Gov. Kevin Stitt hosted a press conference Tuesday regarding COVID-19 in state penitentiaries.
Gov. Stitt talked about the importance of masks and social distancing due to the current rise in state numbers.
“We all have to do our part in the State of Oklahoma,” Gov Stitt said.
Oklahoma has 628 people in hospitals being treated for COVID-19. As a state, Oklahoma is averaging about 1,000 cases per day within the last 2 weeks.
“Our test positivity rate is at 9.2 percent, which ranks Oklahoma 14th in the country,” Gov. Stitt said.
Gov. Stitt encouraged everyone to get tested. There are 80 different test sites across Oklahoma.
“Oklahoma has the 14th lowest death rate per capita,” Gov. Stitt said, when talking about the death rate in Oklahoma.
A big area of our increase in numbers is due to prison systems. There are eight penitentiaries in Oklahoma which are hot spots. Those hot spots include the Lexington Assessment Center, Northeast Correctional Center in Vinita, Charles E. Bill Johnson Correctional Facility in Alva, Jackie Brannon Correctional Center in McAlester, North Fork Correctional Center in Sayre, W S Key Correctional Center in Fort Supply, Enid Community Correctional Center, and Eddie Warrior Correctional Facility in Taft.
“With help from the CDC and the Health Department we have been testing our inmates beyond the requirements since almost the beginning,” Director of Corrections Scott Crow said.
If an inmate does test positive and is in a unit of 500 people, all the inmates from that unit will be quarantined and tested.
“We continue on a daily basis to try to identify resources or processes to mitigate this issue,” Crow said.
Five-hundred-ninety staff members have been tested in penitentiaries around Oklahoma and 278 have been positive with 63 current cases. Fourteen-thousand-and-ten inmates have been tested with 3,168 positives and 22 inmates hospitalized with nine dead and 1,398 current cases of COVID-19.
Crow talked about the reasoning for the recent outbreak in prisons.
“We were able to pause receptions in the beginning, but as things started to get back to a state of normalcy we had to start receiving county jail receptions,” Crow said.
As for right now the prisons are using nasal swabs as form of testing but the potential for rapid testing is potentially an idea and is being communicated with the health department.