COVID In Minnesota: Positivity Rate On A Downward Trend, But Still Above 10%

MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) — With federal teams now in place to help Minnesota’s taxed hospital systems, the state’s health department reports that there have been 12,632 newly reported positive cases of COVID-19.

No new deaths were reported, as the health department did not update the data during the holiday break. The MDH says details of newly reported deaths will resume Wednesday.

Minnesota’s latest rolling seven-day average positivity rate has ticked down another notch, currently sitting at 10.6% from a recent peak of 11%. That’s still, however, above the line considered “high risk,” which is drawn at 10%. There are also a reported 75.6 daily new cases per 100,000 Minnesota residents, which puts the state well above the line considered high risk (which is all the way down at 10 per 100,000).

According to the Minnesota Department of Health’s daily update, the state’s total number of people who have been infected by COVID has risen to 902,032 since the pandemic began, with 9,382 deaths attributed to the virus. Health officials say 10,338 have been reinfected since the start of the pandemic.

Hospitalizations remain about as high as they’ve been outside of November and December of last year. Total ICU bed usage among COVID-19 patients is at 343. Additionally, there are currently 1,189 COVID-19 patients being hospitalized in non-ICU beds. The rate of new COVID hospitalizations per 100,000 residents is at 21.4.

Hospitals across the state are making a desperate plea for the public’s help. Most parts of the state have only single-digit figures for staffed ICU beds for adult patients. The same goes for beds intended for children.

As of Thursday morning, figures from the Minnesota Department of Health showed that about 70% of Minnesotans 5 and older had received at least one vaccine dose, and 96.3% of those 65 or older had received at least one dose. In total, the state has administered 7,825,008 doses of vaccine, with about 3.36 million residents having completed their vaccine series.

There have been nearly 1.1 million vaccine booster shots given to eligible Minnesotans. Minnesota ranks second in the nation for booster doses of the COVID-19 vaccine, with 30% receiving additional shots as experts race to understand an emerging viral variant and blunt its impact.