Public health officials Thursday announced 4,015 more people have tested positive for the coronavirus in Illinois, the highest number of new cases ever reported by the state throughout the COVID-19 pandemic.
The staggering caseload is one greater than the 4,014 cases confirmed by the Illinois Department of Public Health on May 12, at the state’s initial pandemic peak.
Almost three times as many people are being tested on average per day compared to the spring — May’s high figure was confirmed among 29,266 tests, compared to 67,086 with this latest batch of positives — but COVID-19 cases, hospitalizations and deaths have all gradually risen over the last two weeks.
To account for increases in testing, experts say the seven-day average testing positivity rate is a more effective gauge of how rapidly the virus is spreading.
That statewide number has shot up to 4.9% from just 3.3% on Oct. 4. That’s as high as it’s been since early June.
“These numbers are indicating a concerning direction,” Gov. J.B. Pritzker said at a Wednesday press briefing.
Back in mid-May, the state’s average positivity rate hovered close to 20%.
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Officials on Thursday also announced the virus has claimed 53 more lives across the state, topping the daily death toll of 49 from a day earlier that had marked the worst figure since late June.
Fatalities were recorded in more than 30 of the state’s 102 counties, including 11 Cook County residents.
As has been the case throughout the pandemic, most of the victims were elderly, but a man in his 20s from Knox County in western Illinois was included in the latest death count.
“For our long-term care settings, our nursing homes, while the deaths have increased over the last four weeks — which is not a good sign at all — we have seen the number of deaths in nursing homes decrease,” Illinois Public Health Director Dr. Ngozi Ezike said Wednesday. “So we’re, we are taking care of our seniors and trying to keep them as safe as possible. But again, the rest of the population continues to be at risk and we need to keep masking so that we can keep our cases down, which eventually will bring down our hospitalizations and our deaths.”
Since March, more than 6.5 million COVID-19 tests have been administered in Illinois. Of those, 331,620 people have tested positive, and 9,127 have died with the virus.
As of Wednesday night, 1,932 Illinois coronavirus patients were hospitalized, with 388 receiving intensive care and 147 using ventilators.
Officials confirmed Thursday’s case total was the highest for a single day on record. The state reported 5,368 cases Sept. 4, but that was the result of a data processing backlog that included up to three days of cases.
