Two New Clusters Announced in Sedgwick County

(Sedgwick County, Kan.) – There are two new clusters in Sedgwick County – a long-term care facility and one local business. This brings the number of Sedgwick County COVID-19 clusters to eight.

There are less than five cases at the business and 13 cases at the long-term care facility. At this point, the Sedgwick County Health Department has investigated all confirmed cases and close contacts, and believe the clusters to be contained and no risk to the general public. Clusters are defined as two or more non-household COVID-19 cases identified in a certain timeframe and place.

Due to the increase in swabs available, the Health Department now has the capacity to take samples from all residents and staff in long term-term care facilities if there is just one confirmed case of COVID-19. Residents in the new long-term care facility cluster are being tested by the facility.

As with all notifiable diseases, Sedgwick County investigates reports of COVID-19 in facilities. If a case is identified in a long-term care facility, Sedgwick County recommends that the facility isolate any symptomatic people away from other residents. Residents and staff are tested, either by the Health Department or through the facility. The facility monitors all residents and staff for symptoms. The facility should not allow visitors and should cancel any group activities, although most facilities have already done both due to the pandemic. Sedgwick County works with the facility to ensure all close contacts are identified and are properly quarantined or isolated.

 A chart showing clusters by type of entity is available on Sedgwick County’s COVID-19 data dashboard.

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