The county’s first death from COVID-19 complications was a 79-year-old woman who died Monday and was among 65 confirmed positive cases at the Hennessey Nursing and Rehabilitation Center.

The woman was among seven nursing home residents hospitalized with complications from the disease out of a total of 25 residents who tested positive.

Center Administrator Jill Vincent also confirmed Monday that 40 of the center’s 55 staff members also have tested positive for COVID-19 and have been removed from the work schedule to self-quarantine.

The other residents who tested positive remain at the nursing home and additional staff have been hired through an agency to fill in during the 14-day quarantine period.

Vincent said the state will retest staff members sometime this week.

Hennessey Public Schools Superintendent Dr. Mike Woods said Monday that at least two students have tested positive for COVID-19.

He issued a statement that suggests that one or more staff members may also have tested positive.

“HPS will make a general announcement via the all call system identifying if the individual is a student or staff member and which site,” his statement read. “We will only contact students and staff considered to be a close contact, that is someone that is within six feet for 15 continuous minutes of someone with a positive COVID-19 test result.”

Woods also wrote in the statement that due to changing CDC guidelines, “a negative COVID-19 test for a student or staff member considered a close contact will not be accepted to return to school, the student or staff must remain quarantined the entire 14 days.”

The county’s first COVID-related death was confirmed by Vincent on Monday but had not shown up in the Oklahoma State Health Department’s daily situation update as of the latest report on Tuesday.

Hennessey has become a hot spot in a surge of positive cases within the county.

The county’s total confirmed cases had jumped to 238, with 112 of those reported within the Hennessey zip code.

The health department data also showed 84 currently active cases, with 66 of those reported in Hennessey, 13 in Kingfisher and three each in Dover and Okarche.

A total of 16 cases has been reported within the Cashion zip code since the start of the pandemic, but none were listed as recovered in Tuesday’s data.

In the most recent White House coronavirus report for the state for the week ending Aug. 16, Kingfisher was listed as a “red” county.

A different ranking system from the state health department’s alert color code, the national definition of a red county is one with more than 100 new cases per 100,000 in population reported over the previous week and positive test results of over 10%.

Statewide, Oklahoma was ranked in the red zone for new cases and the yellow zone for test positivity (between 5-10%) over the same time period, according to the White House report.