Health & Fitness
Idaho Legislature's COVID-19 Outbreak Infected At Least 14, Spread To Household Members
People in four of Idaho's seven health regions got infected.
April 8, 2021
The COVID-19 cluster that formed last month in the Idaho Capitol building infected at least 14 people who live in four different regions of the state.
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The latest infections bring the total to at least 20 people infected since the Legislature’s session began in January.
Idaho Press on Tuesday reported that one House staffer is currently hospitalized for COVID-19. “I pray especially today for John and for you to touch his life as he’s in the hospital,” House Chaplain Tom Dougherty said in the opening prayer, according to the newspaper.
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There are no requirements for legislators or staff to wear face coverings in the Statehouse building. There also is no requirement that cases in the Statehouse are disclosed to the public.
Legislators reconvened this week, following their quarantine in their home districts. Many of the lawmakers continued not to follow public health guidelines for masks and distancing as they worked in the Capitol.
Idaho’s public health departments have linked 11 “primary” cases and three “secondary” cases to the Statehouse coronavirus outbreak in March. The secondary cases were among people who lived with those infected in the outbreak.
Southwest District Health had the most cases, with four residents in the region infected due to workplace exposure at the Capitol, a spokesperson for the health department said. The department’s contact tracing identified an additional three cases among household members of those infected at the Capitol. (Four of the six House members known to have contracted the virus in the outbreak live in that region.)
Two of the health districts in Idaho’s northernmost regions said they didn’t yet know of any cases of COVID-19 linked to the statehouse outbreak. One health district wasn’t keeping track of cases from the outbreak.
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