COVID-19 In Danbury: Mayor Anticipates A 2nd Phase Of Illness

DANBURY, CT — One more Danbury resident died from COVID-19 in the last 24 hours, Mayor Mark Boughton reported during his nightly news conference on Tuesday. The total death toll from the virus in the city is now 91.

Boughton said that the O'Neill Center at Western Connecticut State University, which had been set up as an overflow center for patients from Danbury Hospital, will remain largely intact over the summer. The city is anticipating another spike in coronavirus-related sickness later in the year, the mayor said.

On the day when Gov. Ned Lamont announced that schools across the state would not be returning to in-person classrooms before the end of the school year, Boughton had some cautionary words for the term beginning in September as well.

"I don't see us putting 3,300 students at the high school all in one building," the mayor said. "We're going to have to split some up, we'll have to utilize the online system we developed, as well as the buildings. We do want people to have that classroom experience, but it's just going to be too many kids, and you can't maintain social distancing by doing that."

Statewide, another 648 lab-confirmed positive coronavirus cases were announced Tuesday out of 3,313 tests. Lamont said that the ratio of positive to negative tests was good news. Unfortunately there were another 77 deaths as well.

There are now 30,621 confirmed coronavirus cases in Connecticut and 2,633 deaths have been reported. A total of 1,500 people are currently hospitalized.

Connecticut had a drop in hospitalizations every day since April 23.