A swab to be used for testing novel coronavirus is seen in the supplies of Harborview Medical Center’s home assessment team during preparations to visit the home of a person potentially exposed to novel coronavirus at Harborview Medical Center in Seattle
David Ryder/Reuters
A woman found dead in her home in Georgia tested positive for the coronavirus, several news agencies reported.
Diedre Wilkes was a mammogram technician at a hospital but was not working with COVID-19 patients, so it’s unclear how she contracted the virus.
Another Georgia healthcare worker also died from COVID-19.
The deaths come as hospital workers across the US ask for more personal protective equipment as they treat an increasing number of cases.
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A Georgia mother was found to be infected with the coronavirus after she had died, NBC News reported.
Diedre Wilkes’ was a mammogram technician at Piedmont Newnan Hospital. She died in her home last week and a posthumous coronavirus test came back positive, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported.
Wilkes was 42 years old. She appears to have died 12 to 16 hours before her body was found in her home. Her four-year-old child was near her body when police found her.
An autopsy is being conducted but the mother did not have any known underlying health conditions. It’s unclear when and where Wilkes contracted the virus, and Piedmont Newnan Hospital told NBC Wilkes was not treating any known or suspected COVID-19 cases.
The hospital told NBC it would contact patients and co-workers she might have come into contact with and give them “detailed information for self-monitoring and will offer COVID-19 testing to those who request it.”
The AJC also reported another Georgia healthcare worker died from the disease. A 48-year-old woman who worked at Donalsonville Hospital in Georgia, died last Thursday at a hospital in Tallahassee, Florida.
Healthcare workers across the country are asking for more personal protective equipment as they treat a growing number of coronavirus patients. Some healthcare workers have resorted to reusing masks or using garbage bags as gowns amid the shortages, and some fear that shortage puts them at a higher risk of contracting and spreading the virus.
Cases of coronavirus infections have exceeded 69,000 in the United States, and more than 1,050 have died.
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