Mayo Clinic
The Minnesota Department of Health’s coronavirus update on Sunday is a combination of results collected Dec. 25-26 and reveals 40 more deaths and more than 2,500 additional laboratory-confirmed cases of COVID-19.
There have now been 5,147 deaths from the virus during the pandemic, of which 64.7% (3,332) came from long-term care, including 27 of the 40 reported on Sunday.
The positive news is that the test positivity rate continues to drop and Minnesota drops to just over 20,000 active cases, which is well below the peak of more than 50,000 active cases in mid-November.
Hospitalizations
Hospitalization figures are not updated on weekends.
As of Dec. 23, the number of people with COVID-19 hospitalized in Minnesota is 1,048. That’s down from 1,060 hospitalized on Tuesday.
Of those hospitalized, 238 were in intensive care and 810 received treatment that was not used in the ICU.
Test rates and positivity
The 2,534 positive results of Sunday’s update came from a total of 87,990 completed tests, creating a daily test positivity rate of 2.88%, which is a step in the right direction when it comes to spreading the word. virus in Minnesota.
The World Health Organization recommended in May that a positive percentage rate (divided by the total number of tests completed) of less than 5% be needed for at least two weeks to reopen the economy safely. This 5% threshold is based on the total positives divided by the total tests.
According to Johns Hopkins University, the Minnesota test positivity rate over the past seven days is 5.18%. In the United States, there are only four states with a test positivity rate of 5% over a 7-day average, and Minnesota could soon become the fifth if the current trend continues.
Coronavirus in Minnesota by the numbers
- Total tests: 5,480,439 (compared to 5,392,411)
- Tested people: 2,947,634 (to 2,918,243)
- Positive cases: 409,061 (up to 406,545)
- Deaths: 5,107 – 154 of which are “probable *” (up to 5,107)
- Active cases: 20,142 (less than 23,840)
- Patients who no longer need isolation: 388,919 (to 382,705)
* Probable deaths are patients who died after testing positive for the COVID-19 antigen test, which is thought to be less accurate than the more common PCR test.