CHICAGO — Dr. Ngozi Ezike with the Illinois Department of Public Health on Wednesday announced 2,270 new cases of COVID-19.
Over 4,000 individuals in the state are in hospitals with COVID-19 symptoms.
Illinois is at 68,232 total positive cases. Ezike announced 136 new deaths related to the virus, bringing the total to 2,974 lives lost.
125 testing centers across the state are offering free testing.
Ezike said treatments for the virus is available to everyone.
“Regardless of ability to pay, not having insurance, and regardless of citizenship status, COVID-19 [testing] is available for everyone,” she said.
The focus of Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s comments revolved around the effect of COVID-19 on minority communities.
“Because of decades of disparities in healthcare access and delivery, we’ve seen the worst effects of this pandemic fall disproportionately upon the backs of the communities of color in our state,” he said.
“That’s especially in our black communities, Native American communities, and Latinx communities,” he said.
He said the Latinx community is testing positive for COVID-19 at the highest rate of any demographic in Illinois.
He said 7.6% of people who have been tested have identified their racial demographic self-identified as Hispanic.
That equals about 26,000 people, nearly 16,000 of whom have tested positive.
“That’s a positivity rate of 60%, nearly three times our state average,” he said.
Pritzker said with over 200 public testing sites in the state, a third of them have been placed in areas with large Latino populations.
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