PEORIA, Ill. — The tri-county has seen an uptick in COVID-19 cases since the beginning of March, especially in the past week, according to the Peoria City/County Health Department.
Public Health Administrator Monica Hendrickson said in the past week, the tri-county has seen an increase of 798 cases.
Peoria County alone saw an increase of 520 cases, added Hendrickson.
“First and foremost, 40% of the cases [in Peoria County] in the past two weeks are attributed to individuals 10 to 29,” said Hendrickson. “Since the beginning of March, the total number of cases has been 276 for those individuals ages 0 to 19.”
Hendrickson added that many of these cases can be traced to school sports team activities and St. Patrick’s Day exposures.
Because of the increase in cases, Hendrickson stressed the importance of vaccinations and adhering to the established guidelines.
“Adherence to the vaccination is one of the best tools that we have…and the reason we can say that is because in the same time period that we saw that high increase in the younger population, we also saw only 8% of cases attributed to those 60 and older” said Hendrickson. “We have high vaccination rates among that population.”
Hendrickson also said the Peoria City/County Health Department is expecting its first shipment of the Johnson & Johnson coronavirus vaccine next week.
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