Utah recorded its highest daily incident rate of COVID-19 Friday and the state epidemiologist says a significant number is due to an outbreak at a meat processing facility in northern Utah.
In a news release Friday, the Utah Health Department announced there were 439 new cases of COVID-19 since the day before. That’s a daily rate increase of 4.1%.
Dr. Angela Dunn, the state epidemiologist, said one in three of the new cases are from the Bear River Health District, which covers three northern Utah counties: Cache, Rich and Box Elder. There have been 561 positive cases of COVID-19 in the Bear River Health District. 514 are in Cache County and most are patients between the ages of 18 and 60.
Dunn says most of the cases are tied to an ongoing outbreak at a local meat processing facility, where many of the workers "match the demographics of high-risk populations." She didn’t explain what demographic that is. But according to the Bear River Health District website, people most at risk are likely to live in densely populated areas, in multi-generational households and work in essential industries or may not have access to paid sick leave.
Since Sunday, Wasatch County has seen an increase of cases, from 282 cases on Sunday to 317 on Friday. Summit County’s COVID-19 has had seven more cases this week, from 415 to 422.
Also on Friday, Utah Governor Herbert announced he would keep the state in the yellow, or low-risk, phase of COVID-19 response, despite an appointed commission recommending the state move to a green level, which is referred to as the “new normal” by state officials. The governor expressed concern about the rising number of COVID-19 cases in Utah. He urged residents to practice social distancing, good hygiene, and wear masks whenever they can’t stay a safe distance from others.