For second straight day, Hays County reports largest single-day increase with 99 new COVID-19 cases

For the second consecutive day and third time this week, Hays County reported its largest single-day increase in COVID-19 cases with 99 new diagnoses on Friday. 

Between Monday and Friday, the county has reported 275 new cases. There are now 402 active cases and there have been 673 since the first coronavirus diagnosis in Hays County on March 14. 

“Today’s COVID-19 numbers are once again high,” county Epidemiologist Eric Schneider said in a statement. “The community needs to remember that we are still in a pandemic.” 

The Hays County Local Health Department has now received 4,641 negative tests and is awaiting results on 57 tests. 

The county reported an additional hospitalization Friday. There are currently 14 county residents hospitalized by the disease and there have been 43 total hospitalizations. 

The local health department reported three additional recoveries, marking 266 county residents who have recovered from COVID-19. 

Hays County has had five reported COVID-19-related fatalities since the first diagnosis of the disease.  

San Marcos, for the second straight day, also reported its largest single-day increase in virus cases with 80 new diagnoses. San Marcos has now surpassed Kyle for the most amount of COVID-19 cases in Hays County with 215 active cases and 296 total cases. 

Kyle added 12 new cases Friday, raising its active case count to 131 and total count to 258. 
Buda tallied five new cases, increasing its total case count to 75 and active case count to 38. Wimberley recorded two new cases Friday and has now had 15 total cases and six active cases. 

Dripping Springs has amassed 10 total cases and has four active cases. Austin, within Hays County has had 10 total cases, including five active cases. Niederwald has had four total cases and has two active cases. Driftwood has had two total cases. Bear Creek, Uhland and Maxwell have each had one case. 

The 20-29 age group continues to see the largest increase in COVID-19 cases. Sixty-nine county residents diagnosed with the disease Friday fell into the 20-29 age range, marking a total of 283 cases among that particular age group. 

One-hundred-seven patients are between 30-39 years old. Eighty-five residents fall in the 50-59-year-old age range. Seventy-eight people diagnosed with the disease are 40-49 years old. Forty patients are 60-69 years old, 29 are between 10-19 years old, 24 are 70-79 years old, 15 are 80 and older and 12 are 9 years old or younger. 

Three-hundred-seventy females and 303 males in Hays County have been diagnosed with the coronavirus.

Additionally, Hays County recently began reporting a breakdown of cases by ethnicity and race. According to the local health department, 50.8% of county residents diagnosed with COVID-19 are Hispanic, while 33.1% are non-Hispanic and 16% are not specified. 

By race, 70.5% of county residents who’ve had COVID-19 are white, 25.8% are unknown or not specified, 2.7% are black and 1% are Asian. 

The Texas Department of State Health Services reported Friday that 83,680 Texans have been diagnosed with COVID-19 and there have been 1,939 fatalities. The DSHS estimates that 55,258 Texans have recovered from the disease.

COVID-19 causes mild or moderate symptoms, such as fever and cough that clear up in two to three weeks for most people.

Schneider continues to stress the importance of wearing a mask in public, washing hands frequently and staying 6 feet away from others while outside the home. 

“We want everyone to remember why we do these things,” Schneider said. “It’s to protect our community.”