As Nevada continues to make significant strides to curb the spread of the coronavirus, one county has made an encouraging leap.
Lincoln County did not have a positive COVID-19 case for two weeks, a spokesman for the state Department of Health and Human services told the Review-Journal. The county did receive a few positive results on Tuesday, and those numbers are expected to be updated on Wednesday.
Still, the county — a rural area with a population of just over 5,000 — managed to hit the milestone and become the only county in the state to drop out of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s “high” transmission tier. State data showed that Lincoln County had conducted an average of 475 daily tests per 100,000 people in the last 14 days, a higher number than the state’s average.
The county’s vaccination rate was still at a below-average 34.24 percent as of Tuesday. Because the county has such a small population compared to others in the state, a slight increase in the number of positive tests could cause the overall metrics to jump significantly.
Lincoln County’s drop in numbers came as the state has shown encouraging recent signs in the fight against COVID-19. Clark County and Nevada as a whole on Tuesday saw key metrics like test positivity rate, daily new cases and hospitalizations continue to drop as the state recovered from the summer’s peak.
Contact Jonah Dylan at jdylan@reviewjournal.com. Follow @TheJonahDylan on Twitter.
