The bill passed earlier this year that removed the old state flag included a little-noticed provision that requires legislators to ratify the action of voters. (AP Photo/Rogelio V. Solis)
Despite a massive vote on Nov. 3 in favor of a new Mississippi state flag that proclaims “In God We Trust,” additional official actions are needed to ensure the death knell for the 126-year-old state flag that features the Confederate battle emblem as part of its design.
During the 2021 legislative session that begins in January, lawmakers must ratify the new state flag approved by voters on Nov. 3. The bill passed this summer — which retired the old flag and formed a commission to recommend a new design (the “In God We Trust” flag) to be approved or rejected by voters on Nov. 3 — included a little-noticed provision that requires legislators to ratify the action of the voters.
That means lawmakers must take at least one more vote on the flag in the rapidly approaching legislative session.
In 2001, during an earlier failed attempt to change the state flag, legislators voted to hold a referendum where the choice would be between the old flag and a new design recommended by a commission. The bill passed by the Legislature that year stated that whatever flag voters approved would be the official flag of the state without any additional action by the Legislature. In 2001, voters overwhelmingly voted to retain the old flag.
But the bill approved this year states that once voters approved the new design, “the Legislature shall enact into law the new design as the official Mississippi state flag.” Of course, the courts have ruled that the word “shall” does not force legislators to do anything they do not want to do.
The vote to change the flag this past summer was a difficult one for many legislators to take, and several lawmakers have taken heat for it in their home districts. That begs the question of why language was put into the bill essentially forcing legislators to take yet another vote on the contentious issue. It seems the easier option would have been to mandate that the vote of the people for a new flag would ratify that banner as official.
As the bill was being crafted in June, concerns were raised about an 1860 Supreme Court case, Alcorn v. Hamer. Some said the ruling in that case could be interpreted to say it was unconstitutional for the Legislature to leave it to a vote of the people to enact general law.
Despite the controversy surrounding replacing the old flag, there is good reason to believe the ratification of the new flag by the Legislature during the 2021 session will be nothing more than a formality and will perhaps happen early in the session.
After all, more Mississippians voted for the new state flag on Nov. 3 than voted for President Donald Trump or U.S. Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith. Heck, more people voted for the new flag than voted for medical marijuana, which also got more votes than Trump and Hyde-Smith.
The only ballot item receiving more votes than the new flag this year was the proposal to change the Constitution to remove the language requiring candidates for statewide office to garner both a majority of the popular votes and to win the most votes in a majority of House districts in order to win the election.
That proposal received 957,420 votes, or 79.2%, in still unofficial returns, while the flag garnered 939,585 vote, or 73.3%. Trump received 756,731 votes, or 57.5%.
Both the electoral provision that was repealed by voters and the old state flag were remnants of the 1890s, when Mississippi’s white power structure took extraordinary steps to deny basic rights to African Americans. The electoral provision was enacted as a method of preventing Black Mississippians, then a majority in the state, from being elected to statewide office.
Placing the Confederate battle emblem on the state’s official flag during the same time period, no doubt, was a way for white lawmakers to pay homage to the Civil War in which Southerners fought to preserve slavery.
Even if the Legislature, as expected, does ratify the new flag in 2021, the controversy may not be quite over. The Let Mississippi Vote political committee plans to try to garner the roughly 100,000 signatures of registered voters needed to place a proposal back on the ballot to allow people to choose between four flags — one being that 126-year-old banner.
Most likely later this month or early next month, the clock will start ticking on the one-year time frame supporters of that ballot initiative will have to gather the signatures to place the flag proposal on the ballot.
Whether Mississippians, who voted overwhelmingly for a new flag on Nov. 3, will want to vote again on the contentious issue remains to be seen.
We are bringing you the latest COVID-19 Mississippi trends with daily case, death and hospitalization updates, as well as testing data charts and other helpful interactive maps and graphs.
