Credit: Navy Medicine via Flickr
Friday’s COVID update from the Minnesota Department of Health includes 33 new deaths and more than 1,600 new cases.
The newly reported deaths bring the state’s total over the course of the pandemic to 5,850, of which 63.8% (3,734) were long-term care residents, including 18 of the 33 reported Friday.
Minnesota confirmed the first five cases of the UK-based mutant variant of COVID-19 Saturday evening, with residents of four Twin Cities counties testing positive for the B.1.1.7. variant after falling ill between December 16-31.
No further cases of the new species have been confirmed, but health officials believe the variant is widely circulating in Minnesota.
Meanwhile, the state reported Thursday that through January 12, 162,040 people have received at least 1 dose of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine, while 24,745 people have completed both doses of the vaccine necessary for the full effect of the vaccines.
The health department has launched a public dashboard to track vaccine distribution in Minnesota, and you can watch it here.
Hospital admissions
Through January 14, the number of people with COVID-19 hospitalized in Minnesota was 612, the lowest number of COVID admissions since October 25 (584).
Of those hospitalized, 125 (versus 131 the day before) were in intensive care and 487 (versus 514) received non-ICU treatment.
Statewide there were 148 manned IC beds available. At its peak in November, the state had fewer than 100 staffed IC beds available. The number of available beds depends on the number of available staff, so the totals are constantly changing.
Test and positivity rates
The 1,640 positive results in Friday’s update came from a total of 46,861 completed tests, creating a daily test positivity of 3.5%.
According to Johns Hopkins University, Minnesota’s positivity rate in the past seven days is 5.79%.
The World Health Organization recommends that a positive rate (total positive divided by total tests completed) of less than 5% for at least two weeks is required to safely reopen the economy. That 5% threshold is based on the total number of positives divided by the total number of tests.
Coronavirus in Minnesota in numbers
- Total number of tests: 6,090,114 (from 6,043,802)
- People tested: 3,124,903 (from 3,112,884)
- Positive cases: 443,562 (from 441,935)
- Deaths: 5,850 – 213 of which “likely *” (up from 5,817)
- Patients who no longer require isolation: 422,289 (from 420,919)
* Probable deaths are patients who died after a positive test using the COVID-19 antigen test, which is believed to be less accurate than the more common PCR test.