Doña Ana has 3 of state’s 8 new virus deaths; Alamogordo nursing home added to infection list
LAS CRUCES, New Mexico — New Mexico health officials reported an additional eight deaths Saturday due to the coronavirus, bringing the death total to 711 statewide.
The latest deaths included three men from Doña Ana County, one each in their 60s, 70s and 90s — all who had underlying conditions. The county's fatality toll now stands at 35.
The state also reported 146 new Covid-19 cases, bringing the total to 23,302 since the pandemic began.
The state’s two most populous counties — Bernalillo (19) and Doña Ana (17) — accounted for 25% of the newly reported cases. The pair typically have led the state recently in recording new cases, with Doña Ana's cumulative case count now reaching 2,618.
Statewide, the tally marked another day of lower daily case counts as state health officials look to keep the numbers from spiking again.
Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham said during a briefing this week that as long as the state can sustain lower case counts, the potential for reopening parts of the economy become greater.
Case counts are just one metric that health officials are tracking. Others include the rate of spread, hospitalizations and the capacity for contact tracing. Officials said this week that those targets are being met.
As of Saturday, there were 113 patients hospitalized in New Mexico for Covid-19, although officials said some of those individuals may be residents from other states who are receiving treatment.
Also Saturday, Casa Arena Blanca Nursing Center in Alamogordo was added to a state list of dozens of assisted living facilities across New Mexico where infections have recently been reported among residents and/or staff.
The nursing home's administrator, Kerry Hansen, told ABC-7 there was a lag in the reporting by state health officials and Casa Arena currently has no active cases.
Hansen said one staff member had tested positive over three weeks ago and added that the individual had since tested negative twice. There have been no other infections to occur, the administrator said.
The nursing home's listing came as Otero County reported two new cases for a pandemic total of 207. The southern New Mexico county's death toll remained at 10.
Below you can see county-by-county data for virus cases and deaths across New Mexico. The data comes from Johns Hopkins University, so the numbers may sometimes vary a bit from what's reported by the state health department. (The Associated Press contributed to this report.)