This page was last updated Saturday, November 28:
New cases: 1,553| New Deaths: 10
Total Hospitalizations: 1,039
Total cases: 149,940| Total Deaths: 3,779
Mask Mandates | On Sept. 30, Gov. Tate Reeves ended the statewide mask mandate order, originally issued Aug. 4. Since then, he has added a total of 41 individual county mask mandates, covering half of the state. State health officials encourage widespread masking and credit the original mandate with helping cases improve after a steep summer spike. View the full list of COVID-19 orders here.
The seven-day new case average reached 1,294 last week, a 75% increase since the start of November and the highest mark since July 31.
The health department has reported over 9,000 new cases in the last week; a threshold only surpassed by one other week in July.
The number of hospitalizations have also begun to surge in the last month; using the seven-day rolling averages, total hospitalizations have increased by 46% in that time, ICU patients by 39%, and patients on ventilators by 47%.
Though hospitalizations haven’t reached peak July levels, they are growing at a quicker pace than before. On Oct. 3, average total hospitalizations were at their lowest point since the state health department started tracking them. In seven weeks, numbers grew by 85%. The same percent growth took 12 weeks from April to July, heading into the peak.
Overall, the state’s ICUs are 83% full, with COVID-19 patients comprising 31% of all ICU beds. Sixteen of the state’s highest level COVID-care centers are at 88% capacity, and six of them — both Baptist Memorial Hospitals in Southaven and in the Golden Triangle, University of Mississippi Medical Center, Baptist and Merit in Jackson, and the Delta Regional Medical Center in Greenville — have zero ICU beds available.
Within the last three weeks, Mississippi has moved from “orange” to “red” on the Global Health Institute’s risk level tracker, meaning it now averages over 25 daily new cases per 100,000 residents, along with most of the country. Despite the rise in cases in the state, Mississippi now ranks 33rd in new cases per capita, dropping from 26th two weeks ago.
Counties across the state saw large increases in cases over the last week. Winston County (13% increase), Jefferson County (12%), Amite County (12%), Stone County (12%) and Choctaw County (11%) saw the biggest surges in that span.
MSDH reports that 121,637 people have recovered.
Click through the links below to view our interactive charts describing the trends around the coronavirus in Mississippi:
Eric J. Shelton, Mississippi Today/Report For America
Flood waters surround Pleasant Grove Baptist Church in the Goose Lake community of Issaquena Count on April 5, 2019.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers says an updated study and proposal for the flood control project known as the Yazoo Pumps will not have a detrimental effect on South Delta wetlands, while environmental groups and experts fear the project would dry up a valuable ecosystem.
During two straight springs that saw over a half million acres of flooding in the Delta — caused by a combination of heavy rainfall and a rising Mississippi River — residents in the area have organized to appeal for a review of the pumps project, which the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency vetoed funding for in 2008 after concerns that it would dry up wetlands.
Several Mississippi politicians in both parties on the state and federal level, namely Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith, led that recent charge, and last year the EPA agreed to give the project another look.
Specifically, the Corps set out after the 2008 veto to show which water sources sustain the South Delta’s wetlands, which conservationists have called some of the most valuable habitat in the country, especially for migratory birds. After collecting a decade’s worth of groundwater and soil observations, the Corps published a peer-reviewed study showing that 87% of the wetlands are sustained by precipitation, as opposed to the springtime flooding.
Dr. Jacob Berkowitz, a scientist with the Corps and one of the study’s authors, explained that most of the area receives the water necessary for sustaining wetlands from rainfall in the winter, suggesting that the water from the spring flooding could be removed without harming the local ecology.
Eric J. Shelton, Mississippi Today/Report For America
A car is nearly submerged in flood water in Issaquena County Friday, April 5, 2019.
“Even if the pumps operate, they’re not going to convert those areas from wetlands to non-wetlands,” Berkowitz said. “The wetlands have already experienced their natural pattern of hydrology before (the flooding) occurs.”
Yet some experts in the environmental community aren’t as convinced by the new research. Dr. Alex Kolker, of the Louisiana Universities Marine Consortium, said the study lacked modeling of what would happen when the pumps are actually in use.
