CHICAGO — Gov. J.B. Pritzker on Saturday delivered some of the most unfortunate news of the coronavirus news cycle: a Cook County infant has passed away from COVID-19.
The total death count rose to 47, with 3,491 positive cases.
“There has never before been a death associated with COVID-19 in an infant,” said Dr. Ngozi Ezike, Director of the Illinois Department of Public Health.
“If you haven’t been paying attention, maybe this is your wake-up call.”
Pritzker said the majority of Illinoisans have followed stay-at-home instructions, but it’s the ones who don’t who cause the case count to continue to rise.
“It doesn’t take that many people, frankly, to break the rules and cause danger to others in their community,” he said.
More than 85% of deaths in Illinois have been among people 60 and older.
The counties of Carroll, Fayette, and Mason have reported their first cases, bringing the amount of counties reporting cases to 43.
The Peoria-Tazewell-Woodford County area positive case count has risen to 14. Seven of those cases are in Peoria, four in Tazewell, and three in Woodford.
In a bit of good news, Ezike said in doing research, she has developed a hypothesis the virus “seems to be a stable virus. It doesn’t mutate significantly.
“You develop antibodies within a week, giving you immunity.”
Pritzker added “this means there are cadres of people who have developed immunity to it. Many people who caught it were never tested for it, thinking they had the cold or flu.”
“We are going to get through this. We are,” Pritzker said.
“We’re working very hard to keep everybody healthy and safe. When we look back upon this in the aftermath, I think we’ll say we did everything we could.”
