FILE PHOTO – COVID-19 vaccine. Photo by Braňo on Unsplash
During an online media briefing Wednesday leaders of four of Utah’s hospital systems said the state is unlikely to return to previous restrictions if more Utahns are vaccinated.
“We have a definitive tool to take care of each other, to keep each other safe, and that is the vaccine,” said Dr. Kencee Graves, associate chief medical officer at University of Utah Health.
The Utah Department of Health’s Wednesday report included 394 new positive coronavirus tests among the 3,619 people tested since Tuesday. Included in the report were two COVID deaths statewide; there have been 2,387 deaths since the start of the pandemic.
The Wednesday update also indicates there have been 417,653 positive coronavirus cases during the 16 months of the pandemic.
The Bear River Health District (BRHD) reported six new COVID cases since Tuesday and now there have been 22,441 in northern Utah with 22,114 of that total are classified as “recovered.” To date 969 have been hospitalized in the district during the pandemic and there have been 112 coronavirus deaths in northern Utah.
The BRHD said Wednesday 53.1 percent of all the district’s residents are fully vaccinated (69,048 people). That includes 55.6 percent in Cache County, 47.7 percent in Box Elder County and 47.9 percent in Rich County. A total of 146,565 doses have been administered in northern Utah.
The rolling seven-day average for new cases has been spiking recently but Wednesday that number dropped by 25 down to 361 per day.
Some metrics continue to increase including the rolling seven-day average for percent positivity of “people over people” which is up in the last 24 hours from 11.3 to 11.8 percent while the rolling seven-day average for percent positivity of “tests over tests,” jumped to 7.9 percent from 7.7 percent.
Over, 6,600 total tests were administered since Tuesday. Since the pandemic started almost 2.82 million Utahns have been tested and there have been 5.1 million tests.
Statewide hospitalizations due to COVID-19 dropped from 274 to 260 since Tuesday. There are 85 Utahns in intensive care, seven fewer than on Tuesday.
The latest news from Idaho shows 2,159 coronavirus deaths with 195,429 confirmed COVID-19 cases. In the three southeast Idaho counties case counts include 1,231 positive cases in Franklin County, 398 in Bear Lake County and 365 in Oneida County.