“I don’t doubt at all that the local rainfall contribution could be extensive,” Kolker told Mississippi Today. “But it doesn’t change my primary concern, which is that over-extensive pumping will lower the water table and dry out the soil.”
After the Corps released its new proposal, which is still in the draft stage, several conservation groups — including American Rivers, Audubon Mississippi, Healthy Gulf, Mississippi River Network and Mississippi Sierra Club — immediately called for the federal government to abandon the project and instead consider alternatives for flood relief.
“This area is home to 17 state and federal threatened and endangered species and is a critical pitstop for migrating fish, birds and wildlife that travel along the Mississippi River Flyway,” said Kelly McGinnis, executive director of the Mississippi River Network. “Losing these wetlands will hurt the entire Mississippi River.”
Earlier this year, American Rivers listed the Big Sunflower River as one of the nation’s most endangered streams because of momentum around the Yazoo Pumps. It also included a list of alternatives — such as voluntary buyouts and elevating structures — that would be cheaper than the pumps, which would likely cost upwards of $300 million.
Eric J. Shelton, Mississippi Today/Report For America
Flood waters surround a property in Issaquena County Friday, April 5, 2019.
The flooded area includes a quarter million acres of farm land — largely crops of soybeans, corn, and cotton — and the last two years Delta farmers have experienced significant financial setbacks, missing entire growing seasons. In a presentation last year, Agriculture and Commerce Commissioner Andy Gipson estimated that the state saw a loss of $500 million worth of crops.
Conservationists who oppose the pumps project argue that the project is more intended to salvage farm revenue rather than to see flood protection for homeowners.
Kolker, the LUMCON professor, added that there are larger issues at play than just the pumps themselves. The Mississippi River is flooding more frequently, a phenomenon most researchers attribute in part to climate change. Others also believe it is due to increased channelization of the river, as well as flood control structures built through the river’s basin such as the Old River Control Structure in Louisiana.
“The hypothesis is that sedimentation just downstream of the Old River Control Structure is causing a change in the slope of the Mississippi River,” Kolker explained, “and that is contributing to increased flooding in this region. That’s one of the pieces I think makes it a bigger picture story than just these pumps. Is (the pump project) a shorter term solution? Is it the right solution?”
For information on submitting a comment to the Corps, click this link.
We are bringing you the latest COVID-19 Mississippi trends with daily case, death and hospitalization updates, as well as testing data charts and other helpful interactive maps and graphs.
This page was last updated Friday, November 27:
New cases: 1,005| New Deaths: 6
Total Hospitalizations: 1,039
Total cases: 148,387| Total Deaths: 3,769
Mask Mandates | On Sept. 30, Gov. Tate Reeves ended the statewide mask mandate order, originally issued Aug. 4. Since then, he has added a total of 41 individual county mask mandates, covering half of the state. State health officials encourage widespread masking and credit the original mandate with helping cases improve after a steep summer spike. View the full list of COVID-19 orders here.
The seven-day new case average reached 1,294 last week, a 75% increase since the start of November and the highest mark since July 31.
The health department has reported over 9,000 new cases in the last week; a threshold only surpassed by one other week in July.
The number of hospitalizations have also begun to surge in the last month; using the seven-day rolling averages, total hospitalizations have increased by 46% in that time, ICU patients by 39%, and patients on ventilators by 47%.
Though hospitalizations haven’t reached peak July levels, they are growing at a quicker pace than before. On Oct. 3, average total hospitalizations were at their lowest point since the state health department started tracking them. In seven weeks, numbers grew by 85%. The same percent growth took 12 weeks from April to July, heading into the peak.
Overall, the state’s ICUs are 83% full, with COVID-19 patients comprising 31% of all ICU beds. Sixteen of the state’s highest level COVID-care centers are at 88% capacity, and six of them — both Baptist Memorial Hospitals in Southaven and in the Golden Triangle, University of Mississippi Medical Center, Baptist and Merit in Jackson, and the Delta Regional Medical Center in Greenville — have zero ICU beds available.
