Reports incorrect on Sumter child dying from COVID-19

Reports that a Sumter County child died from COVID-19 were incorrect, officials said Tuesday.

Multiple TV and news outlets not based in Sumter reported a child from Sumter was among the 19 deaths announced on Labor Day by the state Department of Health and Environmental Control. The Sumter Item did not.

According to Sumter County Coroner Robbie Baker, the person’s date of birth was recorded incorrectly. Baker said the COVID-19-related death, which occurred on Sept. 3, was an 81-year-old.

“We have not had a small child die from COVID-19 in Sumter,” Baker said.

Baker told The Sumter Item last week that two of the COVID-19-related deaths his office has responded to were residents in their 50s. The rest were in their 60s through 90s.

According to DHEC, 14,301 Sumterites have been tested for the respiratory virus, of whom 2,918 have been confirmed to have COVID-19. Sumter has had 270 hospitalizations and 70 deaths.

“The last thing we need is for people to freak out with sending kids back to school,” the coroner said.

Six schools in The Item’s three-county coverage area – Sumter, Clarendon and Lee – have reported cases among faculty or students, according to DHEC’s new school-level case reporting dashboard, which shows 233 confirmed cases among school-aged children and employees as of Tuesday. All of the schools have less than five total cases.

Attempts to reach a DHEC spokesperson Tuesday afternoon were not successful by press time.