5 August 2020 — 0859 & 1034 mdt

139 plus 45 uncounted turistas

Flathead County now has more active
Covid-19 cases than all but two Montana counties

The SARS-cov-2 coronavirus is loose in the Flathead; there is community spread. The number of confirmed active Covid-19 infections (see table below) of residents was 139 as of 3 August (source). Add to that another 45 non-residents (scroll down) who are here, are infected, but, by epidemiological reporting convention, are assigned to their state of residence.

Montana’s DPHHS will update these numbers at approximately 1000 this morning, after which I’ll add an update to this post.

Only Yellowstone and Big Horn Counties have more active cases. Only those counties and Lake and Silver Bow Counties have higher active infections per 1,000 persons rates. Montana has a 1.38 active infections per county rate.

At the Montana Free Press, Eric Dietrich has an excellent report, accompanied by graphs for each county, on the rates of infection across Montana. (I consider Dietrich, an engineer by training, Montana’s leading data journalist.)

Big Horn County’s 16 per 1,000 rate is an order of magnitude higher than Montana’s, and almost five times higher than Yellowstone’s. Both counties have community spread and are places to avoid. Big Horn’s situation suggests a massive failure of social distancing and wearing of face masks.

The Northwest Montana Fair (fair board) is scheduled to commence in two weeks. The 2020–2021 school year starts a week or two later. The Flathead’s Covid-19 outbreak suggests to me that the fair will be a coronavirusville, and that the contagion occurring at the fair could show up in classrooms if that’s where students start school this year.

Here’s the table of active cases by county. You can download the spreadsheet on which the table is based.