TOMPKINS COUNTY, N.Y.—COVID-19 has claimed the lives of two more Tompkins County residents this week, the first two deaths from the coronavirus locally since the end of March.
“Sadly, TCHD was notified of the death of a Tompkins County resident. Our condolences go out to the family of this individual,” read a tweet from the Tompkins County Health Department Friday. A similar message was passed along earlier in the week with the first death.
The pandemic has been fairly quiet recently in Tompkins County, though that is partially because testing and contact tracing have been greatly reduced, either by the government or by people’s own level of caution. Over the last week or so, COVID-19 hospitalizations have hit double digits once again in Tompkins County, the first time since January 2022 that those numbers have sustained that level.
The health department is no longer publishing active case numbers, so it is difficult to tell how many people are currently ailing from COVID-19 in Tompkins County. Recent wastewater testing shows that COVID-19 is trending upward (more on that in a subsequent article), but exact numbers are nigh impossible to pin down. However, the health department lists the level of community transmission at 464 currently, meaning that the number of positive tests over the last week per 100,000 people (conveniently, Tompkins County has just about 100,000 people) is 464. That number is trending upward as well, though not nearly as high as this past December and January.
It is unclear whether or not the two people who passed away this week were vaccinated or not.