Mississippi coronavirus: Reeves orders shelter-in-place for Lauderdale County

Giacomo Bologna , Alissa Zhu | Mississippi Clarion Ledger

Show Caption Hide Caption Gov. Reeves on coronavirus testing in Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves talks about coronavirus testing in Mississippi.

Gov. Tate Reeves announced a lockdown of Lauderdale County in eastern Mississippi at a Tuesday press conference after a spike of coronavirus cases in the area, including several at a nursing home.

The shelter-in-place order will begin at 10 p.m. Tuesday and last through April 14, and will be enforced by state, county and local law enforcement, Reeves said. It's the first state-issued lockdown order in Mississippi. Reeves has so far resisted calls for a statewide lockdown, despite growing public pressure to do so.

He hinted that more county or regional lockdowns are coming.

"This is the first order of what may be several more coming," Reeves said.

Residents are still able leave their homes for essential reasons, such as for groceries.

Why Lauderdale County?

Lauderdale County, which includes the city of Meridian, has a population of about 76,000 people. As of Tuesday, the county had 35 cases of coronavirus, according to the Mississippi State Department of Health.

More populous counties, such as Hinds and DeSoto, have more than double the number of confirmed cases. Pearl River County, which has fewer residents than Lauderdale, has a comparable number of confirmed cases — 30.

Reeves said his administration had repeatedly brought up Pearl River County in recent discussion. It's a county of about 55,000 people near the Gulf Coast and bordering Louisiana, which was one of the first states to see thousands of confirmed cases.

“We think Pearl River County began testing in larger quantities much earlier," Reeves said, explaining that the number of cases there do not appear to be spiking.

Meanwhile, there has been a "rapid increase" in the number of cases in Lauderdale County in the last 48 to 72 hours, said Dr. Paul Byers with the state Department of Health.

More cases at nursing homes

Officials have identified a nursing home in Lauderdale County with "several" coronavirus cases, Byers said. He did not say how many people have been infected at the nursing home and declined to identify the facility, citing privacy concerns. He said nursing home residents and their families have already been notified of the outbreak.

Residents at other nursing homes across the state have contracted the disease, which has proved to be particularly deadly for the elderly and people with compromised immune systems. At least one person has died at a Tunica County nursing home. On Tuesday, a nursing home in Smith County announced several of its residents have been diagnosed with COVID-19.

Byers said he expects the Department of Health to release more information about nursing homes moving forward.

"Stay tuned for that," he said.

While Lauderdale County doesn't have the highest number of confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the state, the recent spike has caused enough concern among officials for it to become the first to experience the state's new strategy of targeted lockdowns.

At a Sunday press conference, Reeves and state Health Officer Dr. Thomas Dobbs said the state was taking an "offensive" strategy against coronavirus. The plan is to step up testing and isolate "clusters" of the disease, a strategy South Korea and Singapore used with relative success.

As part of the strategy, Reeves said the state will be stepping up testing capabilities. So far roughly 10,000 tests have been done in Mississippi, he said. The Department of Health has reported fewer than 5,000 tests so far. Reeves said the other tests have been performed by private laboratories.

As of Tuesday, Mississippi has 937 confirmed cases of COVID-19 and 20 related deaths.

'Hodgepodge approach is baffling'

Despite criticism and calls from some city leaders and residents for a more aggressive statewide clampdown, Reeves and Dobbs both reiterated on Sunday that a statewide shelter-in-place or lockdown is not yet called for. Dobbs called a statewide shelter in place order, "not sustainable."

Some cities across the state have implemented more restrictive orders to slow the spread of the virus, including nightly curfews and enforced social distancing.

Tupelo Mayor Jason Shelton Tupelo, who has ordered his city's residents to shelter-in-place, took to Twitter to criticize the governor's approach.

"The businesses in Lauderdale County are simply losing customers to surrounding counties and (by the way) covid doesn’t stop at the county line ... the hodgepodge approach is baffling," Shelton tweeted Tuesday.

Responding to the tweet during his news conference, Reeves said, “There are those who believe that government ought to take over and run everything,” but he is not one of them.

"Mississippians are smart enough and patriotic enough to pay attention to what we're saying," Reeves said.

Coronavirus in Mississippi: What we know Tuesday

Contact Giacomo "Jack" Bologna at 601-961-7282 or gbologna@gannett.com. Follow him on Twitter @gbolognaCL.