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Wearing a mask can help protect you, not just those around you, from coronavirus transmission, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said in new guidance issued Nov. 10. The statement was the agency’s strongest endorsement yet of face covering, and cited potential economic benefits, as well.

Since our last report in Thursday’s Record, Canadian ISD has received new reports of five new coronavirus cases, bringing the total number of confirmed positives among staff and students to 55, and the number of active positive cases to 15. Last Wednesday evening, Superintendent Lynn Pulliam reported at CHS staff member as the 51st confirmed positive, noting that the staffer was already in quarantine and had had no close contacts. On Thursday evening, Dr. Pulliam reported the 52nd confirmed positive in a CES staff member who does not work directly with students and involving no close contacts. On Friday, the school district received notice of its 53rd and 54th confirmed positives involving students in fifth and eighth grades, both of whom had already been in quarantine. In the only report to date this week, Dr. Pulliam reported Tuesday that one more confirmed positive case involved an eleventh-grade student at CHS who had last been at school on Nov. 17.

In the last week, Hemphill County Hospital has reported 36 new cases for Hemphill County residents, and 54 out of county residents. Wednesday’s newly-reported cases brought the totals to 65 active cases for Hemphill County and 88 out-of-county active cases. To date, 247 residents of Hemphill County and 197 out of county residents have tested positive for the coronavirus. Only one resident of Hemphill County has died from COVID-19.

The main communication tower for Hemphill County’s emergency services, located at the US 60/83 Y south of Canadian, was felled two weeks ago by a winter storm that coated the Panhandle in several layers of ice and snow. County officials turned their attention Monday to what Judge George Briant said could be a quarter-million dollar project to rebuild that structure and restore those essential services.

A steady rain fell on Washington National Cemetery yesterday as President Donald Trump marked Veterans Day with the traditional laying of a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. The ceremony was the president’s first on-camera public appearance since Joe Biden successfully reassembled the so-called wall of blue states surrounding the Great Lakes—Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania—to defeat the incumbent.