On Tuesday, the department reported a death due to COVID-19, but no details were released.

“It with with an incredibly heavy heart that I report this death due to COVID,” said Linda Beers, the county’s director of public health. “This person was an active member of our community and we are so sorry for the family and those most close.”

The North Country region had the second-highest positivity rate out of the 10 regions in the state on Monday, with 5.14% of the COVID-19 tests in the region coming back positive in the past week, according to the state Department of Health.

While nationally the number of new COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations is falling ahead of the holidays, the North Country is still seeing high community spread and increasing numbers of positives and hospitalizations because of the virus.

One of the new cases in Essex County reported Monday is a resident of a nursing home, prison or other congregate setting, according to the county Health Department. The Federal Bureau of Prisons has reported that four staff members at the Federal Correctional Institute in Ray Brook have recently tested positive for the virus.

Earlier this week, there was an outbreak of the virus at the Essex Center nursing home in Elizabethtown, with 17 residents and three staff reported positive before the weekend. Last year, an outbreak at Essex Center had the deadliest cluster of the virus to date in the Essex County. Altogether, 16 residents or patients died from COVID-19.

In total, 38 people have died from COVID-19 in Essex County as of Nov. 2.

(Lake Placid News Editor Andy Flynn contributed to this story.)