As of Thursday, July 23, 2020, Montana reports 2,910 confirmed COVID-19 cases, with 97 new cases reported in the last day: 30 new cases in Gallatin County, 25 in Yellowstone County, 10 in Flathead County, 5 in Lewis & Clark County, 4 in Beaverhead, Missoula, and in Madison County, 3 in Big Horn County, 2 in Deer Lodge, Lincoln, and in Sanders County, and 1 in each of Blaine, Jefferson, Park, Powder River, Roosevelt, and Valley Counties. Statewide, 183 people have been hospitalized, and 54 people are currently being treated in the hospital for COVID-19. Yellowstone County has had 780 cases so far. Gallatin County has 695 coronavirus cases so far. The most active cases are in Yellowstone County, with 505 active cases. 423 eople have died in Montana of COVID-19. Nationwide, more than 145,000 Americans have died.

More than four million people in the U.S. are now known to have been infected with the coronavirus, and it’s suspected that two to three times as many have been infected whose cases haven’t been tested or reported. And it’s not just cases that are rising. The numbers of hospitalizations and deaths reported in the U.S. each day have also been increasing. Cases are trending upward in 39 states, as well as Washington, D.C., Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands, and are decreasing in only two.

A resident in Bozeman’s Hillcrest Senior Living facility has tested positive for coronavirus. Hillcrest is a branch of Bozeman Health. The senior living facility is a retirement community where residents can come and go. The resident contracted COVID-19 outside of the living facility. There’s no indication of transmission or spread within Hillcrest at this time. Hillcrest has the safety precautions it implemented at the beginning of the pandemic, including mask protocols, visitor restrictions and no dining together. The facility has suspended all communal activities and beauty shop services. Officials at Hillcrest are screening staff and residents for symptoms and checking their temperatures. However, the facility is only testing staff and residents who show symptoms of the virus.

In the past two weeks, thirteen residents out of 55 have died at Canyon Creek memory care nursing home in Billings in connection with an outbreak of COVID-19 at that senior care facility. In addition to the 13 Canyon Creek deaths, a resident of MorningStar Senior Living in Billings who had COVID-19 also died within the last two weeks.

13 Catholic nuns in a convent outside Detroit died of COVID-19, with 12 dying in one month, beginning on Good Friday. They were members of the Felician Sisters convent in Livonia, outside of Detroit, and ranged in age from 69 to 99. A 13th sister initially survived the virus but passed away from its effects in June. At the beginning of the pandemic in March, the convent, like other long-term housing residences, implemented a no-visitors rule and placed restrictions on group activities to help curb the spread of the virus. But the virus spread through the convent and on Good Friday, April 10, came the first death. At least 30 of 50 sisters in Livonia were infected with the virus and 17 recovered.