Tri-Cities area new COVID cases keep trending up this week

The Tri-Cities has 40 more confirmed cases of COVID-19, the Benton Franklin Health District reported on Tuesday.

That is close to the average number of new cases this week — starting with the weekend— of 39 per day.

It puts the average number of new daily cases for the week so far above the average daily cases last week of 34 and the week before of 37.

The case rate for the past seven days is 101 new cases per 100,000 people in the Tri-Cities area, which is below the case rate for Washington state as reported on Tuesday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

For the past seven days, Washington has had an increasing case rate of 107 new cases per 100,000 people.

The national rate for the same period was 142 per 100,000, with 20 state reporting a lower case rate than Washington. Michigan has the highest rate in the United States at 515. Arkansas has the lowest at 33.1.

The number of people hospitalized locally for COVID-19 treatment has remained at 18 since Friday.

The number of local hospital patients has ranged this year from as high as 66 in January to as low as eight earlier this month.

The 18 patients on Tuesday accounted for 4.5% of the 401 patients in the Richland, Kennewick, Pasco and Prosser hospitals.

The new community cases in the Tri-Cities area reported on Tuesday included 28 in Benton County and 12 in Franklin County.

They bring the total Tri-Cities area cases confirmed with positive test results since the start of the pandemic to 27,046, including 15,514 in Benton County and 11,532 in Franklin County.

A total of 308 Tri-Cities area deaths due to complications of COVID-19 have been reported since the start of the pandemic, including 208 residents of Benton County and 100 of Franklin County.

Washington state

The Washington state Department of Health reported 791 new COVID-19 cases Monday and seven deaths since Friday.

Statewide totals from the illness caused by the coronavirus are 377,952 cases and 5,329 deaths. Those numbers are up from 377,161 cases Sunday and 5,322 deaths Friday. The case total includes 25,561 infections listed as probable.

As of March 31, the date with the most recent complete data, 53 people with confirmed cases of COVID-19 were admitted to Washington state hospitals.

Preliminary reports indicate average daily hospital admissions were increasing at 46 in early April.

Out of the state’s total staffed intensive care unit beds (1,266) approximately 74.1% (938) were occupied by patients Sunday. Of those staffed ICU beds, 9.1% (115) held suspected and confirmed COVID-19 patients.

According to DOH data, King County, with the state’s highest population, continues to have the highest numbers in Washington, with 94,775 cases and 1,483 deaths.

Pierce County, second in population, is second in cases, with 44,902 and second in deaths at 623.

All counties in Washington have at least 100 cases. Only 11 of the state’s 39 counties have case counts of fewer than 1,000.

There have been more than 31.2 million confirmed coronavirus cases and 562,500 deaths from the virus in the United States as of Monday, according to Johns Hopkins University. The United States has the highest total number of reported cases and deaths of any nation.

More than 2.94 million people have died from the disease worldwide. Global cases exceed 136 million.

Craig Sailor with The (Tacoma) News Tribune contributed to this report.

This story was originally published April 13, 2021 at 3:04 PM.