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Cases of COVID-19 in Mower County have taken a jump upwards since March 19 as reflected in the Minnesota Department of Health’s daily update Friday.

Cases in the county rose from 87 on Thursday to 112 cases today. It is a stunning rise in cases since the beginning of the week, when there were 64 cases reported in the county on Monday.

According to Mower County Health and Human Service Division Director Pam Kellogg, the new cases range in age from 11 to early 70s.

“We see a lot of illness spreading within households or with those who carpool and are in close quarters,” she said.

No updates were available for the number of hospitalized Mower County residents or how many are out of isolation.

To date, there have been 19,005 confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the state of Minnesota since March 6, with 813 new cases reported in Friday’s report.

The death count from the coronavirus rose to 842 after 33 new deaths were added to the statewide number. Earlier this week, Mower reported its first death of a resident from COVID-19. The man was in his 80s and had other underlying health conditions, the county reported.

Currently, there are 534 people that are hospitalized with 233 requiring ICU treatment.

A large number of cases in the state according to the MDH have been between the ages of 30-39 (3,633).

In those counties next to Austin, Freeborn now has 76 cases, Fillmore 17, Olmsted 525, and Steele 134.