Preliminary numbers show a recent decrease in the new number of COVID-19 cases in Elkhart County, Ind. but officials remain cautious.
County officials continue to warn that a backlog in test processing is most likely making the preliminary numbers appear better than reality. With 25 new cases reported on Wednesday, Elkhart County’s preliminary seven-day moving average is 46, down from a recent high of 60 in mid-July. The average seven-day moving average reached 78, its highest point, on June 18.
“Getting accurate data right now is nearly impossible,” said county Health Department spokesperson Melanie Sizemore. “We have roughly 600 tests out in the county that go back all the way to the 3rd or 4th of July.”
The bottleneck is an issue, not just because it makes it impossible to know the exact state of the local outbreak, but because a two-week delay for an asymptomatic carrier of the coronavirus could mean that they and the health authorities do not find out they were infected until after they no longer carry the virus.
Click here to read the full story from Rasmus S. Jorgensen in the Elkhart Truth.
