Trending
CHARLESTON -- West Virginia broke a grim milestone as the week came to a close with more than 200 total deaths attributed to the coronavirus, including the state’s first inmate death.
Gov. Jim Justice and the Department of Homeland Security on Friday announced the death of a 40-year-old Wood County inmate in custody at the South Central Regional Jail in Charleston.
According to DHS, the unnamed Wood County man was in custody on federal charges and had underlying health conditions and tested positive for COVID-19 while in the hospital. The same inmate had tested negative during facility-wide testing on Aug. 12.
State corrections officials have been in contact with state health officials and the U.S. Marshal’s Office.
The Wood County inmate deaths brings the total number of COVID-19 deaths to 203.
Three new deaths were reported Friday: a 93-year old woman from Logan County, an 82-year old woman from Logan County, and a 77-year old man from Cabell County. Nine deaths were reported Thursday -- the most deaths reported in one day since Aug. 8 and Aug. 25, when eight deaths were reported those days.
“I just hate so badly that when we get an outbreak, no matter how it gets there … once it gets there it brings bad tidings,” Justice said. “It’s terrible. It’s just plain terrible, but this disease and this killer we’re dealing with is tough stuff.”
West Virginia’s first COVID-19 death was reported on March 29. Since then, the vast majority of coronavirus deaths have occurred in people ages 70 to 89, making up 61 percent of deaths reported. The average age of deaths is 76. Of the 9,641 cumulative COVID-19 cases reported since March 17, deaths make up 2 percent of total infections.
COVID-19 cases in the state have decreased for the last three weeks in a row. Active coronavirus cases have remained flat this week, with 1,763 active cases as of Friday compared to 1,748 active cases Monday. The state’s Rt number — the rate that shows how fast the virus is reproducing — was in the green at 0.89.
Hospitalizations were down to 133 after peaking Thursday at 146. But deaths between Sunday and Friday totaled 26. Dr. Clay Marsh, the state coronavirus czar, said much of the increase in deaths have come from people traveling and bringing the virus back from urban centers.
“Although cases of COVID-19 seem to be reducing, the number of deaths of COVID-19 are not reducing at the same rate at all,” Marsh said. “As we’ve said before, that comes from largely COVID-19 going from urban centers, where there may be younger people and more health care assets, to rural places as we’ve seen in West Virginia where we have more vulnerable people and perhaps people who have more comorbidities.”