Coronavirus has spread to all 100 counties in NC as Avery County reports first case
Coronavirus has spread to all 100 counties in North Carolina, bringing the global epidemic to every corner of North Carolina.
Monday, mountainous and sparsely populated Avery County in Western North Carolina reported its first positive test results for COVID-19, the disease caused by the novel coronavirus. It was reported on the Avery County Health Department’s Facebook page.
“Avery County has been preparing for this reality and anticipated that our community would likely be impacted at some point,” according to the Facebook page. “Public health staff have already initiated an investigation and have identified close contacts to contain the spread of disease.”
The state confirmed its first case of COVID-19 on March 3, announcing that the Wake County patient had traveled to a Washington state nursing home where the virus had already struck.
Since then, as cases in the state rose to more than 19,000, Avery County continued to report a zero until Monday afternoon.
But after several hundred completed tests, Avery found its first positive case.
Diane Creek is the health department director for the Toe River Health District, which includes Avery, Mitchell and Yancey Counties. On May 11, she said there was no obvious explanation why Avery remained case-free for so long.
“I honestly don’t even know,” Creek told The News & Observer in an interview. “We’ve had the same orders, the same guidelines. ... People are social distancing, taking the same precautions. But people are still going to the grocery stores; life has not stopped there.”
In early May, Creek said Avery conducted a drive-through testing event, where more than 250 nasal tests were performed. The results of those tests started coming in last week, leading to the county’s first confirmed case.
For the first month of the coronavirus in North Carolina, cases shot to over 1,000 statewide. On March 25, Gov. Roy Cooper announced the first deaths in the state: a man in his 70s from Cabarrus County and another person in their 60s who had been traveling from Virginia.
Two days after the first deaths, Cooper issued a statewide stay-at-home order, restricting most outdoor or group activity and limiting open businesses to the most essential.
North Carolina is now in Phase One of Cooper’s reopening plan for the state, meaning stay-at-home orders are still in effect, but residents can visit more retail stores, as well as state and local parks.
Phase Two of the plan, which could go into effect later this week, would partially reopen restaurants, gyms, theaters and beauty salons.
Avery County is home to around 17,000 people, according to census data. Situated in the mountains along the Tennessee border, there are also quite a few second homes in Avery, Creek said. Because of that, the county instituted a 14-day quarantine rule for anyone coming in from out of the county for an overnight stay.
“It is important for the community to understand that the identification of a case does not change our local strategies for preventing and reducing the spread of disease,” officials wrote on the Avery Health Department’s Facebook page.
For the most part, Creek said Avery residents took guidelines and social distancing efforts seriously.
“In Avery, there’s not a lot of people that fight against the rules,” Creek said. “They’re very independent people; they’ve taken this pretty seriously.”
This story was originally published May 18, 2020 at 3:49 PM.
