New COVID-19 cases in Pennsylvania have fallen. CDC puts 31 counties at medium level
The Pennsylvania Department of Health reports new confirmed cases of COVID-19 have fallen in the commonwealth over the latest week, holding with the national trend.
In its Wednesday update, the state health agency reported 8,509 new cases of the disease caused by the novel coronavirus, down by about 1,750 cases from the prior week.
These case counts do not include positives from at-home test kits or those not reported to the state.
The latest reporting period, which stretched from Feb. 22 to 28, also included 113 deaths from COVID-19, the same number as recorded during the prior week. To date, 50,281 individuals in the Keystone State have died from COVID-19 since the pandemic began in the U.S. in March 2020.
Like deaths and cases, hospitalizations are also trending down across the U.S. and in Pennsylvania.
The commonwealth reports 1,035 individuals at facilities for treatment as of Wednesday, down from 1,135 the week prior. The number in intensive care units rose, however, for at least the second week in a row from 129 to 136.
Forty-seven individuals are on ventilators.
The state’s weekly new case rate stands at 81.4 per 100,000 residents and the seven-day average for new hospital admissions is 159.29, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
COVID-19 community levels in Pennsylvania
The number of Pennsylvania counties at the CDC’s medium COVID-19 community level fell this week from 37 to 31.
Additionally, the only county that was at high last week, Sullivan, has been scored at medium.
Under scaled back masking guidance, the CDC recommends those in high-level counties wear a mask indoors in public and on public transport. Under medium, those at higher risk for severe illness should consider the same.
The number of Pennsylvania counties at low sits at 36 as of Thursday’s CDC update, and that figure includes Centre County, which was at medium last week.
The community levels are determined weekly and based on new cases and hospitalizations per 100,000 individuals and a seven-day average of staffed hospital beds occupied by COVID patients.
COVID-19 in Centre County
Centre County is back at a low community level this week after a week at medium.
New reported cases for the latest period came in at 125, according to the CDC, down slightly from the prior week, and the positivity rate fell as well, from 13.23% to 12.85%.
The case rate in the county is lower than the state as a whole, at 76.98 per 100,000 individuals.
Centre County’s bivalent vaccination rate has been largely flat over the past month, however, moving from 19.6% to just 19.7% since Jan. 25.
Mount Nittany Health reports 10 hospitalizations related to the virus as of Thursday. That is the highest the census has been in the most recent seven-day period.
The individuals there range in age from 31 to 90, and none are in the ICU.
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