Update: As of Friday 3-20, 6am, there are now 4 confirmed cases of COVID-19 in Lafayette Parish.
Lafayette and St. Landry Parishes each now have two confirmed cases of COVID-19.
Lafayette Mayor-Parish President Josh Guillory announced that the parish has the two cases during a press conference on Wednesday night.
“This is a moment we all knew would arrive,” Guillory said. “We have prepared. We have planned. We have the personnel and resources in place and we have strong lines of communication with state and national leaders.”
Dr. Tina Stefanski, director of Louisiana’s Region 4 Office of Public Health, said both patients are residents of Lafayette Parish and will be quarantined indefinitely while they battle the virus. Stefanski, citing privacy concerns, would not release any additional information including ages or where they lived or had traveled to in recent weeks.
Both Guillory and Stefanski stressed importance of social distancing, handwashing and taking safety precautions.
“It is critically important for people to realize that their actions will impact the health of residents throughout this region,” Stefanski said. “We need to realize if we don’t take those measures seriously and act now, then in a couple of weeks we could really see a very serious situation in this region that could very quickly overwhelm our healthcare systems.”
St. Landry Parish Director of Emergency Preparedness Van Reed announced that his parish at its first confirmed case around midday on Thursday. The Louisiana Department of Health confirmed Thursday evening of a second case in the parish.
As of 6 p.m. Thursday, the Louisiana Department of Health updated its statistics concerning the COVID-19 pandemic. According to the agency’s website, there are 392 cases of COVID-19 reported in Louisiana, with 10 deaths begin attributed to COVID-19 and that 26 of 64 parishes have reported cases.