COVID-19 Remembrance Ceremony To Honor Those Who Died In NoVA

FAIRFAX COUNTY, VA — Northern Virginia public officials will be taking a moment next week to remember the lives lost across the region due to COVID-19, according to a Fairfax County blog post.

Northern Virginia Regional Commission, which represents 13 jurisdictions, will be presenting a COVID-19 Remembrance Ceremony on Wednesday, June 9, at 6 p.m. The event will take place at the Fairfax County Government Center ellipse and be broadcast live on Channel 16.

The public can also view the ceremony online via both the NVRC and Fairfax County Board of Supervisors Chairman Jeff McKay's Facebook pages.

“We Northern Virginians have worked collaboratively together to stem the tide of the coronavirus pandemic, but our losses are considerable,” NVRC Chairman P. David Tarter said, in the blog post. “We come together to mourn and remember more than 2,350 of our friends, relatives and neighbors lost to this terrible disease.”

Both Tarter and McKay will join other local leaders in speaking about the impact the COVID-19 pandemic has had on the region. Other speakers will include Fairfax Health District Director Dr. Gloria Addo-Ayensu, Fairfax County Fire and Rescue Chief John Butler and Fairfax County Police Chief Kevin Davis, serving as representatives of front-line agencies and workers who daily confronted the disease.

At the end of the ceremony, a Fire and Rescue chaplain will lead an invocation and a "last alarm" bell service.

The following are the 13 jurisdictions NVRC represents and the number of deaths experienced in each one due to COVID-19, according to the latest data from the Virginia Department of Health:

• Alexandria: 137
• Arlington County: 256
• Falls Church: 8
• Fairfax City: 19
• Fairfax County: 1,103
• Leesburg
• Loudoun County: 278
• Manassas: 47
• Manassas Park: 11
• Prince William County: 499

Individual statistics for the following four jurisdictions were not available. Instead, the number of deaths was included in the respective health districts: Dumfries (Prince William County), Leesburg (Loudoun County) and Herndon and Vienna (Fairfax County).