COVID-19 testing is still behind the holiday period

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CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa (KCRG) – The total number of tests for the new coronavirus reported in the new data on Sunday morning remained low, probably due to the Christmas holiday.

On Sunday at 10:30 a.m., the Iowa Department of Public Health said 620 people in Iowa who tested positive for COVID-19 were added to the state’s continuous total, which stands at 274,933 people since the beginning. pandemic. A total of 228,762 people are considered to have recovered from the disease, an increase of 1,092 on Saturday morning.

TestIowa, the state-run testing program, closed early Thursday, Dec. 24, and remained closed Friday for the Christmas holidays. This was probably a factor that contributed to the reduction in the number of people who tested positive and to a smaller number of tests in general. A similar decrease in tests compared to other days was observed near the Thanksgiving holiday at the end of November.

Another person who died of COVID-19 was added to the state total. In all, 3,745 people died from the virus in the state.

553 people had been in Iowa hospitals since Sunday morning, a net drop of five. 109 of these people were in intensive care units, a net decrease of five. 65 of these patients required the use of a ventilator, a net increase of two. 71 new patients were reported in the last 24 hours, similar to the total on Saturday morning.

Another 1,897 people had test results reported by public and private laboratories in the last 24 hours, a significantly smaller number than in recent days due to Christmas. The positivity rate for this batch of tests was 32.7%, higher than the rate of 24% of the report on Saturday morning. The positivity rate calculated using this method may differ from the number on the state coronavirus dashboard due to the fact that it uses the number of people tested, not the total number of tests, including people who have been tested repeatedly.

A total of 1,341,398 people in Iowa have been tested since the beginning of the pandemic.

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