'Sustained Leveling' In Coronavirus Trends: NC Health Official

NORTH CAROLINA — Trends in new coronavirus cases in North Carolina, while continuing to rise every day, are "about stable," North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Mandy Cohen said Wednesday afternoon.

The comment comes less than two days after a report compiled by the White House's pandemic task force emerged, naming North Carolina as one of 10 states to watch due to recent week-to-week increases in cases of new coronavirus, which causes COVID-19.

"We are continuing to watch our trends very closely," Cohen said. "We are seeing our day-over-day new case counts being about stable."

North Carolina's number of new coronavirus cases jumped by 470 Wednesday, for a total of 15,816 cases confirmed in the state in the past day, according to DHHS data. The state also recorded 20 new COVID-19 death, bringing the death count to 597. As of Wednesday morning, there were 521 people hospitalized with coronavirus-related illness, 46 more than reported Tuesday.

This week, state health officials began reporting estimates of state residents recovering from COVID-19. As of May 11, an estimated 9,115 residents who were confirmed to have the coronavirus are considered likely recovered, according to NC DHHS.

"To calculate this number, NCDHHS estimates the median time for recovery from symptoms to be 14 days from the date of specimen collection for non-fatal COVID-19 cases who were not hospitalized or if hospitalization status is unknown, or 28 days for hospitalized non-fatal COVID-19 cases," the agency said.

The state continues to see between 400-600 new cases each day, Cohen said.

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"North Carolina has been in a different place than a number of other states that saw an initial surge or had a peak and are now seeing declines," she said. " For us, it's a leveling or a stability of the numbers."

In addition to new cases confirmed each day, officials are monitoring surveillance data, the percent of positive cases in comparison to total testing

In recent COVID-19 testing, about six percent of all tests have been confirmed positive, Cohen said. "That's very strong," she said. "And we continue to have a lot of capacity in our medical system."

Tuesday, NBC News revealed an internal report compiled by the White House coronavirus task force said North Carolina's Mecklenburg County was listed as stable. The greater Charlotte metro region, however, was noted as a "location to watch" after it recorded 995 new COVID-19 cases in the span of seven days, the report said.

The "locations to watch" designation is given to places with a 10 percent or greater increase in the number of cases week-to-week, with 200 or more new cases and 30 to 100 new cases per 100,000 people. The Charlotte metro region referenced in the report includes Anson, Cabarrus, Gaston, Iredell, Lincoln, Mecklenburg, Rowan and Union counties in North Carolina, as well as South Carolina's Chester, Lancaster and York counties, the Charlotte Observer reported.

"We are trying to strike the right balance of taking a measured and phased approach to reopening here as we go," Cohen said in the press briefing Wednesday. "We feel overall we are about stable and we're seeing a sustained leveling on a large number of our trends and metrics," Cohen said.

"This has been such an unprecedented time for our state, our country, our world, that it's hard to predict "if this would happen, what would we do then,'" Cohen said. "What we will continue to say is we'll look at the numbers and continue to try to make the best decision we can based on science and data," she said.

"We will walk back stay-at-home if we need to to protect public health and the people of North Carolina," she said.

As of Wednesday, families with children who receive free or reduced lunch programs at school will begin receiving an additional benefit to offset food cost. The benefit is $370 per child provided over two installments, Cohen said.

"The great news is that families don't need to apply for the program at all," Cohen said. "Beginning today, most eligible families already receiving food and nutrition service benefits will receive additional funds on their existing [Electronic Benefit Transfer] card."

New recipients of food and nutrition service benefits will be mailed their Pandemic-EBT card in mid to late May, she said.

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