NEWPORT — The Woodlawn Care Center has reported the largest known COVID-19 outbreak in an Upper Valley nursing home.
The outbreak at the Newport nursing home includes 13 residents and three staff members, said Woodlawn administrator Chris Martin. One staff member has recovered, he said.
“Nursing homes in the Upper Valley have been largely spared until now,” Martin said in a Thursday phone interview.
The outbreak comes as cases of COVID-19 are rising across the region. Sullivan County, where Newport is located, had 25 active cases as of Thursday. Grafton County had 74. New Hampshire had a total of 1,546 active cases, including 252 new cases that were announced on Thursday.
This is the first COVID-19 outbreak at Woodlawn, which is home to 45 residents. The first worker tested positive on Oct. 21 and the first resident on Oct. 28. Though two asymptomatic staff members tested positive over the summer, they stayed out of work while infectious and it didn’t spread to others, Martin said.
So far, Martin said no one involved in the outbreak has had to be hospitalized. Those who are infected have been isolated from those who are not. His goal now is to contain transmission and to support residents who are ill. Visits are now restricted to compassionate care and end of life.
He said he feels fortunate that they have sufficient personal protective equipment, as well as an antigen testing machine that provides quick results they can use to track the extent of the outbreak. He has been keeping families up to date via the nursing home’s Facebook page and Zoom.
Woodlawn is one of six institutions with active outbreaks in New Hampshire as of Thursday. Previous cases in Upper Valley nursing homes have included five cases at the Elm Wood Center in Claremont in June and one worker and one resident at Grafton County Nursing Home in North Haverhill who tested positive in April. The resident later died. The Grafton County Nursing Home also had one asymptomatic worker test positive in September.
Though a health care worker at Sullivan County nursing home in Unity tested positive in May, a subsequent test for that worker came back negative.
Long-term care settings account for 2,487 of the state’s 11,808 total cases so far; 212 of the state’s 788 total hospitalizations; and 396 of New Hampshire’s 486 total deaths.
Nora Doyle-Burr can be reached at ndoyleburr@vnews.com or 603-727-3213.
