CDC updates Kansas counties at high risk of coronavirus

WICHITA, Kan. (KSNW) — An upsurge in coronavirus cases means a face mask recommendation for some more Kansas counties. However, some other counties are doing better and have dropped off the mask recommendation list.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) shows that 41 Kansas counties are at high risk of community-level coronavirus transmission. That is better than last week when 55 counties were on the list.

This week’s list includes Rawlins County, which jumped two levels, from low-risk last week to high-risk this week. The CDC recommends that people who are in high-risk counties wear face masks when they are indoors in public.

The CDC says it looks at the combination of three metrics when deciding which counties are at high risk — new COVID-19 admissions per 100,000 population in the past seven days, the percent of staffed inpatient beds occupied by COVID-19 patients, and total new COVID-19 cases per 100,000 population in the last seven days.

The Kansas Department of Health and Environment (KDHE) releases its weekly updates on Wednesdays. This week, it said 6,722 Kansans tested positive in the previous seven days.