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Weekend COVID-19 numbers: no new deaths, positive test rate above 10 percent

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Sunday was a second straight day of no new COVID-19 deaths in Wisconsin.  However, the 10.4 percent positive tests was the second straight day of positive test rates above 10 percent. The Department of Health Services reported 522 of 4,996 new test results were positive.

Saturday saw 738 of 6,822 new test results come back positive. That was 10.8 percent and also broke the previous single day record for positive cases. DHS also reported 31 additional hospitalizations over the weekend.

School resource officers contract set for vote in Madison

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The future of police in Madison schools is scheduled for a vote Monday night. The Madison school board is expected to make a final decision on officers in the high schools.

Board members have signaled they will not be continuing the school resource officer program. For years, activists have called on the district to remove police from schools, and those calls have amped up in recent weeks.

The board is voting on whether to cancel the $350,000 contract that pays the officers at Madison’s four main high schools.

WIBA

Wisconsin prisons get ‘F’ grade from ACLU for COVID-19 response

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Wisconsin prisons get an F-plus grade for the way they’re handling the coronavirus.

The American Civil Liberties Union and the Prison Policy Initiative released a report Thursday analyzing states’ responses to the outbreak.

The report issued nine states D grades and every other state received F’s.

Wisconsin has had more than 270 confirmed coronavirus cases in its prisons. The state Department of Corrections reported this week that nearly all have recovered.

Thursday COVID-19 numbers: positive test rate above 4.0% for second day in a row

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The percentage of positive COVID-19 cases in Wisconsin remained above four percent Thursday.

The Wisconsin Department of Health Services reported that 464–or 4.1 percent — of 11,222 new test results were positive.

That follows a 4.3 percent positive rate on Wednesday, and over the past seven days, an average of 3.6 percent of tests have been positive.

DHS also reported nine deaths, and 27 new hospitalizations.

The state’s public health agency now has a county-level dashboard to assess COVID-19 activity in counties and Healthcare Emergency Readiness Coalition regions, that measures what DHS calls the burden in each county.

There have now been 766 deaths and 3,326 hospitalizations due to COVID-19 in Wisconsin. Out of more than 26,000 cases, 78% have recovered.

Monday COVID-19 numbers for Wisconsin

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Three more deaths due to COVID-19 were reported Monday by the state Department of Health Services. That brings the total number of Wisconsin lives lost to the global pandemic to 697.

The percentage of new positive COVID-19 tests increased slightly from Sunday, to 2.8 percent, but that’s the fourth straight day of positives below 3 percent. Monday’s 174 new confirmed cases bring the total to 22,932.

In addition, hospitalizations have dropped rapidly after a stead rise through May, to 284 on Monday morning, the lowest in two months. One hundred of those patients were in intensive care.

UW System announces students will return to campuses this fall

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The University of Wisconsin System is planning to have students and staff back on campus for the fall semester. System President Ray Cross says they have been planning and preparing to prevent the spread of COVID-19 when they open up in person classes this fall.

The System’s Plan Ahead Team says they’ll be taking measures to keep people socially distanced in classes, while having larger courses meet online only. 180,000 thousand students are expected to be enrolled for Fall semester, and another 39,000 staff will be back to work.

Vos and Fitzgerald outraged over secret recording by Evers staff

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Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald (WRN image)

The Wisconsin legislature’s Republican leaders tore into Governor Tony Evers staff on Wednesday, for recording a telephone meeting with them.

They were not told ahead of time, and in statements, state Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald called Evers “Nixonian,” while Assembly Speaker Robin called the move “unprecedented and clearly outside the norm.”

Evers spokeswoman Melissa Baldauff told The Capitol Times that Evers was not aware the May 14 meeting to discuss next steps for a statewide COVID-19 response was being recorded, and that he’s directed staff that it won’t happen again. But Baldauff did not apologize for the recording, and said the files were intended “for internal use only.”

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel has posted the audio on its website.

Friday COVID-19 update: 20,249 positives but positive percentage continues downward trend

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Confirmed cases of the coronavirus in Wisconsin surpassed 20,000 on Friday. But numbers from the Department of Health Services show the percentage of positive test results continuing a downward trend.

Two-point-nine percent of the 12,322 new tests reported on Friday were positive. That’s 357 new confirmed cases, and the lowest rate since Sunday.

And despite much more widespread testing, analysis by USA TODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin shows the amount of time it takes to double confirmed positive cases is extending. It took 18 days to go from 5,000 positives to 10,000, but 27 days to reach the 20,249 reported on Friday.

DHS reported seven more deaths due to COVID-19 on Friday, bringing the state total to 633 lives lost.

‘We’re by no means out of the woods’ with COVID-19 in Wisconsin

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“We’re by no means out of the woods.” That from Wisconsin’s Chief Medical Officer Dr. Ryan Westergaard on Thursday, in regards to the COVID-19 pandemic.

“We have a percent positive rate, statewide of between three and five percent. Overall it is good. In certain communities that have percent positive rates of 20 to 30 percent, that’s a big problem. Because we know how quickly a community area hotspot, if not contained can spread into a larger community or regional hot spot.”

Four percent of more than 12-thousand new COVID-19 tests were positive on Thursday. That’s the highest percent positive in five days, but overall, the percent of positive tests has been trending down since testing began in the state in early May.

“This disease is still prevalent in communities . . . it is still spreading,” DHS Secretary Andrea Palm said during Thursday’s media conference call. “You can see that in the hundreds of positive cases we are getting on a daily basis.”

The Department of Health Services reported 10 more deaths Thursday, bringing the total number to 626 since the pandemic began. Confirmed cases increased by 492, for a total of 19,892.

Westergaard added that infections in nursing homes remain a concern. “Until we have a really low level, where infections in those settings are rare, I don’t feel like we’re going to feel like we’re anywhere close to being out of the woods. In fact we need to really double down now, to make sure that the number of facility investigations have all the resources they need to prevent them from spilling out to a wider community or regional epidemic.”

‘Wisconsin Unemployment Support Group’ Facebook group asks leaders for help

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The “Wisconsin Unemployment Support Group” on Facebook is asking state political leaders for help in securing benefits, during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

A letter sent to Assembly Speaker Robin Vos requests a special legislative session to be called to deal with the backlog.

Group administrator Chenon Times-Rainwater of West Bernd said she is still waiting, 14 weeks after filing her first application for the benefits. Times-Rainwater of West Bend says Vos was selected because he is in the best position to take the action needed. Additional letters have been sent to Governor Tony Evers and other state officials.