HIDALGO COUNTY, Texas – Texas set a one-day record for deaths and hospitalizations Wednesday afternoon, and one Texas county is enforcing a stay-home order after bodies are being stored in refrigerated trucks, Reuters reported.
The state saw 197 deaths and 10,893 hospitalizations Wednesday, becoming one of the hardest states hit by COVID-19. Hidalgo County, located in south Texas, has seen a sharp rise in cases in the last week, according to Reuters.
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Hidalgo County’s top health official, Dr. Ivan Melendez partly blamed Gov. Greg Abbott’s move to override local mandates for the spike in COVID-19 cases, which has overwhelmed the hospital system. He told Reuters that a stay-home order “is absolutely necessary at this point.”
Hidalgo County Judge Richard Cortez issued a shelter-in-place order, which placed him at odds with Gov. Abbott. He told Reuters that crematoriums have a wait list of two weeks, and with five refrigerated trucks in the county, they have a capacity of 50 bodies each.
“We’ve got to lasso this virus, this stallion, bring the numbers back down and get control of this thing,” Cortez told Reuters. “Because our hospitals – they’re war zones, they are really struggling right now.”
The U.S. topped 1,000 deaths in a single day for the first time since June. Texas, along with California and Florida remain the top three states where coronavirus cases are rising, Reuters reported.