Hospital bed availability remains low in southwest IL; COVID positivity rate drops again
The metro-east’s positivity rate saw another drop Tuesday, but the region’s hospital bed availability decreased.
The 7-day positivity rate for COVID-19 tests in southwestern Illinois fell Tuesday, marking the fifth consecutive day the rate has dropped.
The 7-day rolling average was 14.2% on Tuesday, down from 14.3% on Monday. The new rate is based on tests recorded as of Nov. 21. A region’s positivity rate is its percentage of positive COVID-19 tests versus the number of tests taken over a 7-day period.
Meanwhile, 81.2% of staffed, intensive care unit beds in the metro-east are in use, the Illinois Department of Public Health reported Tuesday, which is up from 79% on Monday. Only 18.8% of the region’s intensive care unit capacity was open, state health officials reported, down from 21% on Monday. Additionally, 16.5% of the metro-east’s staffed hospital beds were available for patient use, the same as Monday.
Under rules set by the Restore Illinois plan, if a region reaches or falls below the 20% threshold, the state may impose tighter restrictions to avoid the possibility of the region running out of hospital and ICU beds.
Tier 3 restrictions went into place statewide on Friday, Nov. 20. The third tier tightens restrictions on indoor dining, bars and social gatherings while adding restrictions to casinos, retailers, video gaming and museums.
Over the past weeks, officials have warned about the possibility of the region running low on hospital and ICU beds, prompting some area hospitals to temporarily cease elective surgeries.
The state classifies the metro-east as Region 4, which covers seven counties: St. Clair, Madison, Monroe, Bond, Washington, Clinton and Randolph. County-by-county data is available on the state health department’s website.
Additionally, the region reported a daily positivity rate of 12.2% on Tuesday, down from 13.6% on Monday.
State of Illinois announces new cases, deaths
Meanwhile, the state of Illinois announced 9,469 new COVID-19 cases Tuesday, bringing the total to 674,809. The state health department also announced 125 additional deaths, bringing the total to 11,677 since the pandemic began.
Also, within the past 24 hours, laboratories have reported 97,323 new tests for a total of 9,990,304.
As of Monday night, 6,134 people in Illinois were reported to be in the hospital with COVID-19. Of those, 1,203 patients were in the ICU and 668 patients with COVID-19 were on ventilators.
The preliminary 7-day statewide positivity for cases as a percent of total tests from Nov. 17-23 is 10.4%.
This story was originally published November 24, 2020 at 12:50 PM.