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RIPLEY -- In an effort to address common questions regarding COVID-19, the Jackson County Health Department took to social media over the weekend to provide answers while still maintaining the privacy of patients.
Sunday evening, they reported 31 positive cases with 15 of those patients who are deemed "success stories."
During a Monday afternoon press conference, Gov. Jim Justice said Jackson County has been added to the list of county hot spots in the state.
"They had the highest increase in cases over the past 24 hours of all our 55 counties. I feel like now we have absolutely got to bring Jackson County in that fold, that makes our total counties 12 that are in that fold," Justice said.
Among the 15 active cases, two are hospitalized and the county suffered one fatality.
The seven Constellium employees who tested positive have recovered, Justice said.
"We send our best wishes out to their CEO Stimple and all the employees at the plant," Justice said.
The health department went in depth about some of the testing protocols. According to the post, those who are not showing symptoms will not be tested.
With an excess of tests going through, the health department said at some points the results were taking 10 to 15 days to come back but the time has since reduced to about four days or less, according to the post..
To answer how the cases are being reported, the Jackson County Health department said those in quarantine are not counted in their total.
"Most of the people we have had that are quarantined have not become symptomatic. Quarantine is a precautionary measure," they said.
Those who live outside the county are being tracked by the health department of the county they live in. If that patient is employed in Jackson County or has contact with anyone in the county, the Jackson County Health Department is notified, the post said.
The Ripley and Ravenswood Coplin Clinic locations are testing along with virtual clinics through Walmart and Fruth, in collaboration with Jackson General Hospital.
Each health department is assigned a National Guard representative, according to the Jackson County Health Department.
"The individual works to help identify needs in the community and runs that information up the chain of command. In current cases with nursing homes on the news, those facilities have exceeded their capacity to do testing themselves and have asked for assistance from the Guard," the post said.
They also stated their process of conducting investigations for nursing homes to see if it is necessary to test residents who aren't showing symptoms.
Some of the factors they're looking at are when the facility was closed to visitors, how the home maintains social distancing with their residents, if employees are screened prior to working and if staff has proper PPE, the post said.
At a later date, the Jackson County Department said they will provide more information about how they track patients.