health, has sought to test 5,000 Hoosiers randomly invited to determine the spread of the virus throughout Indiana. So far, 2,850 Hoosiers have registered to participate. The testing began over the weekend and will continue this week, Rusyniak said. He encouraged anyone asked to participate in this or future phases of the study to participate.
• Nearly one-third of Hoosiers who have died from COVID-19 were in long-term care facilities, Rusyniak said.
• As of April 24, 1,467 positive virus cases and 260 virus-related deaths have been reported in a total of 85 Indiana long-term care facilities. ISDH will be adding the aggregate data for long-term care facilities to its website and will be updating the information every Friday, Rusyniak said. The numbers will not include staff, he said, because some staff members work at multiple facilities.
• ISDH will be providing more specific guidance to nursing homes that will require daily communication to residents and their families about the total number of cases and deaths at the facility and ways the facility is working to mitigate the spread of the virus, Rusyniak said.
• Families who feel they are not getting adequate information from their loved one’s facility can reach out to ISDH via email at familyoutreach@isdh.in.gov.
• The Indiana National Guard will be conducting flyovers this week in Fort Wayne and Indianapolis as a way to thank and recognize frontline responders, Adjutant General Bill Lyles said. Lyles said the flights are incorporated in preplanned and scheduled training missions. The A-10 Warthog stationed in Fort Wayne will conduct a flyover of Fort Wayne on Tuesday between 11:10 and 11:15 a.m. and a flyover of Indianapolis on Thursday between 10:45 and 11:05 a.m.
• Since the end of the week of March 15, applications for all FSSA programs are up by 75%, SNAP benefits applications are up by 253%, TANF benefits applications are up by 209%, and health coverage 9% higher, said Dr. Jennifer Sullivan, secretary of the Family and Social Services Administration.
• To help meet the needs of a number of vulnerable populations during the “stay at home” order, the FSSA is opening 12 sites around the state to assist individuals who are recovering from COVIOD-19 and also experiencing homelessness or at risk of homelessness.
• “Operation Food” is a food availability map that shows pantry locations across the state. That map can be found here.
• Indiana FSSA along with the Department of Homeland Security applied for a month worth of FEMA shelf-stable meals. This week, Indiana’s 12 charitable food banks, along with Salvation Army of Marion County and a large community kitchen, will begin receiving 125,000 meals.
• In all Indiana Medicaid programs, cost-sharing is suspended, meaning no copay fees must be paid at the doctor and premiums and power accounts payments are waived from March to August.

• The USDA recently granted Indiana to provide additional SNAP-Pandemic benefits throughout the duration of the public health emergency. In addition to those households that already receive SNAP benefits, the SNAP-Pandemic benefits will also go to households where children qualify and would normally receive free or reduced-price lunch at school.
• Another new program, SNAP Delivery, will allow SNAP recipients to get food delivered to their homes. That will begin in mid-May and continue permanently after the end of the public health emergency.
• Sullivan also announced a virtual care network for people with COVID-19 or concerned that they might have the virus to get access to monitoring and help as they recover at home.
• Indiana 211 and FSSA are working together to handle a surge of calls, Sullivan said.
• BeWellIndiana.org is a new FSSA website that went live on Monday and includes mental health resources for Hoosiers. It provides free, expert mental health resources and tips for staying healthy as well as addiction support resources.
• Holcomb showed a video featuring state health officials discussing the health care workers available in the state amid the virus.
• Holcomb said the state would be editing the executive order, including the “hunker down” element, on Friday. Joe Heerens, general counsel for the governor, said the eviction and foreclosure provisions are tied to the renewal date of the declaration of emergency and as of Monday, those provisions run through May 5.
• In response to a question concerning a statement by the mayor of Logansport, who said the Indiana Department of Correction was taking some offenders to the juvenile intake facility in Logansport, Rob Carter with IDOC said about 40 elderly offenders were transported to the juvenile intake facility for their own safety. Carter said there was not a riot at Westville, as had been mentioned in a question, but said there has been some tension at some facilities.
• Rusyniak said the previously reported numbers for cases and deaths of staff at nursing homes are from the facilities and that those previous numbers could include overlap of staff who work at more than one facility and that ISDH is working to come up with a way to more accurately collect that data.
• Holcomb said distance learning was something Indiana was considering even into the next semester. He said more information would be released on Friday on pre-K through 12th grade and higher education more toward the middle of May.
• Holcomb said his stance on releasing offenders has not changed amid the growing cases at facilities. One reason the state is not releasing offenders if that many offenders are part of vulnerable populations and have no place to go, Carter said. “There are challenges to releasing offenders; it’s not as easy as it sounds,” Carter said.
• A reported asked about how people can know tests are legitimate, noting a weekend incident in Terre Haute involving “so-called doctors” charging for quick-results tests that ended up being shut down by the prosecutor’s office. Rusyniak says what’s important is to make sure any medical tests are FDA-approved and that someone knows how to interpret the results.
• “We look at the whole state. We look at it region by region and we let the numbers dictate what move we’ll make next,” Holcomb said in answer to a question about the outbreak in Cass County.
• Rusyniak said the strike team is able to go to outbreak areas, test and identify cases and determine how to isolate them from the workforce and from the larger community. Holcomb said those steps would be part of how the state continues to manage the virus.
• Cris Johnston, director of the Office of Management and Budget, talked about funding the state will receive from the federal government, which should be about $2.4 billion. He said the state was working to determine how to allocate those funds, in consideration of the state’s economy and how long it will be needed.
• Fred Payne with the Department of Workforce Development, said the state’s unemployment trust fund has a little under $650 million. He said the state is not currently worried about being able to make payments and had recently put things in place to ensure the fund would be healthy. He said the state has access to federal funds as needed.
• When asked about what businesses are prioritized and why, Holcomb said, “There are numerous factors or pieces that have to snap together. There’s no one-size-fits-all. But obviously, understanding how this novel coronavirus evolves and changes and mutates, we have to make sure that the one thing we are mindful of is the density of it all. That’s why we haven’t singled out — you mentioned churches — but we haven’t singled out any one type of mass gathering but we’re very aware that that’s where this can spread the fastest.” He discussed businesses that could operate safely from a state perspective: construction, pet grooming and others.
• Holcomb said it’s not about one industry or another. It’s about how those industries conduct business.
• In a discussion about Cass County’s high numbers, Sullivan said the working FSSA is doing is regional to manage surge numbers in all areas. Holcomb said the state wants to ensure testing and tracing programs can forecast and help manage those outbreaks.
• In a question about nursing homes requesting immunity from lawsuits, Rusyniak said the state has put out guidance about general liabilities pertaining to COVID-19. The state is working in partnership to help them with potential outbreaks but has not removed all liability, he said.
• Payne said the Pandemic Unemployment Assistance program has received about 65,000 applications since last Friday, some of them duplicates carried over from the other system. Payne said the payments for those applicants should come out sometime in the week of May 8.
• Dr. Kristen Dauss, chief medical officer for the Indiana Department of Correction, said in an ideal world, IDOC would test everyone in their facilities but due to limited resources, IDOC is conducting testing in a targeted manner, in accordance with CDC guidelines, focusing on testing those who have symptoms. She said said 80% of people they have tested have had either no symptoms or mild symptoms, 15% have gone to the hospital, and less than 5% have required ICU care.

Timeline of coronavirus in Indiana

Coronavirus links