Today during a press conference, Montgomery County officials announced that there are 84 new positive cases of Coronavirus in Montgomery County. That brings the total to 3,683.

Also announced were 14 deaths since yesterday, which brings the countywide total of confirmed deaths due to Coronavirus to 220. Probable deaths now total 69. Note that the probable death number refers to deaths not confirmed by a lab test.

Locally the numbers are as follows:

• Conshohocken is at 26 cases, which is the same as yesterday
  • There have been zero deaths in Conshohocken
• Whitemarsh is at 104 cases, which is three more than yesterday
  • There have been nine deaths overall in Whitemarsh
• Plymouth is at 76 cases, which is one more than yesterday
  • There have been four deaths overall in Plymouth
• West Conshohocken has three cases, which is the same as yesterday
  • There have been zero deaths in West Conshohocken

County Commissioner Dr. Val Arkoosh gave an update on the numbers of patients with Coronavirus in hospitals in Montgomery County. On March 23rd, there were 15 COVID-19 inpatients, with four requiring ventilators. Today there are 400 inpatients with 100 requiring ventilators. That leaves 280 regular available beds in county hospitals. Arkoosh stressed that it wasn’t clear if the county had yet reached its peak for hospitalization.

In regards to long-term care facilities, 89 facilities have reported at least one case. As of today, there are 1,013 residents and 390 staff who have tested positive. That is 1,403 in total. Note that they all do not live in Montgomery County, so not all of them count against the county total. There have been 159 confirmed deaths of Montgomery County residents connected to a long-term care facility. That is 72% of all confirmed deaths due to Coronavirus in the county and 62 of the 69 probable deaths.

Arkoosh also went into detail on the testing recently completed at the Montgomery County Correctional Facility. Everyone was tested and the results were:

• 939 inmates were tested and 740 tests are back thus far. 169 inmates were positive. 199 results remain outstanding
• 329 regular staff members and 61 healthcare staff were tested. Out of the 388 staff, 249 tests are back, and 24 county staff members were positive and four healthcare workers were positive.

During the press conference, a question submitted by MoreThanTheCurve.com (Burb Media) was asked of Arkoosh regarding which numbers would be used to calculate reaching Governor Wolf’s requirements to move from phase red to phase yellow. Arkoosh has pointed out several times since the pandemic started that the number of positive results released by the state has been found by county staff to have duplicates, non-county residents, and other issues. The state currently reports 3,817 positive tests. The county after reviewing the data and making corrections reports 3,683. That is a difference of 134. Arkoosh said it was the state’s number currently being used in the calculation.

Arkoosh also addressed whether long-term care facility residents should be included in the number used in the formula to move from phase red and phase yellow. She said she had discussed this with the state. These residents can require hospitalization, thus they can impact a benchmark regarding available hospital beds outlined by Wolf. She also mentioned that these residents are not isolated and interact with staff who go home and out into the community. However, Arkoosh didn’t give a definitive answer. It sounded like it still being determined.

Below is a chart of the number of positive tests over 14 days as reported by the county. It is not the state data, we are going to have to go back and add that to this chart.

You can find the latest data from the county here.

You can watch today’s press conference below: