Coronavirus
It’s been a long year for doctors, too, since COVID arrived in La Crosse
One year after La Crosse County got its first case of COVID-19, even local doctors feel as if time has slowed down.
“It’s hard to remember back to where we didn’t wear masks and that we didn’t have some of our procedures in place,” Dr. Kevin Fitzgerald, a physician in outpatient practice with Mayo in La Crosse, said.
Fitzgerald thinks some medical practices put in place for COVID, such as wearing masks, could become standard after the pandemic is over. He notes that dentists have changed some hygienic practices over the years.
La Crosse County recorded its first two cases of COVID-19 on March 18, 2020. Since then, 80 deaths in the county have been attributed to the virus, and 13,000 county residents have been infected.
Here’s the number of deaths of La Crosse County residents by month and their ages:
| MONTH | TOTAL | AGE | TOTAL |
| July | 1 | 40s | 1 |
| August | 1 | 50s | 2 |
| Sept. | 4 | 60s | 9 |
| Oct. | 18 | 70s | 14 |
| Nov. | 16 | 80+ | 54 |
| Dec. | 25 | TOTAL | 80 |
| Jan. | 11 | ||
| Feb. | 4 | ||
| TOTAL | 80 |
Fitzgerald said Mayo and others have done “remarkably well” in arranging testing and getting vaccines developed in a short time, but he believes it’s still not time for everybody to let down their guard.
He says doctors and government leaders figured out pretty quickly that shutting down society wasn’t going to make the virus go away, so they made adjustments to everyday routines.
