Credit: Noor Joonas / Central Health Laboratory via Flickr
Monday’s COVID update from the Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) includes 611 new cases and two deaths.
The recently reported deaths bring the state’s total to 6,379 during the pandemic. Of these deaths, 62.8% (4,016) were residents of long-term care.
As of Feb. 13, the state reported that 675,329 people had received at least one dose of COVID-19 vaccine, while 238,104 people had completed both doses of the vaccine that are needed for the maximum effect of the vaccines.
MDH has a public dashboard to track the progress of the vaccine in Minnesota and you can view it here.
Two new variants of coronavirus have been confirmed in Minnesota, including what was the first known case of the Brazil P.1 variant in the United States. This case involves a Minnesota man who traveled to Brazil. There are 8 confirmed cases of variant B.1.1.7. It is believed that both new strains are more transmissible.
hospitalization
Hospitalization data are not updated over the weekend and were not yet updated on Monday at the time of writing.
As of Feb. 11, the number of people with COVID-19 hospitalized in Minnesota was 326 – a slight increase from 320 the day before. Of those hospitalized, 73 were in intensive care (down from 78), and 253 received non-ICU treatment (up from 242).
Statewide, 161 beds were available for the ICU. During the November increase, the state had less than 100 intensive care beds available. The number of beds available depends on the number of staff available, so the total is constantly changing.
Test rates and positivity
The 611 positive results from Monday’s update were from a total of 18,165 completed tests, creating a daily test positivity rate of 3.36%.
According to Johns Hopkins University, the test positivity rate in Minnesota in the last seven days is 3.18%, making it one of the lowest rates in the country.
The World Health Organization recommends that a positive percentage rate (total positive divided by the total number of tests completed) of less than 5% for at least two weeks be required for the safe reopening of the economy. This 5% threshold is based on the total positives divided by the total tests.
Coronavirus in Minnesota by numbers
- Total tests: 6,990,085 (from 6,971,879)
- Tested persons: 3,371,276 (from 3,365,599)
- People with at least 1 shot vaccine: 675,329 (of the 661,187)
- People with 2 vaccines: 238,104 (of the 227,551)
- Positive cases: 474,169 (from 473,567)
- Deaths: 6,378 – 265 of which are “probable *” (increasing from 6,376)
- Patients who no longer require isolation: 460,537 (of the 459,525)
* Probable deaths are patients who died after a positive test using the COVID-19 antigen test, which is thought to be less accurate than the more common PCR test.