Tracing is a key component in the five-phase plan. Moving forward from Phase 3, for example, requires tracing and monitoring “within 24 hours of diagnosis for more than 90% of cases in the region.”

On Friday, Pritzker wanted to make clear that the state has been contact tracing since the beginning of the epidemic.

“It’s not that there’s no contact tracing going on,” Pritzker said. “What we’re spinning up in Illinois is a much more robust contact tracing effort.”

He said Illinois is closely following the plan executed in Massachusetts, which has added 1,000 contact tracers.

Since health officials identified the first case of COVID-19 in Illinois in January, the state has monitored contacts of coronavirus patients. IDPH director Dr. Ngozi Ezike said local health departments conduct tracing frequently – even when there’s not a pandemic. Tracers help monitor food-born outbreaks, mumps, measles and other diseases.

Ezike said information might not always be released in the same manner. She said IDPH will work to protect the identity of individuals. That could be especially challenging in smaller towns, for instance, if there’s an outbreak at a local restaurant.

“There may be instances where we need to release a little bit more information to protect the overall public’s health,” Ezike said. “However, we always want to keep peoples’ confidentiality in mind, and we take that very seriously.

Kawasaki-like symptoms: Ezike said IDPH does not have any data to report on any increase in children exhibiting Kawasaki disease or toxic-shock syndrome symptoms.

More than 60 children in New York have shown symptoms similar to the inflammatory disease. New York health officials believe it could be linked to COVID-19. Kawasaki disease causes inflammation in the walls of the arteries and can limit blood flow to the heart. It is most common in children under 5.

Statewide update: Illinois announced 130 additional deaths from COVID-19 and 2,887 more confirmed cases of the novel coronavirus on Friday.

The Illinois Department of Public Health said that 14% of 20,671 total tests in the previous 24 hours came back positive. This is the first day Illinois hit more than 20,000 tests in a day.

Illinois has now seen 73,760 total cases of the virus and 3,241 people have died. A total of 399,714 people have been tested.

As of late Thursday night, Illinois had 4,750 COVID-19 patients in the hospital. Of those, 1,222 were in the ICU and 727 were on ventilators. The state had 10,125 open hospital beds.

Newly reported deaths include 89 in Cook County. Six people died in DuPage and Will, five in Kane and Lake, four in McHenry and Sangamon, two in Madison and St. Clair, and one each in Boone, Jasper, Kankakee, La Salle, Macon and Williamson counties.

Regional update: On Thursday, the Northeast region (Cook, DuPage, Grundy, Kane, Kankakee, Kendall, McHenry, Lake and Will counties) had a positivity rate of 21.8% and ran 13,681 tests. The region also had an average of 18% of medical/surgical beds available, 19% of ICU beds available and 64% of ventilators available.

The North Central region (Bureau, DeKalb, La Salle, Lee, Ogle, Whiteside, Carroll, Boone, Winnebago, Stephenson, Putnam and Jo Daviess counties) had a positivity rate of 8.3% and completed 2,139 tests. On average, there was an availability of 42% of medical/surgical beds, 41% of ICU beds and 69% of ventilators.

The Central region had an 4.6 positivity rate and completed 1,253 tests. On average, there was an availability of 53% of medical/surgical beds, 46% of ICU beds and 71% of ventilators.

The Southern region had about a 11.2% positivity rate and 825 total tests. On average, there was an availability of 46% of medical/surgical beds, 29% of ICU beds and 80% of ventilators.

Threshold for next phase: In addition to having testing available for patients, health care workers, first responders, people with underlying conditions, and residents and staff in congregate living facilities, and contact tracing and monitoring in place 24 hours after diagnosis, regions must hit the following thresholds to move on to the next phase in the Restore Illinois plan:

At or under a 20 percent positive rate and increasing no more than 10 percentage points over a 14-day period, AND

No overall increase (i.e. stability or decrease) in hospital admissions for COVID-19-like illness for 28 days, AND

Available surge capacity of at least 14 percent of ICU beds, medical and surgical beds, and ventilators.