More inmates in Delaware's prison system are testing positive for the deadly coronavirus.
The Delaware Department of Correction (DOC) announced Sunday results of proactive COVID-19 testing of inmates in the same housing unit at James T. Vaughn Correctional Center where four inmates have tested positive in recent days.
Forty-five additional inmates were tested. Eight tested positive for the virus – but are showing no symptoms.
Seven of those eight inmates were moved Saturday night to Vaughn prison’s new COVID-19 treatment center, which was activated Saturday night in a vacant stand-alone building on the Smyrna-area compound. The other inmate was taken to the hospital for monitoring as a precaution.
“Credit goes to DOC’s healthcare provider Centurion for expediting delivery of the COVID-19 tests and to our dedicated team of medical professionals who tested the at-risk inmates so that we could get the results turned around in less than 20 hours,” said DOC Commissioner Claire DeMatteis in a statement Sunday. “Had we not taken this preventative step, we may not have known for days, a week or longer, if ever, of these asymptomatic results.”
Two of the inmates that tested positive last week are also at the COVID-19 treatment center at Vaughn. Another remains hospitalized in stable condition, and the fourth is in the prison infirmary in stable condition.
DeMatteis said with 12 COVID-19 cases identified among the 4,200 inmates in Level 5 DOC facilities, it is important to keep perspective.
"Three-tenths of one percent have tested positive – all contained in one housing unit at one correctional facility," she said. "None are life-threatening and eight have no symptoms.”
DOC also announced Sunday one additional correctional officer assigned to Vaughn has tested positive for COVID-19. So far a total of 11 correctional officers have tested positive, along with two probation and parole officers and several contract healthcare workers.
