A sharp increase in deaths due to coronavirus infection continued Thursday as 21 more fatalities were reported — the most reported in a single day — following 27 being reported Wednesday and 17 Tuesday.
One other previously reported death was removed from the data, so the total death That brings the death toll to 1,347.
Wisconsin has averaged 11.86 deaths per day over the past week and 8.46 per day over the past two weeks.
Six deaths were reported in Milwaukee County, four were reported in Winnebago County, two each were reported in Waukesha and Washington Counties, and one each in Brown, Burnett, Eau Claire, Manitowoc, Oneida, Portage, Rock and Waupaca COo
A sharp increase in hospitalizations slowed Thursday with 669 currently hospitalized, 14 fewer than Wednesday but and 141 more than a week ago. Of those, 208 are in intensive care units, 10 more than Wednesday and 57 more than a week ago.
Meanwhile, the state confirmed 2,887 new coronavirus cases Thursday on 14,361 tests, for a positive test rate of 20.1 percent. Those results bring the total case count to 125,1671, of which more than 22,100 are considered active, about 1,000 more than yesterday.
Wisconsin’s Department of Health Services has changed the way it reports data to more accurately reflect the situation, attributing both positive and negative tests to the dates they were processed, not the dates that the data was reported to DHS. This will give a more accurate report of the percentage of tests returning positive results, but will render the daily percentages as we have been reporting them irrelevant. Therefore we will now only report the seven-day positive test rate, and will no longer report daily percentages for the state or counties.
The state is also reporting this percentage by test, and by person, to account for the fact that some people receive multiple negative tests.
Given these new criteria, Wisconsin’s seven-day of positive tests by person is 17.4 percent, and by test is 9.4 percent — meaning 9.4 percent of the tests given in the past seven days were positive, while 17.4 percent of the people tested were positive.
Today’s data brings the seven-day average of new cases to 2,405.
The highest local new case count came in Milwaukee County, with 329
Other localities with higher case totals and positive tests rates include:
Brown County: 260
Calumet County: 60
Chippewa County: 10
Columbia County: 19
Dane County: 72
Dodge County: 44
Door County: 14
Douglas County: 19
Dunn County: 21
Eau Claire County: 16
Fond du Lac County: 74
Grant County: 52
Green Lake County: 19
Jefferson County: 28
Juneau County: 17
Kenosha County: 22
Kewaukee County: 25
La Crosse County: 75
Lafayette County: 22
Langlade County: 15
Lincoln County: 17
Manitowoc County: 49
Marathon County: 86
Marinette County: 20
Menomonee County: 11
Monroe County: 28
Oconto County: 59
Oneida County: 29
Outagamie County: 204
Ozaukee County: 13
Portage County: 33
Racine County: 85
Richland County: 19
Rock County: 51
Sauk County: 21
Shawano County: 66
Sheboygan County: 156
St Croix County: 10
Trempeleau County: 16
Vernon County: 10
Walworth County: 16
Washington County: 53
Waukesha County: 173
Waupaca County: 81
Waushara County: 28
Winnebago County: 183
Wood County: 21
