Several people are infected with COVID-19 at Beaufort County jail. What we know
Several COVID-19 infections were reported at the Beaufort County jail as the delta variant spreads through Beaufort County.
It’s the Detention Center’s first large spike in cases since the jail reported its first COVID case in August 2020.
Officials discovered the new cluster of cases after a detainee said he was symptomatic on Aug. 7, and officials tested everyone in the jail, according to county spokesperson Chris Ophardt.
The detainee tested positive, as did several others.
Ophardt said “less than 10” people tested positive for COVID, but he refused to disclose specifically how many cases the jail has.
They’re a mix of vaccinated and unvaccinated, he said. All COVID-positive detainees had been clustered together in a “pod” of the jail when they were infected.
Ophardt said the detainees infected with COVID now are sequestered in single-person cells.
The jail has not had COVID spread before this because of practices like requiring Detention Center officers to be masked and testing every new detainee and quarantining them for 14 days, Ophardt said.
The person who tested positive this month had passed his 14-day quarantine period and was in a general holding area with others.
According to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the latest strain of the coronavirus — the delta variant — is more than twice as transmissible as the original strain.
Outside of the jail, Beaufort County’s ongoing COVID-19 surge hasn’t slowed in recent days. The county on Tuesday again reported more than 100 new cases. The seven-day average of newly confirmed infections, as of Tuesday, also increased to 136 cases per day, which is almost a record high.
Local jails, where people are held pre-trial after being charged with crimes, are havens for disease spread because of the confined setting where distancing isn’t an option.
