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Planners meet goal of 1K per day

By Michael Stoll

The free COVID-19 event Saturday and Sunday at the Mower County Fairgrounds ran smoothly with 2,059 tests conducted, according to numbers provided by Public Information Officer Nick Kimball.

“The testing at the fairgrounds went great,” said Pam Kellogg Community Health Division Manager. “We hoped we would get 1,000 people per day, but we also thought that number may be a little ambitious. We ended up meeting our goals, and we could have served even more. It was a well thought out set-up and it was a great collaboration between the State Emergency Operations Center, Minnesota Department of Health, local emergency management and local public health.”

Those who were tested will receive results two to three days after the tests were conducted.

Whether another free testing event will be held remains to be seen.

“We will look over data as the test results come back and determine our next steps after that,” Kellogg said.

Not counting the tests from this weekend, COVID-19 cases went up by almost 50 over the weekend in Mower.

The county currently sits at 802 cases, up from 755 this past Friday.

Statewide, there are now 33,227 total positive cases. There were 308 newly reported cases Monday and four new deaths.

There are currently 332 hospitalized as of Monday with 156 needing ICU care. That number is the lowest it has been since May and continues to slowly go down.

Overall, there have been 513,137 tests conducted, according to the Minnesota Department of Health.