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Oklahoma Tests Nearly 36,000 Long-Term Care Facility Residents, Workers

Georg Arthur Pflueger / Unsplash

Oklahoma Governor Kevin Stitt announced Tuesday the state has tested every nursing home and long-term care facility with a positive case of the coronavirus.

Almost 36,000 people were tested at 265 care sites statewide. Of those tests, 3.18% came back positive, representing 714 residents and 428 staff members.

"Thanks to hardworking public employees and health care professionals across the state, we were able to quadruple our overall COVID-19 testing in May," Stitt said in a news release. "They quickly and successfully adapted to this remarkable increase in workload, and we are in the midst of improving our infrastructure and expanding staffing to ensure we can maintain this momentum."

91 facilities in Oklahoma have had at least one positive case of COVID-19. The state is now working to test the remaining facilities before the end of this week.

The release comes after the state health department was criticized for no longer supplying detailed case numbers by zip code, city or nursing homes and long-term care facilities.

NPR reports nearly 26,000 nursing home residents nationwide have died from COVID-19, while more than 60,000 have fallen ill. Still, those numbers are incomplete, as about 20% of nursing homes have yet to report data to the CDC.

Robby Korth joined KOSU as its news director in November 2022.
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