PICKAWAY – Pickaway County fair is the first state fair of the year and with that set a standard for all other fairs that decided that the show must go on. The fair board worked tirelessly around the clock with Pickaway County Health board to set the stage for what they deemed a, “safe fair.”
Those orders were a refection on Gov Mike Dewine’s orders for safe fair orders. On Wednesday afternoon Mike Dewine address fairs again during a news conference.
“We came out with about three pages of what we thought were very simple orders and some protocol to be followed by the fairs” said DeWine. “What we’ve unfortunately started to see is some fairs that were not following that. Some were, some were not… We had one county fair, so far, we know of 19 cases that arose out of that county fair. We’ve also seen pictures of some fairs where people were not social distancing. We see grandstands full of people.”
Dewine said that he wants fairs to continue, “but, they have to follow the rules. They also have to follow what their local health department says.”
Dewine yesterday ordered a mask mandate across the state with some restrictions.
Pickaway County fair responded to allegation that 21 cases have been tied to the fair and possibly one death.
In the statement Pickaway County Fairboard is inviting Pickaway County Public Health, Pickaway County Commissioners and Ohio Fair Managers Association representatives to a special meeting Monday, July 27 at 7pm in Heritage Hall to discuss how the health department’s data links the fair to the increase in positive COVID-19 cases.
To date as of 3:00 p.m. today, Wenesday, July 22, 2020 there are a total of 74,409 COVID-19 cases in Ohio and 2,976 deaths. Currently there are 2,296 confirmed positive COVID-19 cases in Pickaway County, 2,013 being inmates, leaving 283 local residents who have tested positive.There are 45 active local resident cases with 4 hospitalized. There are a total of 42 deaths, 37 being inmates and 5 community deaths.
In June Pickaway County Health reported an average of 7 active cases, in early July the cases spiked due to what the Health Department said was, “More testing and more socialization.”
