New numbers show 24 Riverbend residents have died in Kansas’ largest COVID outbreak
Five more deaths have been reported at Riverbend, a rehabilitation and nursing facility in Kansas City, Kansas, that has been overwhelmed with coronavirus cases for the past three weeks.
That brings the total to 24 deaths at the facility. There have been 116 cases linked to Riverbend Post Acute Rehabilitation, a combination of 92 residents and 24 employees.
Eight residents are hospitalized, according to numbers provided by the Unified Government’s public health department Monday.
In Monday’s update from the health department, officials announced the formation of a local long-term care facility task force in response to the massive outbreak at Riverbend and nursing homes across the country.
“Additionally, we are working with area partners to draft new guidelines for long-term care facilities,” said the update on the health department’s Facebook page.
No details of the task force were provided.
Leaders of Riverbend alerted the health department on April 1 that one resident and one employee had tested positive for COVID-19 and that 20 tests were pending. On April 3, county officials announced that 17 Riverbend residents and two employees had tested positive for the coronavirus.
On April 5, the first resident died.
This story was originally published April 20, 2020 at 6:29 PM.
