Minnesota COVID-19 briefing: 27 cases linked to Sturgis, Mask Mandate impact after 30 days

Minnesota health officials on Monday provided the latest update on the COVID-19 situation in the state.

Minnesota Department of Health Commissioner Jan Malcolm and Director of Infectious Disease and Epidemiology Kris Ehresmann answered questions on a wide range of topics during Monday’s call, including an update on cases linked to the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally in South Dakota, the Food and Drug Administration’s emergency authorization of convalescent plasma and more.

On Friday, MDH noted that 15 Minnesotans had positive COVID-19 cases linked to Sturgis. As of Monday, that has risen to 27 cases. Ehresmann said 25 of the patients were attendees while two were employees or volunteers during the events. The one person that was hospitalized was released after three days. Ehresmann added that it’s still too early to possibly see secondary cases where those who attended the events may have infected others who didn’t attend.

As for how Sturgis compares so far to the protests and civil unrest following George Floyd’s death, Ehresmann said 13,418 people were tested after the protests and 243 returned positive cases, a 1.8% positivity rate. While the amount of positive cases from Sturgis hasn’t yet risen to that same level, it’s something MDH will continue to track.

KSTP’s Complete COVID-19 Coverage

Meawnwhile, on Tuesday it will be one month since Minnesota’s mask mandate went into effect. Malcolm says she believes the COVID-19 numbers have improved, or at least stabilized since the mandate started. She acknowledged the impact is hard to quantify with statistics.

"I think it’s a fair question and understandably everybody wants to know well how much did it help," she said in response to a question from 5 EYE WITNESS NEWS. "I think the fact that it helped is pretty clear from our own experience and from other studies that have been done. But trying to attribute a percentage impact is going to be very difficult."

With schools getting ready to resume, Malcolm noted that COVID-19 will not only make things difficult for districts in having to teach through different methods, but it also can force schools to make last-second adjustments based on sudden outbreaks or changes in situations.

Malcolm said the Minneota and Ivanhoe school districts were planning to begin the school year on Aug. 24 but had to adjust and delay the start of school to Sept. 1 late Sunday night.

"We know the school year is not going to be easy," Malcolm said, urging people to continue to follow guidelines to help make it a smoother year than it might otherwise be. MDH has also urged students and staff to lay low and isolate for 14 days before going back to school.

Below are some other highlights from Monday’s call:

— MDH has been monitoring for possible cases of re-infection. In the case of the person in Hong Kong, scientists found evidence of differences between the first and second infections. Ehresmann said that’s why it’s so important for people to wear masks and follow health guidelines, even for those who have already been infected, because the virus doesn’t appear to produce lifelong immunity. However, Ehresmann noted the Hong Kong case of re-infection is still just one case so MDH and scientists will have to continue studying and monitoring COVID-19.

Scientists say Hong Kong man got coronavirus a second time

— Officials with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention visited MDH Monday to go over planning for possible COVID-19 vaccinations. Ehresmann said it’s an opportunity to talk about things like how to best make a vaccine available to Minnesotans, who to distribute it to first and what roles different people, such as pharmacists, could play in distributing a vaccine. MDH said earlier this month that Minnesota was one of four states chosen for the vaccine pilot group. It should be noted, being part of the pilot group doesn’t mean the state will get a vaccine before other states but allows MDH to provide input and work through vaccine distribution with the CDC.

— Amid a wave of false positives in NFL testing over the weekend, MDH said it tracks all of its cases for accuracy and recognized that no test is 100% accurate but said there’s no indication that the testing results in Minnesota have been inflated with false positives or false negatives. Ehresmann said she believes the NFL’s false positives were an isolated incident only because of contamination, which the company attributed the issue to on Monday.

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— On the FDA’s emergency authorization of convalescent plasma as a treatment for COVID-19, Malcolm and Ehresmann said that it has shown some level of success but much more studying needs to be done to validate that it is safe and does actually help as intended.

— Malcolm thanked the State Fair and vendors for following health guidance during the drive-thru food parade. She noted that all were checked and found to be social distancing, wearing a mask and following all other guidance.

— Ehresmann reminded people in apartments and condos to wear masks when in common areas.

— The state’s rolling average positivity rate was at 4.9% as of Monday, the same as last week.

MDH: 4 new COVID-19 deaths, 44 new hospitalizations