The Department of Energy’s Portsmouth Site in Pike County, Ohio, which as of last month was the last nuclear cleanup property with indoor mask restrictions, no longer has a high local transmission rate for COVID-19.
The transmission rate in the county surrounding the former gaseous diffusion plant is now medium, according to figures updated Friday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) website.
As of late September, Pike County had a high transmission rate, according to the data reported to CDC. Under DOE guidelines, sites in localities with high transmission rates for the illness, which has killed more than 1 million Americans, had to impose mandatory mask-wearing indoors.
A Monday morning scan of other DOE cleanup sites turned up no other DOE nuclear cleanup host counties with high transmission rates. The agency said last month that due to diminishing case numbers it was suspending reporting of weekly infections across the weapons complex.