10 New Coronavirus Cases In Pierce County; 1 More Dead

PIERCE COUNTY, WA — The Tacoma-Pierce County Health Department reported 10 new cases of the coronavirus, and one additional death linked to COVID-19 Friday afternoon. According to the department, one previously announced case was determined to be either a duplicate, from another county or a false positive.

Friday's update included the lowest number of new cases reported in a single day since April 11.

Health officials said the 58th death linked to the virus in Pierce County was a Puyallup man in his 60s with existing health concerns.

Lab tests have confirmed 1,634 coronavirus cases among Pierce County residents since March. County health officials estimate 828 patients have recovered, while 806 infections remain active.

The Department of Health added 157 cases to its statewide total Friday, along with 14 additional deaths. According to the latest update, 16,388 illnesses have been confirmed across Washington, and 870 people have died. The overall testing positivity rate dropped slightly to 6.9%.

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Catch up on the latest developments:

New report indicates transmission rate may be rising

A new report from the Institute for Disease Modeling suggests the coronavirus transmission rate could again be rising in western Washington.

Last week, researchers found the effective reproductive number — a measure of how many people contract the virus from an infected person — had fallen below one, a critical threshold, between late March and mid-April.

Updated data increased that estimate, now between 0.47 and 1.32 in King County, and between 0.61 and 1.39 across the state.

Public health officials said, with transmission no longer "definitively below" the threshold, new cases could plateau or even increase.

"This report once again reminds us that our position is precarious and COVID-19 transmission and new cases remain unacceptably high, said Dr. Jeff Duchin, health officer for King County. "We need to double down on distancing and other prevention steps at home, in the community, and in workplaces and we must see these numbers improve before relaxing our current restrictions."

In the institute's report, researchers tied the potential increase to higher travel in recent weeks.

"This trend of likely increasing transmission roughly mirrors recent increases in regional traffic as measured by the Washington State Department of Transportation, and these traffic pattern changes have continued into early May," researchers wrote. "These results, driven by more recent data, offer an important reminder that cases and deaths are indicators of past transmission and that conditions will change in response to behavioral changes in ways that are currently challenging to measure."

Read more on the Public Health Insider blog.

5 Washington counties approved to relax certain measures early

State health officials announced the first group of counties approved for a "variance" under Gov. Jay Inslee's Safe Start plan, allowing them to skip ahead to phase 2 before the rest of the state.

To be eligible for the expedited reopening timeline, counties must have a population below 75,000 people and no new cases recorded in the last three weeks.

Columbia, Garfield, Lincoln, Ferry and Pend Oreille were approved Friday, and applications are still pending for Kittitas, Skamania and Wahkiakum. Secretary of Health John Wiesman said Stevens County also applied, but is not yet eligible.

Phase 2 allows more businesses to return to limited operations, including restaurants, salons, and in-store retail. Before each business can reopen, they first must receive updated guidance from the governor's office.

New guidelines released for curbside retail, car washes

Inslee released updated guidance Friday, allowing for curbside retail, landscaping, pet walking, and landscaping to return across the state, with added health precautions.

Retailers will be allowed to operate with minimal staff, and required to adhere to physical distancing and sanitary guidelines. Customers are required to stay in their vehicles during the pickup, and employees must wear face coverings.

Car washes will be allowed only by reservation, and with limited interaction between employees and customers. Workers will be required to sanitize vacuum nozzles, pay terminals, hoses and other machines regularly.

Read more about the new guidelines here.

More than 25,000 complaints filed alleging stay-home violations

The governor's office has received upwards of 25,000 complaints alleging violations to Inslee's "Stay Home, Stay Healthy" order since an online reporting form went live in late March.

An Inslee spokesman told Patch more than half of the reports concerned businesses remaining open under the order, thousands alleged social distancing failures, and more than 2,000 reports concerned large gatherings of people.

Some complaints were more trivial, including those of joggers passing too closely or strangers sneezing. The governor's office said a few hundred complaints were aimed at Inslee, reporting him as a nonessential employee, or asking that he shelter in place.

Of the complaints received, the Inslee's office told Patch only one action had been taken against a business: a Port Orchard nail salon that repeatedly refused to comply with the order.

Coronavirus cases by city

The number of coronavirus cases in Pierce County can be broken down by area as follows:

Location	Confirmed Cases	Deaths
Bonney Lake	38	2
Central Pierce County	124	5
East Pierce County	47	2
Edgewood/Fife/Milton	81	9
Frederickson	54	1
Gig Harbor	51	1
Graham	50	0
Key Peninsula	7	1
Lake Tapps/Sumner	41	0
Lakewood	169	5
Parkland	82	1
Puyallup	114	5
South Hill	85	0
South Pierce County	34	0
Southwest Pierce County	19	2
Spanaway	56	4
Tacoma	527	19
University Place	48	1
Unknown	7	0
Total	1,634	58