Within the last three weeks, Mississippi has moved from “orange” to “red” on the Global Health Institute’s risk level tracker, meaning it now averages over 25 daily new cases per 100,000 residents, along with most of the country. Despite the rise in cases in the state, Mississippi now ranks 33rd in new cases per capita, dropping from 26th two weeks ago.
Counties across the state saw large increases in cases over the last week. Winston County (13% increase), Jefferson County (12%), Amite County (12%), Stone County (12%) and Choctaw County (11%) saw the biggest surges in that span.
MSDH reports that 121,637 people have recovered.
Click through the links below to view our interactive charts describing the trends around the coronavirus in Mississippi:
Revitalizing Lake Hico and the surrounding area to be a viable economic asset for metro Jackson has been bandied about for years, but dreams of bringing the area back to life have officially come to an end.
Entergy recently closed the power plant there and is draining the lake at the request of the Jackson Public School District. The lake itself exists on 16th Section land which the district leased to Entergy to generate funds for the public school system.
The lake was constructed in the late 1950s to provide cooling ponds for electricity production by the Rex Brown Steam Engine Station of the Mississippi Power & Light Company, now Entergy. Entergy’s lease expired Oct. 31 this year and was not renewed.
Entergy’s Senior Lead Communications Specialist Mara Hartman told Mississippi Today that the Rex Brown Steam Engine Station, located at 1960 W. Northside Drive in Jackson, has reached the end of its useful life. Thelast remaining operating units at the plant were retired in June 2019 after nearly 71 years of service.
“We’re in the process of demolishing the remaining infrastructure of the plant and removing it, with expectations of that to be complete early next year. With the retirement of the plant, the body of water that served as the cooling water facility is no longer needed to provide electricity to the metro area,” Hartman said.
Named for Hinds County, Lake Hico was once home to the Jackson Yacht Club. That all ended in the 1960s at the height of the civil rights movement due to a reluctance to integrate. The yacht club moved its operation to the Ross Barnett Reservoir in Madison County, and the park was closed by the city in 1975.
After a lawsuit by a local resident, the park was reopened in 1985. Recreational use of the main lake remained forbidden. Lake Hico was fenced off from the public with only a smaller, adjacent, same-named park available for picnics, tennis, and basketball.
In September 2020, JPS directed Entergy to drain the lake and breach the levee. The power company owns the surrounding property Rex Brown is located on and will hold on to it “for potential future use,” Hartman said.
JACKSON — Challise Burciaga still remembers early country mornings with her grandmother in Amite County. When Grandma got up at dawn, Burciaga got up too.
The two shared a room so Grandma could keep an eye on her young granddaughter’s breathing. While her sisters slept spread out in bedrooms across the country home, Burciaga was up with the sun and roosters.
But bright summer days on the farm taunted her. While her sisters played outdoors roaming the farmland, Burciaga was stuck inside. As a young child, she developed a bad case of asthma that kept her indoors. All the fun aspects of visiting Grandma’s land instantly became threats to fester her respiratory condition. Grass meant to roll in? A trigger. Dander from the farm animals? A trigger. Dust lurking in the aging barns and play places? A trigger.
The country clinics were not equipped to handle asthma attacks at the time, and she remembers having to carry her bag of medications along everywhere she went. In an emergency, she’d have to treat herself with meds and breathing exercises.
Battling bouts of episodes for years — a few scary ones that landed her in the emergency room — she learned to manage the respiratory condition. She found a pediatrician in her hometown of Vicksburg, never left home without her inhaler and generally learned to navigate the new normal. Her mom worked for the Army Corps of Engineers, so the robust federal health insurance was an asset, helping the family access inhalers, treatments and reliable health care.
After years of learning to manage her asthma despite insurance and job changes — at times, going without or over-extending her inhaler’s shelf life — she feels like she’s backsliding. Over the summer, Burciaga, 38, contracted the coronavirus and says her asthma symptoms haven’t been this bad since childhood.
