Part of a middle school in Mountain View and a kindergarten classroom in Rogers moved to all-online instruction Tuesday as the state's count of coronavirus cases grew 273 -- the lowest one-day increase since early July.
The Mountain View School District announced on its Facebook page Monday that fifth-grade students would move to distance learning through Sept. 14 because of "a Covid 19 positive result in the 5th Grade Department."
Meanwhile, a kindergarten class at Tillery Elementary School in Rogers switched to remote learning Tuesday after someone in the classroom tested positive for covid-19.
The class will return to in-person instruction Sept. 14, said Ashley Siwiec, the Rogers School District's director of communications.
The state's death toll from the virus, as tracked by the Department of Health, increased Tuesday by 17, to 814.
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Health Secretary Jose Romero said six of the deaths happened before August but weren't immediately reported. That included one death that happened in June and five from July.
The state's count of deaths among nursing home residents rose by one, to 279. The number of people hospitalized in the state with covid-19 rose by three to 423, while the number of patients on ventilators fell by two to 85.
The shifts Tuesday, during the second week of the state's new school year, followed an announcement Monday by the Marshall School District that its high school would shift to mostly online learning, starting today, through Sept. 11 because of a large number of teachers who had to quarantine because of their contact with someone who had tested positive.
Also Tuesday, virus concerns led to the temporary closure of the Northside High School building in Fort Smith.
Zena Featherston Marshall, Fort Smith School District executive director of communication and community partnerships, said the district, with the help of the Arkansas Department of Health and the Division of Elementary and Secondary Education, determined that it was practical to close and clean the building late Monday afternoon after "several people" were identified as being covid-19 positive and the district needed time to reach all of the close contacts involved.
The Cross County School District resumed in-school instruction Tuesday after the high school relied solely on virtual instruction Monday and canceled its weekend football game.
A positive case of covid-19 within the district's football program resulted in about 30% of the staff in the small high school being placed in quarantine.
Monday was used to determine staffing adjustments, Superintendent Nathan Morris told parents in a letter posted to the district's website.
Gov. Asa Hutchinson and state educational officials have said they expect schools to be open to in-classroom instruction every day that classes are normally held, although they can also offer online options and shift to virtual instruction in response to outbreaks.
KIPP Delta Public Schools in Helena-West Helena started with all-virtual instruction last week after an employee tested positive and 27 others had to quarantine.
In-person classes at the school were tentatively scheduled to resume Thursday.
The Little Rock School District reported two new cases of covid-19 -- a student at Cloverdale Middle School and a staff member at Washington Elementary -- in the 24-hour period between 3 p.m. Monday and 3 p.m. Tuesday.
An additional 14 people -- seven students and seven employees -- were required to quarantine.
The employees are from Chicot, Henderson, Roberts, Rockefeller, Southwest High and two from Stephens. The students are from Chicot, Cloverdale, Southwest, Terry, Washington and two from Watson.
TESTING GOAL
Also Tuesday, Hutchinson set a goal of having 180,000 polymerase chain reaction, or PCR, tests of Arkansans this month, down from the 190,000 tests he set as a goal for last month, which the state did not meet, according to information laboratories reported as of Tuesday.
Hutchinson also set a goal of having 10,000 antigen tests, which are generally faster but less accurate, this month, the same number he set as a goal for last month.
Meanwhile the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences' Fay W. Boozman College of Public Health released updated projections predicting that the state will have 113,248 cases and 1,688 deaths from the coronavirus by Oct. 15.
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The number of cases in the state that were considered active fell Tuesday by 430, to 5,036, as 686 Arkansans were newly classified as having recovered.
Laboratories reported conducting 3,530 PCR tests in Arkansans on Monday. That number is likely to grow as more laboratories report tests to the Health Department.
As it stood Tuesday, however, that was the state's lowest number of tests in a day since early June.
If the number of tests had been significantly higher, "I would have probably been jumping up and down" to announce the 273 cases that were added to the state's total Tuesday, Hutchinson said, "but with the lower testing day, I'm a little bit more calm about that, and we wait for more information tomorrow.
"And so I feel confident that we're steady, that we're not escalating our cases. You can see that in the data. But whenever you have increased activity, you've got to continue to make sure we do the right thing, follow the guidelines, or we're going to have an acceleration of cases."
