RAYMONDVILLE — Last month, some officials here believed Willacy County’s new coronavirus cases had flattened.
But on Tuesday, health officials confirmed a COVID-19-related death along with two new cases in this rural county of about 22,000 residents.
Officials confirmed a man in his 60s who had tested positive for COVID-19 died of complications in a Harlingen hospital — the second county resident whose death has been linked to the virus in two months.
“It wasn’t till today that the cause of death was directly related to COVID-19,” Frank Torres, the county’s emergency management coordinator, said.
The man died Saturday at Valley Baptist Medical Center in Harlingen, Dr. Emilie Prot, Region 11’s medical director, stated in a press release.
“A Willacy County man in his 60s who had previously tested positive for COVID-19 was being treated in Valley Baptist Harlingen and succumbed to the disease,” she stated.
On April 4, officials confirmed a Willacy County man in 60s had become the first to die of complications related to COVID-19 in the Rio Grande Valley.
Two new cases
Meanwhile, two more residents have tested positive for the coronavirus in this rural county where officials last month believed case numbers had flattened.
On Tuesday, state health officials confirmed a woman in her 30s had become the county’s 20th case while a woman in her 50s had become its 21st case.
An investigation found the women contracted the virus from a resident who has already tested positive for COVID-19, Prot stated in a press release.
On Monday, health officials confirmed a woman in her 50s had become the county’s 19th case.
Last week, officials confirmed the county’s 15th and 16th cases of the coronavirus — its first new cases in nearly three weeks.
On Thursday, officials confirmed a woman in her 60s had become the county’s 15th case of the COVID-19 virus.
Then on Friday, they confirmed a man in his 60s had become the 16th case.
The series of cases marks the county’s first new cases since May 6, when officials began investigating how a man in his 30s contracted the virus.