Ironically though, she thinks her asthma history helped her COVID-19 case — she was able to catch it early and knew how to both manage and treat chest tightness. Her case wasn’t too severe — it started with a headache, then progressed to sinus congestion and chest tightness. She immediately started exercises and home remedies that helped her asthma, and they helped relieve her symptoms.
Knowing her body and particularly her lungs helped, she says. “I’m paying attention to every little symptom that I got. And I think that helped me a lot too. I caught mine really, really early. I could feel it starting,” she said, noting the familiar tightness that creeps up her chest.
She’s recovered now, but worries about the unknown ramifications of COVID-19 on her already weakened respiratory system. She’s not alone — though treatments are improving, research is struggling to keep pace with the novel coronavirus developments and doctors don’t yet know the disease’s long-term effects.
Jackson metro is one of the asthma capitals of the U.S. More people per capita experience complications from the respiratory condition than almost any other city, including regional areas with similar demographics, poverty and environmental conditions — all of which can factor into asthma rates. And of those who have it here, more people die from it than anywhere else in the nation — a worrisome sign that speaks less to the disease itself and more the lacking treatment around it.
Burciaga’s experience is not unique. When it comes to lung conditions specifically, research shows Black Americans are disproportionately high-risk and less likely to get apt care to help manage those conditions. While Black Americans are two times more likely to have asthma, they are three times more likely to die from it. With lung cancer, early diagnosis and treatment is key — but Black Americans are 16% less likely to be diagnosed early, 19% less likely to receive surgical treatment, and 7% more likely to not receive any treatment compared to white Americans, according to a new report from the American Lung Association.
Burciaga teaches high school and has state health insurance, but she hasn’t found a primary care doctor who will reliably prescribe her affordable inhalers on her high-deductible plan. She struggles to find the same for her kids — 12 and 10, who qualify for the state-sponsored Childhood Health Insurance Program, or CHIP — one of whom has asthma and the other has bad allergies.
Vickie D. King/Mississippi Today
Challise Burciaga of Brandon, with daughters Skye Brittain, 10 (left) and Sania Brittain, 12, and their 4-year-old Yorkie terrier Rudy. Burciaga is a survivor of COVID-19.
Though she says she manages alright on a limited budget as a single mom, she doesn’t feel like she has a financial or medical safety net in an emergency. COVID-19 reminded her of that, as she rode it out at home, sticking to home remedies learned from decades of managing asthma.
Early disparities in COVID-19’s toll on Black Americans has highlighted a stark gap that has long festered in pulmonary care in the U.S. Though the disparities have lessened over time as more white people contracted the coronavirus, Black Mississippians — Black women in particular — still bear the brunt of COVID-19 spread overall. While Black and white women have both seen about 26,000 cases where race is known, because there are fewer Black women, their share of cases is disproportionate. Nearly 5% of Black women in Mississippi have tested positive, compared to 3% of white women.
Lung cancer and chronic lower respiratory diseases like asthma, emphysema and COPD not only are more common in Mississippi, they also kill at higher rates here — meaning health care workers devoted to caring for lung conditions are spread thin against worse cases.
As a stop-gap between pulmonologists and daily treatments, the role of respiratory therapists has been spotlighted during the pandemic. But there aren’t enough of them to go around, and hospitals worry their scarcity will soon limit the specialty treatment needed for severe COVID-19 cases as spread surges across the country. As of late October, there is about one respiratory therapist for every 100 COVID-19 cases in Mississippi — one of the largest ratios in the U.S. and double the nation’s average caseload, according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Respiratory therapists manually do what your body can’t when breathing is obstructed, whether from a trauma injury that blocks airflow or when a disease, like COVID-19, attacks the lungs’ ability to breathe on their own. They work every unit in the hospital, manually breathing either through “bagging the patient” by pumping air from a handheld pump into their lungs, or making sure the ventilator and intubation tubes are working at proper speeds.
