Gov. Spencer Cox speaks at a news conference in Salt Lake City on Thursday, Jan. 28, 2021 (Trent Nelson | The Salt Lake Tribune).
According to Utah Department of Health figures released Thursday, nearly two-thirds of Utah’s population has been tested for COVID-19. Exactly 2,000,023 people have been tested, which amounts to 63 percent of all Utahns.
Thursday’s report also indicates 267,027 total vaccine doses have been administered in Utah, that is 16,579 more than Wednesday.
Governor Spencer Cox said during his press briefing Thursday those numbers represent a significant increase in seven days.
“A week ago today our total doses administered were 193,777, and that includes first and second doses,” Gov. Cox explained. “That is a weekly increase of 73,250 doses. The first week in January we could only do about 40,000 doses a week. So that increase is just tremendous and so many partners helped to make that work.”
The Governor also announced news from the Biden administration that Utah’s allotment of the Moderna vaccine will increase.
“That means our monthly allotment will increase for Moderna and Pfizer from about 33,000 per week, which is where we have been, to about 40,000 doses a week which is a little bit north of a 16 percent increase,” he added. “That is great news, those are first doses that we will be able to get into arms, prioritizing our 70 and older population.”
An increase of 1,761 new coronavirus cases in Utah’s Thursday report, based on 10,917 tests statewide, means the 24-hour positivity rate was 15.7 percent.
The state reported no new deaths but it was determined later that was incorrect and “was due to a data transmission error” and that Friday’s count will include those deaths.
The rolling seven-day average for positive tests is 1,710 a day and the rolling seven-days average for percent of positive laboratory tests is 18.3 percent.
The Thursday Bear River Health Department report included 84 positive coronavirus cases in northern Utah and a new total of 18,295 in the district since the start of the pandemic.
There have been 682 patients in the district who have been hospitalized and there are 16,960 who have recovered among the 18,295 total cases in the BRHD.
The latest Idaho report shows 161,212 confirmed COVID-19 cases in the state. There have been 1,714 deaths in Idaho with 1,007 positive tests in Franklin County, 327 cases in Bear Lake County and 306 in Oneida County.