TOLEDO, Ohio — While cases of coronavirus are spiking around the country, Lucas County is managing well with total cases.
This week, the county registered one of the lowest daily increases with just six new cases Thursday.
But Toledo-Lucas County health commissioner Eric Zgodzinski stressed now is not the time to let up.
It's been nearly seven months since the World Health Organization declared the coronavirus outbreak a pandemic and the United States declared a state of emergency.
In that time, we've seen cases go up and down here in Lucas County. But this Thursday, the county registered the lowest single-day increase since June 23, with just six new cases.
"We want to continue to drive these numbers down so that, I will call it manageable," Zgodzinski said. "What do I mean by manageable? Manageable means again we're not taxing any one system."
The goal from the beginning was to flatten the curve. There was a brief spike in cases after the Fourth of July holiday. But numbers started to trend downward after mask mandates were put into effect, locally on July 13 and statewide on July 23.
"Yeah, that doesn't surprise me at all," community member Matthew Hutcherson said of the mask mandates. "That makes very logical sense."
Hutcherson, who works in healthcare in Toledo, said the local response has mostly been good.
"I certainly think things kind of opened up a little earlier than they should have," he added, "but there has to be that balancing I guess."
Zgodzinski said masks, social distancing and avoiding mass gatherings are all working but we can't stop being vigilant.
"Every time we get low numbers we get the sense that hey we're ok," he said. "Let's go ahead and do more things. Again, we can't have that attitude or do that thinking because then what happens is we drive those numbers back up."
President Donald Trump and the First Lady tested positive for the virus Friday.
"His interactions with just the general population are obviously very limited," Hutcherson said. "Even though he's holding all these rallies he's far off on the stage compared to everyone, so, come on."
Health experts noted it's a sobering reminder for everyone that even the President of the United States is not immune to the coronavirus.