BREAKING: Illinois Covid Numbers Going Down, Why Are Some Schools Closing?
BREAKING NEWS: New Illinois covid numbers for the past week show modest improvement for the fourth consecutive week, but some schools are closing and going to remote learning and Gov. JB Pritkzer’s mitigations remain in place, with no indication of the mask mandate ending soon.
The latest Illinois covid numbers.
Covid numbers statewide continued to show improvement over the month of September, as the positivity rate for last week, Sept. 27-Oct. 3, dropped to 2.7 percent statewide.
The Illinois Department of Public Health reported 18,735 new COVID-19 cases in the past week, along with 236 additional deaths and over 159,000 new vaccine doses administered. That marks a total of 1,630,864 cases of coronavirus reported statewide since the pandemic began, and 25,017 confirmed COVID fatalities statewide. As of Sunday night, 1,687 patients in Illinois were reported to be in the hospital with COVID-19. Of those, 412 patients were in the ICU and 234 patients with COVID-19 were on ventilators.
Still, mitigations remain in place, and some schools are even going to remote learning with others considering the move due to protests by parents.
Rich Township High School in Matteson, in suburban Chicagoland, has gone to remote learning through at least Oct. 18 after a number of cases were reported at the school.
In addition, parents in Chicago protested near Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s home calling for schools to be sent to remote learning.
After a dangerous spike, Illinois covid numbers have begun slowly going down over the past couple of weeks.
In suburban Waukegan, parents, students and community members gathered to call for a remote learning option.
“If they don’t feel like it’s safe for their child, then they should have a choice to be able to send their child or not to send their child and continue their children’s education,” said Anita Hanna, a Waukegan school board member, to Chicago’s NBC-TV5.
Just a few weeks ago, Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker announced even more mitigations banning students and staff from schools if they tested positive for covid or had exposure to the virus. That was in addition to the statewide mask mandate and other mitigations already in place from Pritzker.
In early August, Pritzker announced Illinois students preschool through 12 would be required to wear masks during school and indoor sports and activities, as reported on QuadCities.com. That requirement for kids to wear masks in all schools remains in effect.
Last year at this time, the Illinois positivity rate was at 3.5 percent and climbing, as Illinois numbers raged out of control in October and November, causing a statewide shutdown.
For more ongoing coverage of this situation, stay tuned to your free, fact-based alternative media, QuadCities.com.
