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COVID hospitalizations reach another record in Iowa

Iowa recorded three consecutive days of 500 or more COVID-19 hospitalizations this week as new cases continue to climb.

The Iowa Department of Public Health reported 502 hospitalizations on Monday, the first time more than 500 have been recorded in one day during the pandemic. There were 535 on Tuesday which dropped to 530 on Wednesday. Ninety COVID patients were admitted to the hospital on Tuesday and another 85 on Wednesday.

A report from the White House Coronavirus Task Force released Sunday said Iowa has the eighth highest positivity rate in the country. Iowa’s 238 new cases per 100,000 population during the week of Oct. 5-11 were well above the national average of 117 per 100,000. The task force recommends Iowans increase mitigation efforts to avoid “prolonged community spread and increased fatalities.”

There have been 89 deaths in the last week, bringing the state’s total to 1,594. Marshall County has reported no new deaths, leaving its total at 36. Ninety percent of Iowa’s dead were 61 years old or older. Pre-existing conditions were present in 1,060 cases,107 did not have pre-existing conditions and 428 are unknown.

There are 135 intensive care patients across the state and 53 on ventilators, according to IDPH. The number of ICU beds available has dropped steadily since May.

Iowa has tallied 111,107 positive cases out of 918,587 individuals tested. Of the Test Iowa assessments completed, 60.1 percent of the test subjects were female.

Lab results received Wednesday showed 738 individuals tested positive, including four in Marshall County. The county’s positivity rate is an average 5.6 percent over the last 14 days, which is lower than the state average 9.8 percent.

Marshall County schools recorded an average 5.6 percent positivity rate over 14 days which is seventh best in Iowa.

Nursing homes continue to be threatened by the virus with 70 current outbreaks tied to long-term care facilities in Iowa. None of the facilities in Marshall County are reporting outbreaks but there are two in neighboring Tama County: Sunrise Hill Care and Rehab Center in Traer and Sunnycrest Nursing Center in Dysart. Long-term care outbreaks have been tied to 793 deaths related to COVID-19.

Of the county’s 1,951 confirmed cases, 1,746 have recovered.

USAfacts.org, a nonprofit organization which records and reports government data, reports 218,935 people have died from COVID-19 in the United States. The case total is more than 8.2 million with an additional 59,734 reported on Tuesday. The website’s data shows new cases have consistently climbed since mid September.

USAfacts data on Marshall County differs from what is reported by IDPH. USAfacts counts 1,928 COVID cases in the county with 4,897.3 per 100,000 population.

ACCORDING TO IDPH DATA:

Race:

Caucasian: 73 percent

African American: 5 percent

Asian: 3 percent

Native American: 0 percent

Hispanic or Latino: 12 percent

Sex:

Female: 51 percent

Male: 48 percent

Age:

0-17: 9 percent

18-40: 46 percent

41-60: 27 percent

61-80: 14 percent

80 or older: 4 percent

Marshall County has the 13th highest number of COVID-19 cases in Iowa

The counties with higher numbers include

Polk — 18,312

Woodbury — 6,930

Johnson — 5,699

Black Hawk — 5,325

Linn — 5,206

Dubuque — 4,834

Scott — 4,156

Story — 3,906

Dallas — 3,348

Pottawattamie –3,064

Sioux — 2,335

Buena Vista — 2,217

Contact Joe Fisher at 641-753-6611 or jfisher@timesrepublican.com

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