After topping 80 new coronavirus cases in four of the previous six days, Bulloch County saw a reduction Thursday with 51 new cases reported. Since last Friday, there have been 574 new confirmed cases in Bulloch.

In his daily report to the public, Bulloch County Public Safety/Emergency Management Agency Director Ted Wynn said Bulloch now has 2,188 confirmed cases of COVID-19 since the pandemic began in March.

Wynn said East Georgia Regional Medical Center staff were caring for 28 patients Thursday, which is an increase of seven patients in the past 24 hours, and five are on ventilators.

Since the beginning of the pandemic, Bulloch County has reported 124 hospitalizations and 22 deaths. Bulloch EMS has transported a total of 104 people with probable COVID-19 and 105 with confirmed cases, he said.

Bulloch County Schools reported Thursday that there were 45 COVID-19 positive cases within its student and faculty body — public schools only — with 442 quarantined.  

Georgia Southern University, which only reports weekly, listed 487 cases, including both university-confirmed and self-reported, on the Statesboro GS campus this week among its students and faculty. The next report is expected to be released Monday.

At East Georgia State College, officials reported 18 cases, both confirmed and self-reported, on the Statesboro campus and 35 cases overall on its three campuses as of Thursday.

Ogeechee Technical College is reporting cases weekly and had 12 confirmed cases as of Monday.

In Georgia, the state reported 2,733 new cases Thursday. Georgia's total number of confirmed cases is 277,288. The state reported 75 deaths Thursday, raising the death toll to 5,868.

As of Wednesday afternoon, 185,963 Americans had died from coronavirus, and the U.S. had recorded 6,134,700 confirmed cases, according to statistics from the New York Times.

Appointments for free COVID testing at the Specimen Point of Collection site at 1 W. Altman St. in Statesboro may be made by calling (855) 473-4374 or by clicking here.