Last week’s good news about a downward trend in coronavirus cases is followed this week with a sudden uptick that increased the number of cases in Gloucester County by more than 50 percent, from 52 cases last Wednesday morning to 79 cases this Wednesday.
The Three Rivers Health District as a whole had around a 23 percent jump in the number of cases, from 669 last week to 824 this week.
The good news is that there hasn’t yet been an equivalent increase in the number of hospitalizations or deaths. The number of Gloucester residents hospitalized for the disease rose from nine last week to 11 this week, while the number of deaths remained the same, at one. Districtwide, 58 people had been hospitalized as of Wednesday morning, an increase of four since last Wednesday, while 11 people have died, up from 10 deaths last week across the Three Rivers Health District.
Mathews County added one new case over the past week, for a total of seven, while hospitalizations remained the same, at two. There have been no deaths from the disease in Mathews.
Middlesex County saw an increase of three cases during the past week, from 15 last Wednesday morning to 18 this Wednesday, and a second person in the county has been hospitalized, with no deaths.
Statewide, the number of cases rose from 67,375 cases last week to 73,527 this week, a difference of 6,152 cases. Cumulative hospitalizations across the state went from 6,577 last week to 6,905 this week, an increase of 328, while deaths went from 1905 to 1992, or 87 deaths during the week.
Testing has continued unabated across the state, with 88,917 PCR tests conducted since last week for a cumulative total statewide of 842,124 as of Wednesday. The rate of positive cases went up during the past week, from 6 percent last Wednesday to 7.2 percent this Wednesday. In the Three Rivers Health District, 1,970 PCR tests were conducted during the past week, for a total of 13,899 since testing began. The positivity rate has increased in the district, as well, from 3.9 percent last week to 5.4 percent on Wednesday.
According to the Virginia Hospital and Healthcare Association, 1,081 people with confirmed or pending COVID-19 cases were in hospitals across the state on Wednesday morning, 110 more than last week. Of those, 246 people were hospitalized in the intensive care unit, and 113 of those were on ventilators. Since the pandemic began, 9,527 people have been treated for COVID-19 in Virginia hospitals and released from care.
On Wednesday morning, there were 3,055 total ventilators on hand in hospitals, while 664 were in use. The number of regular hospital beds available across the state was 3,543, while an additional 3,695 were made available under Executive Order 52.