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March was quiet on the COVID-19 front.

According to the latest update Friday from the Clark County Health Department, March saw just 131 confirmed cases in Clark County, which is the lowest total since the 42 reported last June.

Twelve positive cases were reported by the end of the week, down from the 16 that were reported the week prior.
Of the 11,016 cases reported in the county since March 2020, 4328 or 39.2 percent were reported in January and February this year during the surge caused by the omicron variant of the virus.

As of Friday, 8,318 Clark Countians have been vaccinated against the virus.

In further good news, after consulting with the Kentucky Department of Public Health and the Centers for Disease Control, Clark County has been moved to the “green” level of community spread.

Public Health Director Becky Kissick explained why the area was still “red” even as case counts fell.

“You may recall last week that the CDC was reporting that Clark County’s total number of new cases was 111. You saw that we were reporting 16 new cases. That is really where we started digging and started asking some questions,” Kissick explained.

It turns out that the issue was a system glitch that occurred when local information was uploaded to the CDC’s national database.

“When that data was being transmitted, basically anytime we had gone in to update a case status or add vaccine information, it was being considered a new notification to the CDC,” Kissick said. “It looked like it was a new case, but it was not; it was a case that we had previously reported.”

Once the state and the national health agencies identified the issue, they worked in unison to correct it.

The health department also announced Friday that it would begin to report cases numbers monthly instead of weekly.