COVID-19 kills three more in region nursing homes.

Increase in cases a result of more tests in nursing homes

The Capital Region recorded five more deaths from the novel coronavirus on Friday, including three among residents of long-term care facilities.

Albany County experienced three new deaths in total overnight Friday — two men in their 70s, including one who was a resident of the county-run Shaker Place nursing home in Colonie, and a woman in her 80s.

The county saw a notable jump in the number of residents testing positive for COVID-19 in recent days. As of Friday, the number of known cases to date had climbed to 1,151, with 578 of them since recovered.

A large portion of the new cases this week were a result of aggressive testing at nursing homes and long-term care facilities in the county, said County Health Commissioner Elizabeth Whalen. Testing in those facilities is finding more asymptomatic cases, often at a higher rate than expected, she said.

“We know these agencies are doing their best but we know again that this is a highly contagious disease,” she said.

Shaker Place has had 46 residents and 25 employees test positive for the virus at this point, but other large outbreaks in the county have been detected at Our Lady of Mercy Life Center and Grand Rehabilitation and Nursing in Guilderland, and Teresian

House and Hudson Park Rehabilitation and Nursing in Albany.

Rensselaer County had another death at the Diamond Hill nursing home in Schaghticoke on Friday. That, along with the Thursday night death of Troy Police Sgt. Randall French, brought the county’s known death toll from the virus to 20.

On Friday, County Executive Steve Mclaughlin wrote a letter to state health commissioner Howard Zucker requesting that all residents of the Diamond Hill facility with a known case of COVID-19 be transferred to a hospital “or other appropriate medical facility.”

Twelve of the facility’s residents have died from the disease so far, and a total of 25 residents and 12 staff have tested positive for the novel coronavirus.

“We believe the situation at Diamond Hill is continuing to worsen,” he wrote. “We are asking the state, which supervises adult care facilities like Diamond Hill, to step in and get these residents to a safer place. We have gotten many, many calls about Diamond Hill since the outbreak started. The county first contacted the state several weeks ago. Our concern has only grown since then.”

Warren County officials also reported a death connected to a long-term care facility on Friday.

The person who died was a resident of an assisted living facility in the southern part of the county and succumbed to the virus while hospitalized, the county said. It did not offer other details.

Of that county’s 14 deaths to date, seven have occurred within the walls of a nursing home, five have occurred at a hospital, one has occurred at an assisted living facility and one has occurred within a private residence.

Meanwhile, Rensselaer County officials announced Friday that they are partnering with IMA Group, Labcorp and Whitney M. Young, Jr. Health Center to bring the first COVID-19 testing sites to the county next week.

One site will be stationary. The others will rotate on a weekly basis, as part of an effort to increase testing access across the county. The stationary site will be set up at Hudson Valley Community College in Troy with the help of IMA Group, a Tarrytownbased firm that provides employment-related services, and Labcorp, which provides laboratory testing of potential COVID-19 samples, county officials said.

County Executive Steve Mclaughlin said Friday that an official opening date has not yet been set for the site, but that it will likely occur mid-next week. Test kits for the site were on their way Friday, he said during a Facebook Live update.

Testing at the site will be available by appointment only. A phone number will be set up for individuals to call and be screened for symptoms first, at which point they may be given an appointment. Health care workers and first responders will be prioritized in the first few days, Mclaughlin said.

The county has also partnered with Whitney Young to bring mobile, walk-up testing to parts of the county next week. That testing operation will be by appointment only, and will rotate locations and hours based on need and demand. Next week, it will be in Troy on Tuesday, Rensselaer on Thursday and Lansingburgh on Friday. (See locations/hours in box with this story.)

Details of the Whitney Young sites in Rensselaer County were initially released Friday by Albany County, which partnered with Whitney Young several weeks ago to open mobile test sites in underserved neighborhoods throughout the county. In a news release containing next week’s testing schedule, County Executive Dan Mccoy’s office said the county had “expanded our partnership and testing is taking a regional approach to address additional areas.”

Mclaughlin said Friday that plans for the testing sites came together “pretty quickly.” A frequent critic of Gov. Andrew Cuomo, he has chided the state for weeks now for its “failure” to send enough test kits to the county that would enable a test site to open.

New cases, deaths in the Capital Region

As of Friday, 3,183 residents in the 11-county Capital District had tested positive for COVID-19 since the global pandemic began. Nearly 150 have died.

Five more deaths were recorded in the region on Friday — three in Albany County, two in Rensselaer County and one in Warren County. Three of the five new deaths were tied to long-term care facilities.

Below are the known cases, hospitalizations, recoveries and deaths from COVID-19 broken down by county:

■ Albany — 1,151 cases, 33 hospitalized, 8 in ICU, 578 recovered, 44 deaths

■ Columbia — 210 cases, 14 hospitalized, 6 in ICU, 94 recovered, 13 deaths

■ Fulton — 75 cases, 3 deaths

■ Greene — 155 cases, 51 active, 104 resolved, 7 hospitalized, 5 deaths

■ Montgomery — 54 cases, 35 recovered, 2 under medical care, 1 death

■ Rensselaer — 320 cases, 170 recovered, 6 hospitalized, 1 in ICU, 20 deaths

■ Saratoga — 355 cases, 11 hospitalized, 393* recoveries, 14 deaths

■ Schenectady — 495 cases, 19** hospitalized, 336 recoveries, 27 deaths

■ Schoharie — 40 cases, 8 hospitalized, 35 recovered, 1 death

■ Warren — 172 cases, 3 hospitalized, 103 recovered, 14 deaths

■ Washington — 156 cases, 71 recovered, 6 deaths

*as of April 29, includes recoveries from presumed and confirmed COVID-19 **includes all hospitalizations in county, regardless of patient’s county of residence