New Jersey’s Covid-19 case count is spiking, but hospitals remain within their capacity, New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy said Monday.
“We are now seeing the daily case count hitting levels we haven’t seen since mid-January of this year,” Murphy said, a figure echoed by Health Commissioner Judy Persichilli, who said that Sunday’s 6,533 positive PCR tests marked the highest single day of positive tests since January 2021.
The statewide percent-positivity is 12.11%.
Still, the governor said, hospitalizations are not growing at the same rate.
“We continue to stay at hospitalization levels that are just a fraction of what they were at this time last year, even as the recent case counts are going up with such speed,” Murphy said.
“This is only possible because the vaccines are keeping even those folks who have breakthrough case of infection from developing a serious Covid-related illness,” he added.
The state reports 1,902 people currently hospitalized with the virus. Hospitalizations peaked early in the pandemic with 8,270 reported hospitalizations in April 2020.
“We’re nowhere near where we were,” Murphy said.
According to state data, 73% of eligible New Jersey residents have received a full initial course of vaccination, and 40% of those who can be are boosted.
There has been an uptick of in-school Covid-19 transmission, Murphy said, with 47 outbreaks tied to in-school transmission in the week of Dec. 6 — the most recent available data — up from 15 outbreaks three weeks prior.
Murphy said that despite the rise, “these cases do remain somewhat rare.”
To that end, Murphy was supportive when asked about a so-called test-and-stay program for students in New Jersey schools. He and Persichilli said they were preparing a pilot program for such a policy, in which students known to be close contacts of Covid-positive individuals can take frequent Covid-19 tests in lieu of quarantining.
