Live updates: 2 Oregonians younger than 40 die of COVID-19

August 31, 2020 steven

For two consecutive days, Oregon has reported the deaths of people younger than 40 due to the coronavirus, both residents of the greater Portland area.

A 37-year-old Washington County woman with underlying medical conditions died of the virus at Providence St. Vincent Medical Center, the Oregon Health Authority said Saturday. That news comes a day after the state agency announced the death of a 29-year-old Multnomah County man with no underlying medical conditions at OHSU hospital.

In keeping with a policy of protecting private health information, the state provided few details on either death, other than to say the 29-year-old tested positive on Aug. 22 and died the same day, and the 37-year-old tested positive on Aug. 10 and died Aug. 15.

Oregon has announced four more deaths to COVID-19, bringing the pandemic’s death toll in the state to 458 as of Sunday.

The Oregon Health Authority also reported 269 new confirmed and presumptive diagnosis. Since the coronavirus was detected in Oregon, 26,554 people have been diagnosed with it, and 4,884 have been declared recovered.

According to the health authority, the deaths most recently attributed to the virus were:

A 70-year-old Douglas County woman who died Saturday at a Portland hospital, three weeks after she tested positive. It’s not clear if she had underlying medical conditions.
A 79-year-old Marion County woman with underlying medical who was diagnosed Aug. 8 and died Aug. 25 at Salem Hospital.
A 79-year-old Marion County an with underlying medical conditions who was diagnosed July 30 and died Aug. 28 at Salem Hospital.
An 88-year-old Washington County man with underlying medical conditions who was diagnosed Aug. 25 and died Aug. 28 at Legacy Meridian Park Medical Center.

At a press briefing last week, officials with the Oregon Health Authority said coronavirus diagnoses, hospitalizations and deaths have gradually declined over the past three weeks, although not at the pace necessary to reopen schools in most of the state.

Counties with 10 or more new diagnoses reported Sunday were: Marion with 48 cases, Multnomah with 36, Washington with 35, Malheur with 22 and Clackamas with 16 and Jackson with 13.

Ranked by population, Malheur County now has the highest COVID-19 infection rate in Oregon. According to an analysis by the Malheur Enterprise, tests for the coronavirus are coming back “positive” at a rate 10 times the statewide average.

Unemployed Oregonians will be able to get $300 more per week as part of a federal program created by executive order of President Donald Trump. Officials at the Oregon Employment Department and the Federal Emergency Management Agency announced Friday evening that Oregon has been approved for the Lost Wages Assistance program, a fund that promises $44 billion to help the nation’s unemployed after an earlier pandemic assistance program’s funding expired.

Oregon officials have tried to temper expectations regarding how long the funding will last. Oregon Employment Department Director David Gerstenfeld said the federal funding is projected to cover three to five weeks of $300 payments for thousands of out-of-work Oregonians, possibly a little further. But because the money is coming from a disaster relief fund, it could disappear quickly if natural disasters, such as hurricanes, draw down the fund.

Another 32 people tested positive for the novel coronavirus in Clark County, Washington, the local public health department reported Friday. To date, 2,534 residents of Clark County have tested positive for the virus and 49 have died.

Since the start of the pandemic, 73,301 people have been diagnosed with COVID-19 in Washington, and 1,905 have died, according to the latest count available from the state.

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