As of Tuesday, February 9, 2021, Montana reports 96,288 confirmed COVID-19 cases, with 383 new cases reported in the last day: 75 in Cascade County, 51 in Gallatin County, 50 in Yellowstone County, 39 in Flathead County, 33 in Lewis & Clark County, and more new cases in 30 more Montana counties. The number of active coronavirus cases in Montana is 3,189. Statewide, 4,374 people have been hospitalized. Currently, 102 people are being treated in Montana hospitals for COVID-19. The most active cases are in Yellowstone, Flathead, Cascade, and Gallatin Counties. 1,315 people have died in Montana of COVID-19. Nationwide, more than 465,000 Americans have died of COVID-19. There have been 27,100,000 cases of coronavirus in the US, and counting.

It is “extremely unlikely” that the coronavirus leaked from a lab in the Chinese city of Wuhan, where Covid-19 first emerged, according to the head of a team of experts that on Tuesday released the first details of its fact-finding mission into the virus’s origins. Dr. Peter Ben Embarek from the World Health Organization said it is more likely that the virus had jumped to humans from an animal. Coronavirus now claimed more than 2.3 million lives worldwide. Dr. Ben Embarek said, “Our initial findings suggest that the introduction through an intermediary host species is the most likely pathway and one that will require more studies and more specific targeted research.”

Efforts to revise state laws related to the COVID-19 pandemic are moving forward in the Montana Legislature. Several bills that would give the state Legislature additional power during emergencies and that would shift authority from local health boards and officers to local elected officials have passed out of committee. The effort to revise law related to emergency powers and public health comes as some businesses, individuals and political groups have criticized health boards, saying they’re not accountable to the people and have too much power. Public health and health care experts have pushed back on this claim, saying the boards are accountable to the public because they are appointed by elected officials and, unlike some elected officials, have the expertise necessary to make decisions on topics like wastewater treatment and infectious diseases. So far, there are five proposals for shifting power from local health boards to local elected officials.

Bozeman School District’s two middle schools have wrapped up their first full week of in-person learning since schools went remote at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic last March. The middle schools joined the elementary and high schools in expanding in-person learning on Monday, marking the first week the district has had all of its schools in four or five days of in-person learning a week. Elementary schools were the first in the district to move back to five days of in-person learning in November of last year. The district’s two high schools transitioned to a 4-plus-1 model, or four days of in person and one day of remote learning on Jan. 27. As of Friday, there was one COVID-19 active case in Bozeman High School and one in Gallatin High School. Sacajawea has 719 students attending in-person learning and 118 students who enrolled in the Bozeman Online School.

A western Montana man is suspected of shooting his two young sons, killing one, before fatally shooting himself, Mineral County officials said. A woman called 911 just before 5 p.m. Saturday to say she’d come home from work and found her son and two grandchildren had been shot, sheriff’s office said. Responding officers found Anthony Dascher, 37, and a 7 -year-old boy dead and a 4-year-old boy with a gunshot wound, said Sheriff Mike Toth. The 4-year-old was taken to the hospital in Missoula and then air lifted to a hospital in Spokane, Washington, where he is on life support.