Virtually every day Utah reaches a new milestone among the various metrics the state Health Department uses to chart the pandemic in Utah.
For example, the 1,501 new coronavirus cases in Thursday’s report is the highest one-day total in the seven months since the outbreak.
Each day UDOH presents the rolling seven-day average for positive tests and today’s 1,114 a day is another new record high.
When hospitalization numbers spike, state health officials grow concerned, and with good reason. Thursday it was reported 237 Utahns are receiving hospital care, still another record-breaker.
During a Thursday press briefing Gov. Gary Herbert remained opposed to further restrictions such as a statewide mask mandate, saying citizens don’t need government to tell them what they know is the right thing to do.
The Bear River Health Department monitors the pandemic for Cache, Box Elder and Rich counties and the 85 new coronavirus cases announced Wednesday were the most since the outbreak four months ago at the JBS meat packing plant in Hyrum.
Lloyd Berentzen, BRHD executive director, said when local case counts surged recently in northern Utah it came mostly among the 18-25 year old group returning to school at Utah State University. They used to make up about 60 percent of the district’s total cases.
“Their numbers are about the same but the community spread has increased to making it so that only 43 percent of our cases now are in that 18-25 year old category and all of the other age groups now are that other 57 percent,” Berentzen explained. “Where we worry about, obviously we have talked about this before, our immune-compromised that are over a certain age, and even younger people who have certain underlying health conditions, those folks we just keep emphasizing to try to keep them away from potential disease.”
At the same time the rolling seven-day average for percent of positive tests remains high at 13.8 percent.
The Bear River Health Department Thursday reported 59 new cases: 48 in Cache County and 11 in Box Elder County.
There have been 3,844 positive cases over the course of the pandemic in the Bear River Health District, 3,170 in Cache County, 654 in Box Elder County and 20 in Rich County.
Among the new positives in the district, 2,944 are considered “recovered”. There are now seven from the district in hospitals, two from Cache County and five from Box Elder County.
From the beginning of the outbreak, total Utah COVID-19 hospitalizations are now 4,167.
The total number of positive cases detected since early-March in Utah has grown to 81,947. Among those positive tests in Utah since the outbreak, 60,220 are considered recovered.
There have been 501 COVID-19 deaths in Utah which is five more than Wednesday.
A total of 892,022 tests have been administered in Utah during the pandemic.
In the most recent report from Idaho there are 45,753 confirmed COVID-19 cases in the state. There have been 500 COVID deaths with 176 positive tests in Franklin County, 50 positives in Bear Lake County and 29 in Oneida County.