TULARE COUNTY, Calif. (KFSN) — While many parts of California are finally beginning to see the number of COVID-19 cases flatten out, Tulare County remains a hotspot for the virus.
“We are seeing if we’re looking at our curve and as our cases are coming in we are still on the incline. Today our latest numbers is at 916 positive cases,” said Tulare County spokesperson Carrie Monteiro.
101 new cases were reported by Tulare County on Tuesday and another 58 positive cases Wednesday.
RELATED: Coronavirus: Tracking Central California COVID-19 cases
But experts say they can explain why the county is seeing a jump in numbers.
“We did have some clusters and outbreaks occur at two nursing facilities in the county. One in Dinuba and another in Porterville, so now we have a total of five nursing home facilities in our County that have positive cases of 11 or more,” says Monteiro.
More than 100 employees at two Ruiz Foods processing plants in Dinuba and Tulare have tested positive for the virus, forcing officials to stop production lines this week at the Dinuba facility and increase testing of its employees.
RELATED: More Ruiz Foods employees test positive for COVID-19, bringing total to 107
A large number of cases are also tied to Central Valley Meats in Hanford.
“Even though Central Valley Meats is in Kings County, we’re seeing as of yesterday 30 cases of Tulare County residents that work at that facility,” says Monteiro.
RELATED: 138 employees at Hanford meat plant test positive for COVID-19
County officials are also seeing a rise in positive cases involving family-to-family contact transmission.
“As people socialize beyond their single household we’re seeing results of what possible social activities occurred two to fourteen days ago from this week.”
Tulare County’s public health lab continues to test individuals while more commercial labs have come online since the pandemic hit to help ease the county’s burden to test for the virus.
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