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The Callaway County Health Department on Thursday reported what could be Callaway County's biggest ever one-day spike in COVID-19 cases. The CCHD added 43 new cases, bringing the total known cases since March to 447 from 404 on Wednesday. Of those cases, a record-high 155 were active Thursday.
A number of active cases are associated with Westminster College (36 active cases as of Wednesday) and William Woods University (three active cases as of Wednesday). However, it's not clear whether all the cases CCHD reported Thursday are truly new, or if some were already known to the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services and were simply retroactively added to the CCHD's total.
As of Wednesday, the MDHSS was already reporting 442 cases; they added a more-modest 16 cases for a total of 458 on Thursday.
The MDHSS has consistently reported more cases in Callaway County than the CCHD. In fact, according to the MDHSS, Callaway County passed the 404-case mark back on Sept. 3. CCHD executive director Sharon Lynch did not respond to a request for comment Thursday.