Daily: More People COVID-19 Tested This Week Than All of April – Urban Milwaukee

Get a daily rundown of the top stories on Urban Milwaukee

COVID-19. Credit: U.S. Army.

COVID-19. Credit: U.S. Army.

COVID-19 data continues to give mixed signals in Wisconsin.

Case in point: On Saturday the Department of Health Services reported the greatest number of people newly hospitalized with a case of COVID-19 in over 50 days, but the number of people currently hospitalized went down.

DHS reports that 64 people were newly hospitalized in the past 24 hours, above the 30-day average of 35, but the number of people hospitalized decreased from 423 to 409. The number of people actively hospitalized has increased by 21 in the past seven days.

There have been 71 deaths from COVID-19 in the past four days, the highest total reported on any four consecutive days. But there were only 21 in the four days prior, the lowest four day total.

Testing data also has a mix of positives and negatives.

DHS reports that 66,932 people were tested in the past week, more than the 57,522 people that were tested in the entire month of April. But the week figure is over 18,000 short of the state’s goal of testing 85,000 per week. Only one day in the past week did the state exceed over 12,000 per day.

DHS reported Saturday that 9,843 tests were processed in the past 24 hours, the fifth-highest total on record. From those, 5.31 percent came back positive, an increase of 523 cases, the fourth-greatest single-day total.

The result was slightly above the seven-day and 14-day averages of 5.01 percent and 5.27 percent, but below the May average of 6.15 percent. Public health officials are looking for the percentage to trend downward as the number of tests increases.

Throughout the outbreak, 18,230 Wisconsin residents have tested positive for COVID-19. DHS reports that 62 percent have recovered, defined by a positive test over 30 days ago or a record of symptom abatement.

The death toll from the virus has hit 588 in Wisconsin, with 20 newly-confirmed deaths. Three percent of people with confirmed cases have died.

Milwaukee County accounts for 299 of the 588 deaths and 7,654 cases according to state data.

Both Brown and Racine counties continue to have greater per capita outbreaks than Milwaukee. Racine and Milwaukee counties have narrowed the gap with Brown County over the past week according to state testing data.

Brown County, which is anchored by Green Bay, has 892.3 cases per 100,000 residents (up from 888.4). Racine County has 877.2 cases per 100,000 residents (up from 845.4). Milwaukee County has 802.3 cases per 100,000 residents (up from 778.6).

Kenosha (692.1), Rock (390.7), Walworth (380.5), Forest (310.5) and Dodge (244.9) are the only other counties with more than 200 cases per 100,000 presidents.

The statewide average of cases per 100,000 residents has risen to 315.5 (up from 306.4).

There are currently 957 ventilators and 344 intensive care unit (ICU) beds available across the state according to the Wisconsin Hospital Association. Since the data became publicly available on April 10th, WHA has reported an average of 935 ventilators and 417 ICU beds as available.

Charts and Maps

More about the Coronavirus Pandemic

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *