Three Arizona teachers who all shared a classroom were diagnosed with the coronavirus before one died from the illness as morgues in the state hit 97 per cent capacity while Florida sets a grim record of nearly 500 deaths in a week and US cases jump by more than 61,000.
Kimberley Chavez Lopez Byrd, 61, who worked at the Hayden Winkelman School District for 38 years, died on June 26, according to CNN. She had been hospitalized a little less than two weeks before her death. Arizona health officials have reported more than 119,000 cases of the virus with at least 2,151 deaths.
Two other teachers, Jena Martinez and Angela Skillings, were also diagnosed with the virus last month. They both shared a summer classroom with Byrd and said they are still struggling with the effects of COVID-19.
All three teachers wore PPE, which included masks and gloves. They also used hand sanitizer and made sure to social distance, but they still ended up getting sick.
Byrd’s husband, Jesse, told CNN that his wife, who suffered from asthma, diabetes and lupus, started feeling sick in June.
She was prescribed antibiotics and steroids before being hospitalized on June 13.
Jesse said the last time he spoke with his wife was the next day on June 14 when she called him to say that doctors were putting her on a ventilator.
Kimberley Chavez Lopez Byrd (pictured with her husband Jesse), 61, who worked at the Hayden Winkelman School District for 38 years, died on June 26
Byrd (pictured with her husband) had been hospitalized a little less than two weeks before her death
Byrd (left) shared a summer classroom with two other teachers, Jena Martinez (right) and Angela Skillings, who were also diagnosed with the virus last month
‘I just had this horrible gut-wrenching feeling just knowing how much of a struggle this was going to be because I knew her lungs were compromised even before this … fear, just the worst fear that you could feel,’ Jesse told CNN.
Shortly after her hospitalization, Jesse, his daughter, son and multiple relatives also tested positive for the virus.
Byrd is being remembered as a loving teacher who cared for her students and had a passion for teaching.
Jeff Gregorich, the superintendent of Hayden Winkelman Unifed School District, recalled how some of his fondest memories of Byrd was ‘every time I would see her, she would show me [pictures of] her last weekend fishing at the lake’.
Gregorich then spoke about the seriousness of COVID-19 and how the teachers were all careful but still ended up getting the virus.
‘I think that’s really the message or the concern that our staff has is we can’t even keep our staff safe by themselves … how are we going to keep 20 kids in a classroom safe? I just don’t see how that’s possible to do that,’ he told CNN.
Jesse also said that he doesn’t believe schools should reopen any time soon, saying: ‘They have no business opening the schools to try and get back to a traditional classroom … let’s get through this pandemic first before we try to get back to normal.’
The Byrd family’s tragedy rings true for thousands of Americans who have lost loved ones to the virus that spread like wildfire across the US in mid-March.
There are more than 3.2 million confirmed cases of the virus in the US with at least 134,817 deaths.
While New York and other northern states, including New Jersey and Connecticut, were among the first to see the impact of the virus, several southern states are starting to take a turn for the worse.
More than 70,000 Americans tested positive for the virus on Friday – the fourth consecutive day that the number of confirmed cases broke a new record.
On Saturday, five states and territories set a record for coronavirus-related hospitalizations: Puerto Rico, North Carolina, Alaska, Florida and California.
A doctor is pictured in Houston, Texas, informing relatives of a patient who died. Texas is among the states to have a soaring toll from the coronavirus
Medics try unsuccessfully to save the life of a COVID-19 patient in Houston, Texas
California is averaging 91 reported deaths per day while Texas is close behind with 66. Florida, Arizona, Illinois, New Jersey and South Carolina also saw sizable rises.
And 33 states have this week seen their number of cases rise, Axios reported.
Dr Robert Lahita, clinical professor of medicine at Rutgers New Jersey Medical School, urged states with increasing caseloads to rethink their reopening.
