Governor Pritzker and the Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH) are announcing additional COVID-19 mitigation efforts that will be implemented in Region 1 beginning on Sunday, Oct. 25, 2020. According to a news release issued Thursday afternoon, after mitigation efforts initially took effect in Region 1 on Oct. 3, the positivity rate has remained the highest in the state, with the region reporting an 11.9% rolling positivity rate today, Oct. 22.
The release says Region 1 has been under Tier 1 of the state’s resurgence mitigation plan since Oct. 3, after seeing a 7-day rolling average test positivity rate of 8% or above for three consecutive days.
Beginning Oct. 25, northwestern Illinois will face additional mitigations, such as a tighter gathering cap of 10 individuals rather than 25 and new table caps of six rather than 10 when eating out. Region 1 includes Boone, Carroll, DeKalb, Jo Daviess, Lee, Ogle, Stephenson, Whiteside and Winnebago counties.
For Region 1, additional mitigation measures taking effect Oct. 25 include the following:
Bars and Restaurants
- Reduce party size from 10 to six individuals
Meetings, Social Events and Gatherings
- Maximum indoor / outdoor gathering size of 10 individuals
- Applicable to professional, religious, cultural and social group gatherings
- Not applicable to students participating in-person classroom learning
- This does not reduce the overall facility capacity dictated by general business guidance, such as office, retail, etc.
- Not applicable to sports, see sports guidance
Indoor recreation
- Maintain lesser of 25 people/25% of capacity
- No groups more than 10 individuals
- Does not apply to fitness
These mitigations do not apply to schools or polling places.
The latest release says Illinois is now averaging over 70,000 tests per day and today the administration reported surpassing 7 million total tests. To find the nearest testing center, please visit DPH.Illinois.Gov/Testing.
In the coming days, IDPH reports that it will continue to track the positivity rate in Region 1 to determine if mitigations can be relaxed, if additional mitigations are required, or if current mitigation should remain in place.
On Monday, the administration announced Tier 1 COVID-19 resurgence mitigations will be implemented in Region 5, in southern Illinois, beginning Thursday. On Tuesday, the administration announced Tier 1 resurgence mitigations will be implemented in Region 7 (Will and Kankakee counties) and Region 8 (Kane and DuPage counties), beginning tomorrow, Oct. 23. These regions are seeing a 7-day rolling positivity rate of 8 percent or above for three consecutive days, which exceeds the threshold set for establishing mitigation measures under the state’s Restore Illinois Plan. Currently, four of the 11 public health regions have now triggered the state’s failsafe state-action metric.
A full list of mitigation measures pertaining to some businesses and industries may be found on the DCEO website here.
Meanwhile, State Senator Dave Syverson (R-Rockford) issued the following statement criticizing the actions:
“The overreaching restrictions IDPH placed on Region 1 weeks ago targeted restaurants and bars, and the end result was it did nothing to decrease the positivity rates in the area. In fact, while business owners lost revenue and employees’ jobs were put at risk due to the new restrictions, positivity rates actually went up.
IDPH’s own data shows that restaurants and bars are not the major problem. However, they are most easily controlled. Meanwhile, huge companies, like Amazon who have had thousands of cases, have no actions being taken against their operations. Restaurants and bars have gone out of their way to make their businesses safe for their patrons. If a business owner is not following the rules, then the health department should deal with that specific facility instead of punishing all restaurants in northern Illinois.
I appreciate the Governor’s desire to keep Illinois residents safe, but I believe he's getting bad advice from people who are addressing this issue with theories rather than common sense and science. The state needs to rethink its mitigation plan to focus on protecting those at risk and holding those who are violating the rules accountable. In the meantime, the rest of the region shouldn’t be pulled backwards.”
A recent CDC report finds going to locations that offer on-site eating and drinking options were associated with COVID-19 positivity.