A team from the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention has arrived in Sioux Falls to help with the Smithfield Foods coronavirus hotspot, which has become the biggest single-source of cases in the United States.

South Dakota's total number of COVID-19 cases increased by 180 to 1,168 on Wednesday. Eighty of the new cases are Smithfield Foods employees, bringing the total to 518 Smithfield employees who have tested positive. There are also now 126 total cases of non-employees that became infected when they came into contact with a Smithfield employee, according to the South Dakota Department of Health.

The 518 employees and 126 non-employees connected to Smithfield makes it the largest cluster in the country (644), according to tracking by the New York Times. The previous top cluster was 585 cases aboard the USS Theodore Roosevelt in Guam.

Smithfield announced on Sunday that it would be closing its Sioux Falls plant indefinitely on Wednesday. The plant has 3,700 employees.

Gov. Kristi Noem said the state is "aggressively testing" Smithfield employees and people who have come into contact with them, as well as getting people into isolation as soon as possible.

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The CDC team is scheduled to tour the Smithfield plant on Thursday morning and create a checklist of items to complete before the plant can reopen, Noem said during a press conference on Wednesday. Noem said she's working with federal officials and Smithfield leaders to get the plant back online to provide relief for pork producers and the food chain.

Coronavirus update:Cases surpass 1,100 in South Dakota with 166 more in Minnehaha County

Health Secretary Kim Malsam-Rysdon said they requested that the CDC bring in occupational health experts to help the state understand Smithfield's coronavirus situation and what the company can do to protect its workers. Smithfield is cooperating with the state, and they look forward to the mitigation efforts so the plant can reopen, she said.

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Lower projected peak

Noem announced a lower projection for the state's peak of COVID-19 cases on Wednesday, saying that residents' actions are successfully bending the curve. However, people still need to practice mitigation efforts such as social distancing, wearing masks out in public and washing hands, she said.

"We need to stay the course," she said.

Sioux Falls' peak is now expected in mid-May, and the state's peak is also likely changing, Noem said, but a new timeline wasn't given on Wednesday. If nothing was done about the pandemic, the state would be peaking a week from now with 10,000 hospitalizations, according to state projections.

At the peak in Sioux Falls, the state is now projecting that about 1,200-1,300 hospital beds will be needed and the healthcare systems already have that capacity, Noem said. State epidemiologist Josh Clayton said the state is now projecting that 2,500 beds and 650 ventilators will be needed at the state's peak instead of the previous projection of 5,000 beds and 1,300 ventilators.

But, Noem said, state officials are still planning for 5,000 hospital beds at the state's peak.

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Cases in Minnehaha County increased by 166 to 934 on Wednesday, and in Lincoln County the confirmed cases rose from 55 to 65 cases, according to the state Department of Health.

The state's death toll remains at six as no new deaths were reported on Wednesday. Recoveries increased by 69 to 329 total. Six more people have been hospitalized for a total of 51 people who have been hospitalized at some point since the pandemic began, according to the state health department.

The state has also received Avid testing machines that can rapidly run coronavirus tests, and the state is trying to increase the testing supplies it has for those machines, Malsam-Rysdon said.

Health care facilities in Watertown, Redfield, Huron, Sioux Falls, Mobridge, Martin, Hot Springs and Spearfish will receive the Avid machines. The communities were chosen because they are hard hit by the pandemic or didn't have ready access to commercial labs, as well as increasing the testing ability West River.

United States hot spots

Smithfield Foods meatpacking plant; Sioux Falls, S.D. 644

Aboard the U.S.S. Theodore Roosevelt; Guam, 585

Cook County Jail; Chicago, 524

Parnall Correctional Facility; Jackson, Mich., 212

Soldiers' Home in Holyoke; Holyoke, Mass., 194

Source: New York Times