Cases and hospitalizations log biggest weekly drop since pandemic started
Reuters reports:
- US cases and hospitalizations log biggest weekly drop since pandemic started
- reported a 25% drop in new cases to about 825,000 last week. Largest fall since pandemic started
- health officials still worried new variants of the virus could slow or reverse case progress
- new cases have now fallen for 4 weeks in a row to the lowest level since Roy November
- California had the steepest drop with a 48% decline
- Only Oregon, Puerto Rico, Arkansas and Vermont so cases rise
- at least 3 new variants of the coronavirus are circulating and in the US including the UK variant that is 30% to 40% more contagious
- the average number of patients in hospitals fell by 15% to 88,000 was also a record percentage drop. It was also the lowest average number and hospitals since late November.
- Deaths fell -2.5% to 22,193. If numbers excluded a backlog of deaths reported by Indiana, then Fed tallies would have fell by -9.5%
- overall 464,000 people died from the virus or one in every 704 residents
- 7.3 of the tests came back positive down from 8.5% the prior week
Overall, the statistics show improving trends. The larger infection rate coupled with vaccinations is the good news for the spread. The not so good news is the variants which may not respond to vaccinations and spread at a faster pace.
