Local health department reports COVID-19 fatality

Editor’s Note: In Thursday’s COVID-19 story, the Daily Record omitted a COVID-19-related fatality. This story corrects the error. We apologize for any confusion created by our mistake.

A Buda man in his 60s died of COVID-19, the Hays County Local Health Department announced Thursday.

Hays County has recorded 236 coronavirus-related fatalities since the first diagnosis of the disease within its boundaries on March 14, 2020.

As of Thursday, the county considers 400 cases active — 33 more than Wednesday — and there have been 17,187 total cases since the first recorded coronavirus case within its boundaries on March 14, 2020. Hays County has tallied 574 COVID-19 cases over the past 21 days. There have been 1,894 probable cases spanning from April 2020 through April 1, 2021.

Twelve county residents are currently hospitalized by COVID-19 and there have been 796 total hospitalizations with the fluctuation in hospitalizations and hospital discharges reported Thursday. Some patients hospitalized by COVID-19 are in hospitals outside of Hays County but are included in the county’s numbers if they reside within Hays County, the local health department said.

There have been 16,551 county residents who have recovered from the corona virus with the 26 recoveries recorded Thursday.

The local health department has received 144,079 negative tests and there have been 161,266 tests administered in Hays County.

The county did not report new COVID-19 data on Friday as its offices were closed in observance of Good Friday.

San Marcos has 142 active cases — a 11-case increase since Wednesday — and there have been 6,112 total cases.

The local health department reported that 8,995 females and 8,192 males in Hays County have been diagnosed with COVID-19.

The county’s ethnic breakdown stated 49.1% of county residents diagnosed with the coronavirus are Hispanic, while 34.4% of county residents diagnosed with the disease are non-Hispanic and 16.5% don’t have a specified ethnicity.

By race, 70.2% of county residents who’ve had COVID-19 are white, 25.4% are unknown or not specified, 2.6% are Black, 1% are listed as other, 0.7% are Asian and 0.1% are American Indian.

The Texas Department of State Health Services reported there have been 2,400,470 Texans diagnosed with COVID-19 and 47,639 fatalities as of Wednesday. There are currently 2,928 Texans hospitalized by the coronavirus, according to the DSHS.

At Texas State University there have been 2,471 total coronavirus cases since March 1, 2020 — 2,218 among students and 253 among faculty and staff — as of press time on Saturday. There are currently 97 active cases, according to the university’s dashboard.

San Marcos Consolidated ISD reported two COVID-19 cases among students for the week of March 22.

COVID-19 causes mild or moderate symptoms, such as fever and cough that clear up in two to three weeks for most people. The disease, however, can cause more severe illness, including pneumonia, and death, especially for older adults and people with existing health problems.

COVID-19 VACCINE SIGNUP

To pre-register for Hays County’s COVID-19 vaccine waitlist visit haysinformed.com/covid-19. The pre-registration list does not guarantee an appointment. The state is allowing all adults to sign up to receive a COVID-19 vaccine, which went into effect Monday. According to the DSHS, 57,291 county residents have received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine as of Friday, while 31,252 have been fully vaccinated, approximately 17.04% of eligible adults. The DSHS estimates that Hays County has a population of 183,380 who are 16 years or older.