{"id":2583,"date":"2020-04-30T19:55:03","date_gmt":"2020-05-01T00:55:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/com.bradley.edu\/newslab\/?p=2583"},"modified":"2020-04-30T19:55:03","modified_gmt":"2020-05-01T00:55:03","slug":"northern-illinois-battles-covid-19-amid-lawsuits-between-politicians","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/com.bradley.edu\/newslab\/2020\/04\/30\/northern-illinois-battles-covid-19-amid-lawsuits-between-politicians\/","title":{"rendered":"Northern Illinois Battles COVID-19 amid lawsuits between politicians"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

As the state of Illinois remains in a stay at home order, different regions of the state are dealing with different situations amid the COVID-19 pandemic. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to the Illinois Department of Public Health, as of April 29th, the state of Illinois has seen 52,918 cases of COVID-19, a number that continues to grow every day. 21,491 of those cases are in the city of Chicago. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

60 miles northwest, Rockford, Illinois and the surrounding areas are dealing with the virus on a smaller scale. As of Wednesday, Winnebago county, home to Rockford and other communities, has reported 422 positive tests and 11 deaths from COVID-19. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The Winnebago County Department of Public Health continues to stress the importance of staying home with updated graphics posted every day to its website<\/a>. The Department emphasizes that the county has multiple \u201clocations of concern\u201d such as the county jail, seven care centers and nursing homes, and the Rockford Rescue Mission homeless shelter. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

On April 24th, the state opened a drive through testing unit last Monday at the University of Illinois College of Medicine location in Rockford. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe\u2019re working every day to expand testing in the state, and you\u2019re starting to see some success,\u201d Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker said. \u201cI want many more tests in the state, and you shouldn\u2019t be surprised if that testing number continues to grow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to the Illinois Department of Public Health, those testing numbers vary from county to county. Winnebago County has tested 1.14% of the population. Stephenson County, Winnebago\u2019s westerly neighbor, has tested just 0.62%. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Readers can view data on testing, cases, and deaths on the department\u2019s website, which features an interactive map<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

On May 1st, the state\u2019s stay at home order will be extended another 30 days by Pritzker. The extension comes with some modifications, including facemask requirements in public places such as grocery stores. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

While many applaud the proactiveness, not everybody is thrilled with the governor\u2019s action. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

On Wednesday, Illinois State Representative John Cabello, who represents a portion of Winnebago County, joined another state rep in sueing Pritzker because he believes the order is against citizen\u2019s constitutional rights.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"State
State Representative John Cabello (R). <\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

A church in Lena, Illinois is also suing the governor, as they believe the stay at home order is discriminatory to religious practices. The congregation had previously been issued a \u201ccease and desist\u201d order for defying the state\u2019s orders, and plans to hold services this upcoming Sunday. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

On the other hand, Rockford mayor Tom McNamara supports the governor’s action and is frustrated with the lawsuits. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe lawsuits are disappointing,\u201d McNamara said Wednesday morning on Q98.5 FM in Rockford. \u201cThe idea that we would be considering a wide-open economy, to me, is really just foolish and doesn\u2019t have any basis in science.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

While Rockford\u2019s cases are not astronomically high as of now, trends point towards the city becoming a hotspot, as new case numbers are still increasing daily.\u00a0
For more information on the novel coronavirus and how to prevent the spread, visit https:\/\/www.cdc.gov\/coronavirus\/2019-ncov\/index.html<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As the state of Illinois remains in a stay at home order, different regions of the state are dealing with different situations amid the COVID-19 pandemic.  According to the Illinois Department of Public Health, as of April 29th, the state of Illinois has seen 52,918 cases of COVID-19, a number that continues to grow every day. 21,491 of those cases are in the city of Chicago.  60 miles northwest, Rockford, Illinois and the surrounding areas are dealing with the virus on a smaller scale. As of Wednesday, Winnebago county, home to Rockford and other communities, has reported 422 positive tests and 11 deaths from COVID-19.  The Winnebago County Department of Public Health continues to stress the importance of staying home with updated graphics posted every day to its website. The Department emphasizes that the county has multiple \u201clocations of concern\u201d such as the county jail, seven care centers and nursing homes, and the Rockford Rescue Mission homeless shelter.  On April 24th, the state opened a drive through testing unit last Monday at the University of Illinois College of Medicine location in Rockford.  \u201cWe\u2019re working every day to expand testing in the state, and you\u2019re starting to see some success,\u201d Illinois […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":294,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[253,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2583","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-government","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/com.bradley.edu\/newslab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2583","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/com.bradley.edu\/newslab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/com.bradley.edu\/newslab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/com.bradley.edu\/newslab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/294"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/com.bradley.edu\/newslab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2583"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/com.bradley.edu\/newslab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2583\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2584,"href":"https:\/\/com.bradley.edu\/newslab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2583\/revisions\/2584"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/com.bradley.edu\/newslab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2583"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/com.bradley.edu\/newslab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2583"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/com.bradley.edu\/newslab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2583"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}