COVID-19 Cases Continue Climbing

New Record of 280 Patients Hospitalized for COVID

According to the Hamilton County Health Department, on Tuesday, Aug. 31, there were a record 280 people hospitalized in the county for COVID-19. Seventy-two people were in area hospital Intensive Care Units, a decline of five over the previous day.

On Tuesday, 457 new cases of COVID were reported, statistics showed. The total number of people who have contracted the virus since the beginning of the pandemic now stands at 54,814. One more death was recorded on Tuesday, bringing the total number of people who have died to 555.

There have been 3,263 cases reported in East Ridge since the beginning of the pandemic. The current number of cases stood at 193.

About Dick Cook

Dick Cook has lived in East Ridge since the Kennedy Administration when his parents bought a house on Marietta Street. Dick graduated from ERHS in 1976 before going on to the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga where he studied Political Science. Dick worked for the Chattanooga Free-Press and the Chattanooga Times Free Press for 22 years. Free-Press Sports Editor Roy Exum plucked him out of production in 1989 and gave him a job as a sports reporter. Dick covered everything from prep sports to the whitewater events on the Ocoee River for the 1996 Olympics. When Chattanooga's two paper's merged, he became the Crime Reporter covering both the Chattanooga Police and Fire Departments. He was among reporters who were honored by the Associated Press for the TFP's coverage of the 2002 fog-shrouded crash on I-75 in Catoosa County, Dick and his wife, Cathy, live on Marlboro Avenue where they are seen frequently chasing around their three grandsons.