SLIDELL, La. — A 63-year-old Mississippi resident being treated for COVID-19 in St. Tammany Parish has died, the parish coroner says.
According to St. Tammany Coroner Dr. Charles Preston, Howard Pickens, a Waveland, MS resident, died of respiratory failure Thursday after being hospitalized for the new coronavirus at Ochsner Northshore in Slidell on March 13.
Pickens had an underlying medical condition that made him more vulnerable to complications from COVID-19, Preston said. He's the first person to pass away from the virus in St. Tammany Parish.
There are now 11 people dead in Louisiana from the new coronavirus. Eight were from New Orleans, one was from Jefferson Parish, one from St. James Parish and now one from St. Tammany Parish.
There have already been 392 positive cases of COVID-19 in the state as of Friday morning, including at least 249 cases in Orleans Parish and 69 cases in Jefferson Parish.
There are 10 total reported COVID-19 cases in St. Tammany Parish.
"We offer our condolences to Mr. Pickens' family in this tragic time," Preston said. "Let this case be a reminder that no community is immune to this illness, and that we all must take full precautions no matter how we're feeling and no matter our presumed risk of exposure. Hand-washing, coughing into one's arm, maintaining social distance and avoiding gatherings are essential to flattening the curve of COVID-19's spread."
Gov. John Bel Edwards said Thursday that Louisiana is on pace to meet a "worst-case scenario" in which coronavirus cases outpace the state's healthcare capacity as early as next week.
"Our trajectory is basically the same as what they had in Italy," Edwards said at a Thursday news conference following a phone call with President Donald Trump and other governors.
During that call, Edwards told Trump that forecast models had predicted that cases of COVID-19 could outpace the healthcare capacity in the New Orleans - Jefferson Parish area in seven to ten days without additional support from the federal government.
Thursday, Italy became the country with the most coronavirus-related deaths, surpassing China by registering 3,405 dead. Italy's healthcare system has been overwhelmed by the virus and on Thursday a visiting Chinese Red Cross team criticized the failure of Italians to fully quarantine and take the national lockdown seriously. Overall, Italy has recorded 41,035 infections, more than half of the world's positive cases.
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