It will likely take at least three weeks before Minnesota starts to see how a recent requirement to wear masks in public indoor places impacts the state’s coronavirus outbreak.
“Don’t be discouraged that our case numbers were large today,” said Kris Ehresmann, director of the infectious disease division of the Minnesota Department of Health, on Monday. “The mask order only started Saturday.”
Minnesota reported 650 new coronavirus infections Monday and two additional COVID-19 deaths. That brings the state’s case load to 51,803 laboratory-confirmed infections and 1,576 fatalities.
There’s now at least one coronavirus case in each of Minnesota’s 87 counties after Lake of the Woods County recorded its first case over the weekend. The majority of cases are in the Twin Cities metro, but rural counties with meat processing plants have the most cases per capita.
Minnesota has seen a steady climb in cases, on average 580 new infections per day, throughout July. The state added 2,315 new infections since Friday.
To slow the spread of the coronavirus, Gov. Tim Walz issued an executive order July 22 requiring masks to be worn in all indoor public places with exceptions for residents with health conditions. The order took affect Saturday and is expected to be in place for months to come.
The statewide order has been criticized by some, including prominent Republican lawmakers, as too broad and unnecessary.
Jan Malcolm, state health commissioner, said Monday that wearing a mask along with maintaining a social distance of at least six feet, frequent hand washing and staying home when sick are the easiest and most effective things Minnesotans can do to slow the spread of the coronavirus. She added that a recent poll found 85 percent of Minnesotans have a positive view of mask wearing.
“We certainly don’t want Minnesota to experience the consequences of very fast (infection) growth like Florida and other states,” Malcolm said. “We have it in our power to prevent that rapid and uncontrolled spread.”
Malcolm and Ehresmann said the state Health Department routinely receives complaints of businesses and residents not following state guidance in place to slow the coronavirus spread — including about 60 complaints over the weekend. The state hasn’t yet had to take enforcement action such as fines or license revocation because businesses identified in complaints have addressed them on their own.
Health officials are closely monitoring several important factors about the state’s outbreak including test positivity rates, patients hospitalized and whether infections are spreading through unknown sources. That data is used to make decisions about rules to slow the coronavirus spread.
There are 257 patients hospitalized with 126 in critical condition. More than 45,000 people who tested positive for the virus have recovered enough they no longer need to be isolated.
Minnesota currently has a test positivity rate of under 5 percent and a cumulative positivity rate of 5.3 percent.
Those will be among the metrics state leaders consider when they announce guidance later this week for the best way to reopen public schools this year.
“Compliance with the guidelines we’ve put out there is so critical right now. We feel like we are in a very vulnerable state,” Malcolm said. “The trends of the last few weeks have made this analysis more challenging. These next weeks are so critical.”
