This week on the Minnesota Native News Health Report surges in Northern Minnesota, worries about Sturgis, and warnings about scams. I’m Marie Rock. The small town of Sturgis South Dakota will be full of motorcycle enthusiasts this week, and that worries public health officials. Reporter Laurie Stern has more.
The small town of Sturgiss South Dakota will be full of motorcycle enthusiasts this week, and that worries public health officials. Reporter Laurie Stern has more.
Laurie: More than a quarter million motorcycle riders are expected to head for the annual party in Sturgiss South Dakota this week. An attempt to cancel the rally failed, and now public health officials are asking bikers to remember the virus when they come home. This is Health Department Commissioner Jan Malcolm.
JM: it’s not just the risk to yourself but your ability to, to spread the virus to people who may be at at a higher risk when you might consider yourself to be. So it would be it would be really prudent no and I really very thoughtful thing to do for people to quarantine if they if they do go to Sturgis and come back and certainly be vigilant and watch for symptoms and get tested. consider getting tested, five to seven days after you get back even even if you don’t have symptoms, but to stay away from from other people for that for that period of time, would be really thoughtful thing to do.
Malcolm also reported continued case growth and hospitalizations. St. Louis County in Northern Minnesota – full of favorite spots to gather and vacation – is reporting the fastest growth in cases of any county in the state.
JM We’ve been seeing pretty significant case growth and an uptick in hospitalizations like in June.
Officials also warned about scams. People taking advantage of people’s anxiety about the virus and precautions they’re being asked to take: This is Kris Ehresman, director of the state’s division of infection disease.
KE: We’ve received emails about fake “get out of mask free cards” posing as official MDH certificates being used at businesses and restaurants.One of the most disturbing parts of this fake message is it seeks to confuse people into not wearing a mask when it would be especially important to do so. Like saying dry cough, a common symptom of Covid, is because of dry mold in your mask and warrants its disposal.
Ehresman said there are also scams related to contact tracing. She said real contact tracers will always use the phone – not text – and will never ask for your social security or credit card information. If you’ve been approached by scammers, health officials want you to report that to the attorney general’s office.
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