SAN ANTONIO – Editor’s Note: Watch the entire briefing in the video player above. Newsletter recipients can click here to access the video.
Local officials on Tuesday announced 136 new COVID-19 cases in Bexar County during San Antonio’s nightly coronavirus briefing.
The daily case number is much higher than the one reported Monday, when officials announced 56 new cases. Bexar County’s cumulative COVID-19 case total stands out 41,274. Officials believe roughly 7,000 of those cases are active.
San Antonio Mayor Ron Nirenberg said 10 more people have died of the virus, bringing the death toll to 380.
Hospital capacity, which has steadily declined in recent weeks, decreased again on Tuesday.
COVID-19 hospitalizations stood at 838 on Tuesday, down from 886 on Monday. Of those patients, 336 are in the intensive care unit and 234 patients are on ventilators.
Nirenberg said 17% of staffed hospital beds and 50% of ventilators are available in Bexar County.
The mayor said the city is still converting to the Texas Health Trace reporting system, causing lower reported numbers. He said the updated numbers either on Wednesday or sometime later this week will be completely caught up once the transition is complete.
Nirenberg reminded the public to tune into the COVID-19 & Schools town hall that’s happening on Wednesday so that people can see the metrics used to determine when it’s safe to open school campuses.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott was in San Antonio Tuesday to tour a warehouse that is storing and distributing personal protective equipment, or PPE.
During that visit, he pledged schools will have access to all the PPE they need at no cost to local school districts.
“This is being paid for by the state of Texas to ease the financial burdens of the local school districts,” Abbott said.
To date, the state had distributed 59 million masks, 24,000 thermometers, 565,000 gallons of hand sanitizers and more than 500,000 face shields to Texas schools, Abbott said.
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