He told CBS on Friday that there will be ‘tremendous deaths’ in those areas and said it was a ‘very good idea’ to impose new lockdowns.
He said: ‘I’m hoping that the governors use some common sense and close up again.
‘It comes close to irresponsible, reopening, until we have absolute proof that the disease is under control.’
He said that he fears doctors and experts have been ‘pushed to the side’ and re-openings have become an ‘economic issue’.
‘I understand that some of these meetings at the governors’ mansions have included eight businesspeople versus one epidemiologist or one doctor,’ he said.
‘Prioritization for a lot of the governors are to get the economy rolling again.’
President Donald Trump has emphasized the need to re-open the economy, ahead of the November election. He has also consistently urged administrators to reopen schools in the fall.
Yet even he had to accept the reality of the virus on Saturday, and wear a face mask during a visit to the Walter Reed medical center. It was the first time he’d been seen in public wearing a mask.
Donald Trump on Saturday wore a mask in public for the first time, at the Walter Reed hospital
Walt Disney World’s Magic Kingdom and Animal Kingdom reopened on Saturday, despite a surge in the number of Floridians testing positive for the coronavirus.
The state set a record of nearly 500 confirmed deaths from COVID-19 this week.
In recent weeks, Florida has ramped up its testing, but the percentage of people testing positive has also risen.
A month ago, fewer than 5 per cent of tests came up positive on a daily average. Over the past week, the daily average exceeded 19 percent.
Meanwhile, the Florida Agency for Healthcare Administration reported that almost 85 per cent of the state’s ICU hospital beds are now full.
At a press conference on Saturday, Gov Ron DeSantis said medical staff and additional drugs may be flown into the Sunshine state to help with the crisis.
‘COVID is very labor intensive. There’s a lot of procedures that go into place [to test and treat it] … so the personnel is something that’s very significant,’ he stated, according to The Orlando Sentinel.
He also revealed that a shipment of the experimental drug Remdesivir was arrived in the state on Saturday.
More people in the US now have COVID-19 than live in Chicago, the country’s third-largest city.
Texas, Arizona and South Carolina are now being buffeted by the pandemic.
The three states have all seen their death tolls rise by more than 100 per cent in the past four weeks, according to an analysis of state and county health data by The Washington Post on Friday.
Four more states – Mississippi, Tennessee, California and Louisiana – have seen at least a 10 per cent jump in that time span.
Texas set four records on Saturday: new single-day cases, seven-day average of cases, seven-day average of deaths and hospitalizations.
Disney World’s Magic Kingdom in Orlando, Florida, reopened on Saturday to welcome guests
Wearing face masks, guest could once again enjoy rides such as Thunder Mountain
Houston area hospitals are reaching capacity, with some patients being treated in ICU wards.
In Arizona, Phoenix is bringing in refrigerated morgue trucks as the existing facilities overflow.
After mid-April, the daily death toll declined as shutdown orders took effect across the country and the virus curve began to flatten.
The low point came July 5, with 217 recorded coronavirus deaths – the lowest toll since March 24.
Since then, amid record-breaking case numbers in several states, the death count has begun to rise, surpassing 800 deaths each of the past four days to Friday.
Nicholas Reich, a University of Massachusetts biostatistician who aggregates more than 30 epidemiological models to create a forecast of the coming weeks of the pandemic, on Wednesday predicted that by August 1, the country would see its death toll rise to 147,466.
That would mark an increase of about 16,000 over two and a half weeks.
‘The model’s best guess is that we will see a slow and steady increase in new #COVID19 deaths in the US over the next four weeks, between 3,800 and 5,000 per week.
‘This captures declines in some states, and increases in others,’ Reich wrote on Twitter.
The Corpus Christi fire department conducts COVID-19 test for first responders Wednesday
Gravediggers hard at work in Avondale, Arizona, on Wednesday, as COVID-19 ravages the state
Motorists lined up to be tested for COVID-19 in a parking lot at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles