The Illinois Department of Public Health is reporting 4,000 new COVID-19 cases on Tuesday. That brings the total number of cases to nearly 383-thousand in Illinois, with more than 95-hundred deaths. Over half of the state’s regions including Southern Illinois and the Metro East are under stricter mitigations like no indoor dining because of rising positivity rates.
Governor JB Pritzker was asked if he would consider allowing restaurants in the impacted areas to remain open inside as the weather gets colder.
“Right now the studies don’t really show that gathering inside in large numbers in restaurants and bars can be done as safely as other kinds of service. But that doesn’t mean that we are not going to try and help our bars and restaurants to get on their feet,” said Pritzker.
The Governor says the state has grant programs available to help struggling businesses. He says the best thing everyone can do is mask up and take other safety precautions so numbers come down and the extra rules can be lifted.
The statewide positivity rate for the past seven days is now reported at 6.4-percent.
The Southern Illinois Region weekly positivity rate for the week ending October 24th jumped two-tenths of a percent to nine percent. Marion County’s rate jumped 1.1-percent to 9.1-percent. The Metro East Region is down a tenth of a percent to 8.3-percent. The East Central Illinois Region is up another tenth of a percent to 7.9-percent.
