Most young virus cases in Texas county diagnosed this month

HOUSTON (AP) — Most of the 85 young children in a South Texas county who are known to have contracted the coronavirus tested positive this month amid a surge in the state, a health official said Sunday.

Nearly all of the children, most of whom are 1 year old or younger, are expected to recover on their own, Annette Rodriguez, the Corpus Christi-Nueces County public health director, told The Associated Press by phone. One of the children died, but officials are still trying to determine if COVID-19 was the cause, she said.

“There’s always that concern that you’re going to have that one baby like we did that passed away,” Rodriguez said. “How many more from this group? What percent will you lose possibly to this virus?”

The county, which is home to about 362,000 people and sits on the Gulf Coast, is one of several COVID-19 hot spots in Texas, which has been hammered by the disease in recent weeks.

On Sunday, Gov. Greg Abbott announced that the Department of Defense had sent five teams of Navy doctors to four locations in southern and southwestern Texas to help hospitals where capacity has become stretched.

Rodriguez said during a public health update on Friday that 85 infants in Nueces County had tested positive, though she clarified Sunday that some of the kids were not infants — up to a year old — and were as old as 23 months. Her Friday claim prompted Nueces County's top elected official, Judge Barbara Canales, to issue a statement Saturday saying the 85 figure reflected the cumulative total since mid-March.

But Rodriguez stressed Sunday that although the oldest of the cases goes back to mid-March, most of them — 60 infants — tested positive from July 1 to July 16.

“But it’s still important. Eighty-five (young children) picking up COVID-19...