COVID-19 positivity rate falls while hospital beds continue to fill up in southwest IL
The metro-east’s rolling seven-day average positivity rate for COVID-19 tests stayed below a key threshold for a fifth consecutive day Thursday.
So has the percentage of available hospital and intensive care unit beds.
Region 4’s positivity rate was 11.6% on Thursday, down from 11.8% on Wednesday, marking the fifth consecutive day the rate has been below 12%.
The new rate is based on tests recorded as of Dec. 21. A region’s positivity rate is its percentage of positive COVID-19 tests versus the number of tests taken over a seven-day period.
For Tier 3 mitigation metrics to be relaxed or to move to Tier 2, the region must experience a less than 12% seven-day rolling average positivity rate for three consecutive days while also seeing 20% available intensive care unit and medical/surgical bed availability for three consecutive days.
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.
But last week Gov. J.B. Pritzker said that while numbers are heading in the right direction, the state may not be ready for relaxed mitigations in any of its 11 regions. State health officials also are worried about upcoming holiday gatherings and the possible effect on new cases further straining hospital capacity, he said.
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.
Additionally, the region reported a daily positivity rate of 13.6% on Thursday, up from 11.7% on Wednesday.
Meanwhile, the metro-east’s hospital bed availability fell again Thursday ahead of Christmas celebrations some officials worry could bring on a spike in COVID-19 cases.
As of Thursday, 15.4% of the metro-east’s staffed hospital beds were available for patient use, down from 15.5% on Wednesday according to data from the Illinois Department of Public Health. The metro-east’s hospital bed availability has been under that threshold since Nov. 16. The region’s intensive care unit availability, however, was at 18.2% on Thursday, up from 17.9% on Wednesday.
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.
State of Illinois announces new cases, deaths
The state of Illinois announced 7,037 new COVID-19 cases Thursday, bringing the total to 925,107. The state health department also announced 96 additional deaths to bring the total to 15,643 since the pandemic began.
Also within the past 24 hours, laboratories reported 94,909 new tests have been administered for a total of 12,782,980.
As of Wednesday, when the latest data was available, 4,488 people in Illinois were reported to be in the hospital with COVID-19. Of those, 944 patients were in the ICU and 518 patients with COVID-19 were on ventilators.
The preliminary seven-day statewide positivity for cases as a percent of total tests from Dec. 17-23 is 7.2%.