Uptick in Kane County COVID-19 cases triggers warning; state sees 857 new cases, 39 deaths
Kane County is one of eight counties in Illinois showing warning signs of increased COVID-19 risks.
That's according to the Illinois Department of Public Health's new risk metrics released on their COVID-19 statistics website, dph.illinois.gov/countymetrics.
The new tracking site went live Friday, the same day Illinois moved to Phase 4 of the governor's reopening plan, which saw restaurants allow limited numbers of diners back inside, fitness centers reopen and loosened restrictions for gatherings of 50 or fewer.
The state also announced 39 more COVID-19 deaths Friday, bringing the state's death toll from the respiratory disease to 6,847. Another 857 residents tested positive as well, which means the disease has now infected 140,291 people in Illinois, according to the IDPH.
The new county risk tracking site is just the latest data portal IDPH has rolled out since the outbreak began. It shows each county's weekly new case average, number of deaths, test positivity rates, the number of tests performed, emergency room visits, hospitalizations, the percentage of new cases that are part of a cluster and the number of intensive care unit beds available.
Kane County averaged 58 new cases for every 100,000 residents between June 14 and June 20. Anything above 50 cases per 100,000 residents triggers the warning, according to the website. Less populated counties are measure by the growth in cases during the week. The target is anything less than 10 new cases for the week in those locations, according to the IDPH site.
Kane County also shows 15.8% of the cases from that week came from cluster events. That could be an outbreak at a group living facility like a nursing home or jail, or a party where people were exposed. Cases linked to clusters are 3% in Chicago, 3.9% in suburban Cook, 4.1% in DuPage, 5.6% in Lake, 7.9% in McHenry and 2.6% in Will counties.
"This metric is used for context to understand large increases in cases," according to the explanation on the IDPH website. "It is also an indicator of successful investigation of cases to a known source. This is not a metric that is used to trigger a county warning."
Kane County was on target in six other categories. Chicago and suburban Cook, DuPage, Lake, McHenry and Will counties were on target in all categories.
Outside the Chicago area, Boone, Cass, Kankakee, St. Clair and Union counties also are averaging more than 50 new cases per 100,000 residents, according to the site. In Cass and Wabash counties, more than 10% of COVID-19 tests had positive results for the week, as well. Morgan County received a warning because the number of deaths increased from the previous week's total. IDPH said the warnings should help guide residents' decisions to visit those counties.
Meanwhile, the state is experiencing a slight uptick in its seven-day rolling average infection rate. On Tuesday, the state was showing an average 2.4% of those who took a test over the past seven days were positive for the virus. On Friday, 2.7% of the people who took tests over the past seven days were diagnosed with an infection. That's still well below the threshold that would require the state to revert to a more restrictive phase, but noteworthy because the state moved into Phase 3 less than a month ago and the infection rate had been dwindling until three days ago.