Hutchinson had set a goal of having 200,000 Arkansans tested through PCR tests in July.
Numbers initially released by the Health Department indicated that the state did not meet that goal, but a chart that Hutchinson displayed Tuesday indicated that the number rose to 214,868 as laboratories reported more results to the department.
As of Tuesday, the department had received the results of 186,379 PCR tests that were performed on Arkansans in August.
That was down from the previous month, as well as June, when 198,081 such tests were conducted in the state.
Hutchinson noted that the testing last month still amounted to more than 6% of the state's population. In May, just 2.7% of the state's population was tested.
He called 6% of the state's population "a good goal."
"Every month, if we can do that, that gives us a good indication as to where we are in the state."
Hutchinson didn't say Tuesday how many antigen tests were performed in August. A chart that he displayed Monday indicated the number was 4,644 as of Sunday.
The number of antigen tests performed Monday wasn't available Tuesday, Health Department spokeswoman Danyelle McNeill said.
The state's case count does not include infections identified solely through antigen tests. A Health Department spokeswoman said Aug. 20 that 1,436 antigen tests in the state had been positive.
The department hasn't released an updated total since then, although Hutchinson displayed a chart Monday showing the percentage of antigen tests that were positive each day for most of August.
Hutchinson said Tuesday that the state will release information on antigen testing "on a more regular basis" this month.
"Right now, it is a small percent of our overall testing, and we're keeping that in a separate category," he said.
McNeill said she didn't have information Tuesday on the number of positive antigen tests in the state since Aug. 20.
The cumulative number of Arkansans who have been hospitalized rose Tuesday by 93, to 4,306, indicating that 90 previously hospitalized patients were discharged or died.
The number of covid-19 patients who had ever been on ventilators increased by 12, to 554.
Of the Arkansans who had ever been hospitalized with covid-19 as of Tuesday, 601, or almost 14%, died, Health Department spokesman Gavin Lesnick said.
The cases added to the state's total Tuesday included 44 in Pulaski County, 29 in Benton County, 24 in Sebastian County and 21 in Washington County.
UA RESPONSE
At the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, the Health Department reported that 350 people were tested at a drive-thru event Tuesday after the campus reported a surge in cases last week and over the weekend.
The testing will continue today and Thursday.
"We'll have a better idea of what the prevalence is in the individuals that were tested in a couple of days," Romero said.
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On Monday, the university listed 222 active cases of covid-19 among individuals who have possibly been on campus this semester and in the two weeks before the start of classes, which began Aug. 24.
Case totals are expected to be updated today.
The medical director for the UA-Fayetteville health center, Dr. Huda Sharaf, has said the increase in cases has mostly been within the university's student population. The state's largest university last fall enrolled about 27,500 students.
Romero on Friday said there were outbreaks at some colleges, including an "alarming" number of cases at UA-Fayetteville.
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A similar state Health Department testing event is scheduled for Thursday at the University of the Ozarks in Clarksville. On its website Tuesday, the private university listed seven active cases. Last fall it enrolled 824 students, according to state data.
The Department of Health's twice-weekly report on covid-19 cases at educational institutions listed 18 active cases as of Monday at the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff. The report differs from what universities are self-reporting on their websites.
"We are closely monitoring our COVID-19 cases, and providing the direct support necessary to keep our students and employees safe," George Cotton Sr., UAPB's vice chancellor for institutional advancement, said in an email.
He said the university hosted a testing event Saturday that was sponsored by health care organization Jefferson Comprehensive Care System Inc.
UAPB, which last fall enrolled about 2,500 students, does not list covid-19 campus case information on its website, but Cotton said the university is "working on" publishing an informational dashboard.
"The turnout for the first day of this drive-thru clinic is very encouraging. The response by the U of A community shows we are taking this seriously and adhering to the recommendations by our health experts and leaders," UA spokesman Zac Brown said in an email.
Romero said Tuesday that the Health Department has deployed additional testing equipment, including to UA-Fayetteville.
But while the university about a week ago received a BD Veritor rapid antigen testing machine, Brown said it isn't being used regularly because of a lack of test kits. Romero said Tuesday that the state has a shortage of the kits.
"Access to this mode of testing is critical for increasing testing capacity and more quickly identifying persons that need to be isolated," Brown said.
The university received 30 kits and asked about getting more, but thus far has "not been given a clear timeline as to when those test kits will be available," Brown said.