Allasica Byrd, a respiratory therapist from Clarksdale says despite being the safety net for hospitals’ response to the pandemic, she and her colleagues aren’t paid or respected enough — and they’re burning out, something echoed by hospitals across the nation and in Mississippi. “People didn’t realize how important respiratory therapists are until pandemics and crises hit,” she said. “It’s a bad shortage in it. And they’re overworking us and they’re not paying (enough).”
Respiratory therapist Allasica Byrd, 33, at her Clarksdale vintage store and event space, The Delta Byrd. Owning a local business and community space helps keep her motivated and positive, she says, despite the constant stress of working the frontlines of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“We’re the ones running around saving and keeping everybody together. We’re the peanut butter in between the bread to keep everything together,” Byrd said. “I have to breathe for you – I got to know what I’m doing when I’m breathing for you.”
Mississippi has the lowest paid respiratory therapists in the nation. And though the state does have one of the densest number of respiratory therapists per 1,000 jobs and per capita, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Mississippi also has one of the highest rates of and deaths to lung conditions per capita. Essentially the state has more of the lung specialists, but they’re in higher demand and have larger case loads because of the level of need.
The year has piled on challenges for practitioners and patients who are paying attention to public health factors: spotlighted respiratory disparities with COVID-19; ongoing challenges for patient access to care that’s exacerbated by health care worker shortages; and efforts to tackle institutional racism and bias in health care, sparked by renewed focus on the Black Lives Matter movement after white police officers killed George Floyd, an unarmed Black man, in May.
With all these factors in mind, the American College of Chest Physicians recently launched a new effort — listening. Their virtual Listening Tour launched September in Jackson, where one in seven residents have a chronic lung condition — 57 times the nation’s average. The tour, put on through the group’s philanthropy arm the Chest Foundation, brought together patients, like Burciaga, caregivers, community leaders, and providers to frankly identify real-world barriers that keep Jackson’s lung conditions so prevalent and chronic.
Providers participating in the new listening effort said starting in Jackson means acknowledging that robust access to care has historically fallen along racial and class lines, and addressing it will need an intersectional approach. But they too said, health care needs to get back to the basics of treating people, not just their disease.
“We have a health issue here in Mississippi but we have a bigger heart issue here in Mississippi. It’s not about Black and white, it’s not about insured versus uninsured, it’s not about low class versus high class, it’s just about humanity and dignity,” said Dr. Justin Turner, an internist in Jackson.
Jackson is a microcosm of barriers to accessing care, but in the hub of the state’s medical system. If each of the 26 practicing pulmonologists in Jackson, the densest physician population in the state, took an even share of all the patients with lung conditions, they’d have more than 1,600 patients each. Too, 16% of residents are uninsured, so finding specialty care is not the only problem — it’s paying for it.
The first stop on the new tour identified three major barriers to overall lung health in Jackson — all anecdotal, but also reflected in research: access to care and treatment, such as un- or under-insurance rates, high deductibles and medication cost; equity imbalance, like few Black doctors and health disparities; and lacking trust in the system.
Based on their report from the tour, the foundation is recommending actions across the pulmonology field, including: teach providers to ensure patients can afford medication when they prescribe it and keep up with the prescriptions; ensure easily accessible information about doctors who accept low-income health insurance; educate providers to identify and understand barriers to access; and, raise awareness of local resources to help address social determinants of health that exacerbate disparities.
Public health advocates have long-agreed that social determinants of health, like living in poverty, low levels of education and inability to meet basic needs like food and shelter are often the missing building blocks when it comes to overall wellness. And too often, it’s lacking the proper health insurance to cover surprise medical costs.
For Burciaga, she hopes sharing her story can help others learn about lung health and the disparities endemic to accessing care.
Vickie D. King/Mississippi Today
“I’m feeling fine now,” said Challise Burciaga in her Brandon home with dog Rudy, 4 and daughters Sania, 12 and Skye, 10. Burciaga recovered from COVID-19.
“As far as healthcare goes, I really wish it wasn’t such a political game,” she said. “That’s what’s so frustrating, is that they (lawmakers) use healthcare as a pawn in their game, but they’re not really even taking into consideration how it really affects people’s lives and how much some people really depend on it. It’s sad that the United States being what it’s supposed to be — the reputation of what it should be and is supposed to be — is so far from what it really is.”
