Nevada adds 980 COVID-19 cases, 15 deaths over preceding day
Nevada recorded 980 new COVID-19 cases and 15 additional deaths over the preceding day, according to state data posted Tuesday.
The new cases posted on the Department of Health and Human Services’ nvhealthresponse.nv.gov website, pushed the case total for the state to 52,179 and the fatalities increased the death toll to 862. Figures from local health districts and counties put the case total higher, at 52,232 as of Tuesday evening.
New cases announced by the state were under the daily average of nearly 1,040 a day over the preceding week. Fatalities also were slightly below the daily average of just over 16 for the period.
The agency also reported that the number of hospitalizations of confirmed and suspected COVID-19 patients declined by six over the preceding day to a total of 1,146. That remains in the range of 1,100-1,165 where the number has remained over the past two weeks, according to the Nevada Hospital Association.
The association warned, however, that as of Monday, Clark County was experiencing “near intensive care saturation levels” with 624 ICU beds occupied and nearly 40 percent of those believed to be suffering from COVID-19. According to data for the county, that represented 85 percent of the available ICU beds in the county.
y rate, considered a better barometer of the trend of the outbreak than new cases of deaths announcements, continued to rise, hitting 10.79 percent.
The rate, confirmed cases divided by the number of people tested, declined over several months before bottoming out at 5.20 percent on June 17 before beginning to climb. The higher rate, indicating the disease caused by the new coronavirus is spreading more quickly, on Tuesday posted its 27th straight daily increase.
The state changed the way it calculates its positivity rate on Tuesday, resulting in an apparent decline in the figure. But state officials confirmed at a news briefing that the decrease was the result of the new formula, not an actual downturn.
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The Southern Nevada Health District, meanwhile, reported 931 new COVID-19 cases and 14 deaths over the preceding day in Clark County.
The new cases posted on the district’s coronavirus website brought the total for the county to 44,997 while the fatalities increased the death toll to 716. The district estimates that 36,666 of the patients who contracted the illness have recovered.
New cases were slightly below the daily average of just over 939 for the preceding week, while the fatalities were slightly higher than the daily average of nearly 13 over the period.
The health district reported 53 new hospitalizations of confirmed or suspected COVID-19 patients.
Both the health district and the state often redistribute data after it is announced to better reflect the trend of the outbreak. For example, a case might be assigned a new date to correspond with when symptoms first appeared, or a death might be switched to another date to reflect when it occurred rather than when it was reported.
As a result, the number of cases and deaths announced generally doesn’t match with the reworked figures used by the agencies in their detailed breakdowns.
Contact Mike Brunker at mbrunker@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-4656. Follow @mike_brunker on Twitter.
