Dr. Adi Pour, the director of the Douglas County Health Department, said the local community has capacity available for a rise in COVID-19 cases.

As of Friday afternoon, Omaha had 632 hospital beds, with 53% of them open, and 366 ventilators, with three taken by COVID-19 patients and 89 by others. “We have quite a capacity of ventilators in this community,” Pour said.

A dry, persistent cough has been the most common symptom of COVID-19 reported in the Omaha community, Pour said. Only about half of people reported a fever, and one in four say they lost their sense of taste or smell. “A fever is not as necessary as we thought in the beginning,” Pour said.

– Scott Stewart