Twenty-eight patients and 16 employees at a Cookeville nursing home have tested positive for the coronavirus, officials said Thursday, exposing another hot spot in a region that is still recovering from a rash of deadly tornadoes.

Lee Rooney, CEO at the facility, Signature HealthCARE of Putnam, said the nursing home cared for "the sickest of the sick." He said the virus had moved through the building despite added safety precautions, including eliminating visitors on March 9 and screening employees for symptoms each time they entered.

The facility had 320 employees and patients tested for the virus earlier this week after two COVID-19 cases were identified.

The vast majority of the 44 people in that group who ultimately tested positive were "symptom-free," Rooney said, raising the troubling possibility that they could have spread the potentially deadly virus to others without realizing they had it.