So "we are not currently using this machine as our primary mode of testing patients," Brown said, with the university's Pat Walker Health Center continuing to use PCR testing rather than antigen testing.
The BD Veritor machine, when operating, can run four test specimens per hour, Brown said.
"With an adequate supply of testing kits and supplies, we will be able to more efficiently identify positive cases and mitigate the spread within our U of A community. While the use of a rapid testing machine is helpful in identifying active cases of covid-19, it can only be used to detect infection among symptomatic individuals," Brown said.
PROJECTIONS UPDATED
Long-term projections released by the College of Public Health on Tuesday predicted that the number of active infections in the state will peak at 78,888 on Dec. 26 under a moderate scenario or 116,044 on Dec. 15 under a worst-case scenario.
Those numbers include infections predicted to be confirmed through tests, as well as undetected infections of people who don't show symptoms and others who are infected but don't get tested.
The latest projections are an improvement from the college's previous forecast, dated Aug. 14, which predicted that active infections would peak at 90,522 on Dec. 19 under a moderate scenario or 130,747 on Dec. 9 under a worst-case scenario.
Similarly, the latest forecast predicts that hospitalizations will peak, under a moderate scenario, at 1,972, down from 2,263 in the earlier forecast.
The predicted peak of patients in intensive care units in that scenario fell from 905 to 788, while the number predicted to be on ventilators fell from 362 to 315.
The state's outlook in the forecast, now updated every two weeks, has generally improved as more data on the virus' spread in the state has become available.
"After peaking, the pandemic will begin a slow, downward trend during the early months of 2021," researchers wrote in the latest forecast.
Another model in the forecast report estimated that holding classes exclusively through online instruction would reduce the number of new infections in the state each day, including infections that are not detected through testing, to about 2,000 a day by Oct. 24.
A chart in the report indicates the current level of new infections was estimated to be between 3,000 and 4,000.
Holding classes through a mix of online and in-person instruction would result in the number of new infections each day rising to 5,500, while holding only in-person classes would cause the number to rise to 8,000, researchers predicted.
Similarly, with classes held through a mix on in-person and online instruction, researchers predicted that strict adherence to the state's policy requiring people to wear masks would keep the number of new infections each day at about 3,600 on Oct. 24.
That compares to an increase in infections of 7,400 a day if Arkansans did not change their behavior in response to the mask order, researchers wrote.
WHITE HOUSE REPORT
The White House coronavirus task force's latest report on Arkansas, dated Sunday, found that the state continues to be in the "red zone" for new cases, with 130 cases per 100,000 residents reported in the states last week, compared with 121 cases per 100,000 residents the previous week.
The report also put the state in the "yellow zone" for the percentage of its PCR tests that were positive.
Last week, 9.8% of the tests were positive, the seventh-highest rate in the country.
That was up slightly from the previous week, when 9.6% of the state's tests were positive, the ninth-highest rate.
States were listed as being in the red zone for new cases if they had more than 100 new cases per 100,000 residents in the seven-day period ending Friday.
They were listed as being in the red zone for "positivity" if more than 10% of their tests during a seven-day period ending Wednesday were positive.
The report also listed 27 of the state's counties as being in the red zone, meaning they had more than 100 new cases per 100,000 residents the previous week and that more than 10% of their tests were positive.
That was down from the 33 counties in the state that were labeled as being in the red zone a week earlier.
The latest report continued to recommend that Arkansas take steps such as closing bars and more severely restricting restaurant seating.
It also highlighted infections in the state's nursing homes. From Aug. 10-16, 15.7% of the state's more than 200 nursing homes had at least one new case among residents, compared with the rate of 10.7% among nursing home nationally.
It said 9.1% of Arkansas' nursing homes had a resident who died of the virus during the week, compared with 5% of nursing homes nationally.
"The high proportion of nursing homes with more than one positive resident is concerning, along with deaths of nursing home residents," the report says.
Hutchinson said the report highlights the need for people to follow public health directives, such as the state's mask mandate, so that more restrictions on business don't become necessary.
"Absolutely if we saw cases that reached to an uncontrollable level, then we would be looking at additional options, some of which are included in the White House recommendations," he said.
Information for this article was contributed by Thomas Saccente and Cynthia Howell of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette; and by Dave Perozek of the Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.
