The Adair County Health Department reports four Adair county residents, who are employed at Milan, are among the eight workers who have tested positive for the coronavirus.
Testing was conducted this week at the Smithfield Foods Plant in Milan as part of the states’ expanded effort to test workers who may be infected with the virus but do not display any symptoms.
The Sullivan County Health Department on Wednesday confirmed nine positive COVID-19 cases within the county. The confirmed positives were identified through a mass testing process and have been determined to be community-related.
Sullivan County Health said no other information would be provided about the individuals to maintain confidentiality. It referred news media questions to the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services. Communications director Lisa Cox replied Wednesday evening to an email sent by KTTN which in part states she’s awaiting data from testing in Milan. She noted she believed the state used more of a “box in” strategy for testing at the facility.
Director of Health and Senior Services, Dr. Randall Williams, reported on Monday that mass testing had begun on 1,500 employees at the Milan packing plant. It’s also noted the state website tracking the number of Coronavirus cases has numbers listed for the county of residence, regardless of where they worked and were exposed.
Adair County now reports a total of 17 positive coronavirus cases with 12 recovered. There have been no deaths there due to COVID 19.
In their news release, Adair County Health staff has begun contract-tracing to identify any other residents who might have had close contact with the four persons and will advise people who’ve probably been exposed to self-quarantine for at least 14 days.
Sullivan county health staff is conducting case investigations to determine identified close contacts. Individuals will be notified and walked through recommendations on how to proceed with quarantine measures.
Over 10, 100 people statewide have tested positive for COVID-19 since the testing began in early March. Governor Mike Parson has described this as an accumulated total with the biggest majority of infected persons recovered or are recovering. There have been 542 deaths in Missouri.
