As of Monday, July 27, 2020, Montana reports 3,381 confirmed COVID-19 cases, with 41 new cases reported in the last day: 22 new cases in Yellowstone County, 9 in Big Horn County, 7 in Gallatin County, and 1 in each of Cascade, Lake, and Lewis & Clark Counties. Statewide, 201 people have been hospitalized, and 61 people are currently being treated in the hospital for COVID-19. Yellowstone County has had 893 cases so far. Gallatin County has had 774 total cases so far. Montana has 1,244 active cases of COVID-19. The most active cases are in Yellowstone County, with 483. Gallatin County has 108 active cases. 47 people have died in Montana of COVID-19. Nationwide, more than 149,000 Americans have died.

In Wolf Point, Montana, the Roosevelt County Health Department has closed after an employee contracted COVID-19. No one is in the office to answer phones so messages will take time to be answered. The health department also notified residents that if they have concerns about their health or possible exposure to the virus they should contact their personal health care provider. Roosevelt County currently has a total of 9 coronavirus cases and has one active case.

Google will keep its 200,000 full-time and contract employees home until at least next July, 2021, to keep them from workplaces where they could be more easily exposed to the coronavirus. The policy makes the search-engine giant the first major U.S. corporation to formalize such an extended timetable in the face of the coronavirus pandemic.

Target joins Walmart in staying closed for Thanksgiving this year, sidestepping a recent tradition of keeping stores open for customers to bargain hunt after their turkey dinners. “This isn’t a year for crowds,” the retailer said in a blog post on its website. Target also said it will be making more than 20,000 items, including fresh and frozen food, available for curbside pickup and delivery ahead of the holidays.

A Texas man died of COVID-19 after a visit by his granddaughter, who was infected at a party. Before she was symptomatic, she visited her 80-year-old grandparents and they got sick. When the granddaughter got sick she was treated in the hospital’s intensive care unit, where she was put into a medically induced coma and was given a ventilator to help her breathe. Ten days later the young patient was conscious again, only to find out that her grandfather had also been put into intensive care and had died the previous day. When patients are placed on a ventilator they are at a crisis point in their illness. Experts predict that around 40% and 50% of patients die after going on ventilation, regardless of how healthy they may be before they contracted the virus.

In Montana, a cluster of coronavirus illnesses involving a college sports team and their friends in Montana included 20 cases and 80 contacts in one county alone. The cluster was then later connected to additional cases in three other counties, by way of a wedding and other social events that people attended while infectious. The majority of cases were in younger individuals. The cluster is not as simple as one specific event, but a combination of several events (including football practices) and other gatherings where transmissions occurred. 20 cases were positive COVID-19 cases, not antibody tests, and preliminary info showed that two people were asymptomatic. The other 18 suffered symptoms, but no hospitalizations resulted from the cluster.