Of Lyon County’s six cases of coronavirus, five were apparently linked to some sort of travel.
The sixth — a woman in her 70s announced Saturday — was not travel-related. That means some sort of community spread, according to Lyon County Public Health Public Information Officer Verlin Conkle.
Conkle is concerned about the overall trend to community spread, but he’s also concerned about an untold number of asymptomatic patients who could well be carriers of the virus.
The development of community spread in Lyon County comes as county health officials urged residents to adhere to the county’s stricter stay-at-home guidelines after Governor Laura Kelly issued a statewide stay-home order Saturday. Lyon County Health Officer Renee Hively says the county setup for gatherings and restaurants was tighter than the governor’s, but that was done with the health of residents in mind.
There were, unfortunately, more confirmed cases across the KVOE listening area Saturday. Coffey County is reporting cases in an 86-year-old man, 67-year-old woman and the youngest case in the area so far, a 20-year-old woman. This pushes the Coffey County total to eight, and the county’s Health Department says all the cases originated from a currently unspecified skilled nursing and rehabilitation facility in Burlington.
Before the Lyon and Coffey County announcements, the state count was over 260 cases and five deaths through the Kansas Department of Health and Environment.
Hively and Lyon County Emergency Management Director Jarrod Fell will be on KVOE’s Newsmaker segment at 7:15 am Monday.
