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FRANKLIN

Contrary to a previous report, there is currently no outbreak of COVID-19 at Village at Woods Edge in Franklin. This has been affirmed by both the Virginia Department of Health and the retirement community’s executive director, Billie Turner.

In “COVID-19 cases trending slightly down,” which was published on Aug. 19, the article stated that there was an outbreak in progress then at The Village at Manor Care assisted living facility in Franklin.

There is no such facility by that name in this city.

When this was brought to the attention of the VDH, district epidemiologist Amal Patel replied via email, “This was an inadvertent mistake. There are two places to put the name of the facility in our outbreak reporting system. In one, you manually type in the name. In the other, there is a drop down list to select the facility. It is the drop down list that is displayed on the LTC outbreak dashboard. In this case, both facility names are next to each other in the dropdown list and the wrong one was picked. The reporting system has been updated.”

Patel said that the outbreak report is in the process of being closed, and added, “The data and other information entered into the outbreak report has to be finalized before we close the outbreak report.”

Turner made this statement, “The Village at Woods Edge’s Assisted Living is no longer experiencing any further cases of COVID-19 associated with the June 23, 2020, declared COVID-19 outbreak (as defined by the Virginia Department of Health as two or more individuals testing positive for the virus). The Village continues to report to the Virginia Department of Health and has requested the outbreak to be re-evaluated for outbreak closure.”