I hope you and your family have a safe and wonderful Thanksgiving. I am very thankful for you, for reading my work and for your support of Mississippi Today. 2020 has been a challenge for many of us, but we’re making it through together. On behalf of my family at Mississippi Today, we wish you the best — and say thank you.
We are bringing you the latest COVID-19 Mississippi trends with daily case, death and hospitalization updates, as well as testing data charts and other helpful interactive maps and graphs.
This page was last updated Thursday, November 26:
New cases: 1,746| New Deaths: 18
Total Hospitalizations: 1,039
Total cases: 147,382| Total Deaths: 3,763
Mask Mandates | On Sept. 30, Gov. Tate Reeves ended the statewide mask mandate order, originally issued Aug. 4. Since then, he has added a total of 41 individual county mask mandates, covering half of the state. State health officials encourage widespread masking and credit the original mandate with helping cases improve after a steep summer spike. View the full list of COVID-19 orders here.
The seven-day new case average reached 1,294 last week, a 75% increase since the start of November and the highest mark since July 31.
The health department has reported over 9,000 new cases in the last week; a threshold only surpassed by one other week in July.
The number of hospitalizations have also begun to surge in the last month; using the seven-day rolling averages, total hospitalizations have increased by 46% in that time, ICU patients by 39%, and patients on ventilators by 47%.
Though hospitalizations haven’t reached peak July levels, they are growing at a quicker pace than before. On Oct. 3, average total hospitalizations were at their lowest point since the state health department started tracking them. In seven weeks, numbers grew by 85%. The same percent growth took 12 weeks from April to July, heading into the peak.
Overall, the state’s ICUs are 83% full, with COVID-19 patients comprising 31% of all ICU beds. Sixteen of the state’s highest level COVID-care centers are at 88% capacity, and six of them — both Baptist Memorial Hospitals in Southaven and in the Golden Triangle, University of Mississippi Medical Center, Baptist and Merit in Jackson, and the Delta Regional Medical Center in Greenville — have zero ICU beds available.
Within the last three weeks, Mississippi has moved from “orange” to “red” on the Global Health Institute’s risk level tracker, meaning it now averages over 25 daily new cases per 100,000 residents, along with most of the country. Despite the rise in cases in the state, Mississippi now ranks 33rd in new cases per capita, dropping from 26th two weeks ago.
Counties across the state saw large increases in cases over the last week. Winston County (13% increase), Jefferson County (12%), Amite County (12%), Stone County (12%) and Choctaw County (11%) saw the biggest surges in that span.
MSDH reports that 121,637 people have recovered.
Click through the links below to view our interactive charts describing the trends around the coronavirus in Mississippi:
James Meredith announces future plans to open the James Meredith Museum and Bible Society , located at 217 W. Griffith Street in Jackson, on Nov. 25, 2020.
Author and civil rights activist James Meredith announced plans Wednesday to open a museum that will chronicle his life’s accomplishments, house an archival library and provide a sanctuary for those wanting to study the Bible.
The project, announced at a press conference, fulfills a continuing dream of Meredith’s to “help uplift the moral character of families and to build leadership skills in kids,” Meredith said. He said the museum is slated to open in late 2021. The museum will be located at 217 W. Griffith Street in Jackson.
Vickie D. King/Mississippi Today
James Meredith at the site of his future museum and Bible Society Mission, located at 217 W. Griffith Street in Jackson.
Meredith said the museum is a multi-million dollar project, and the nonprofit the museum will operate under, the James H. Meredith Interpretive Center and Bible Society, is currently accepting donations.
Meredith became a household name when he integrated the University of Mississippi in 1962. He went on to attend law school at Columbia University in 1968 and remained active in the civil rights movement, including organizing the March Against Fear in 1966 when he was shot attempting to walk from Memphis to Jackson to encourage voter registration. He is also the author of several books.
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