Allegheny County eclipses 60000 coronavirus cases, adds 9 deaths - TribLIVE

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Allegheny County on Saturday recorded 849 new coronavirus cases, as recent numbers continue to hover below the 1,000 case mark.

The county has reported nine days of at least 1,000 new cases, but hasn’t posted one since this time last week.

Nine new deaths were reported Saturday, lifting the county’s toll at 1,086. That’s 111 more deaths than this time last week.

December had recorded 446 — or about 41% — of covid-related deaths in Allegheny County since the start of the pandemic.

Wednesday’s report included 46 deaths, a high for the week.

Of the newly reported deaths, one person was in their 60s; four people were in their 70s; and four were in their 80s.

Three deaths were associated with long-term care facilities.

The dates of death occurred from Jan. 2 to Thursday.

The county has amassed 60,188 cases of covid-19, according to data from the Allegheny County Health Department.

Of the new cases, 625 are confirmed, while 224 are listed as probable.

Health officials define a probable case as one in which a patient has a positive viral antigen test or covid symptoms with a “high-risk exposure” to someone who has been confirmed to have coronavirus.

The recent batch of samples comprising 2,385 tests were collected from Dec. 10 through Friday. Eight of those positive tests were more than a week old, officials said.

The tests yielded a positivity rate of about 26%. The cases range in age from 7 months to 96 years old, with a median age of 40.

Thirty-three new hospitalizations were reported. Officials say 3,381 people have been hospitalized — 162 more than this time last week — since the virus was first reported in Allegheny County on March 14.

There are currently 574 covid-19 patients hospitalized in Allegheny County, 178 of whom have been admitted to intensive care units. Seventy-six of those in ICU are reported to be on ventilators.

Through the first nine days of January, Allegheny County has reported 6,379 covid-19 cases, which is an average of 709 per day. It is on pace for 21,972 cases for the month.

Throughout December, the county had amassed 25,405 new cases. This represents nearly 46% of Allegheny County’s cases.

That averages 820 per day (down from an average of 910 during the middle of the month); during the peak of its surge, the county was on pace to rack up 28,210 cases for the month.

In November, officials recorded 12,608 new cases. December more than doubled that amount.

In the entirety of October, the county saw 3,448 new cases of the virus, which was an increase of 72.3% from September (2,001).

According to the Allegheny County covid website, officials are estimating that more than 20,000 people have now recovered from the virus.

The website counts people as recovered based on one of two conditions: It’s been 32 days since the person was hospitalized for covid-19 and not deceased; or, if they were not hospitalized, 14 days since they tested positive.

Samson X Horne is a Tribune-Review digital producer. You can contact Samson at 412-320-7845, shorne@triblive.com or via Twitter .

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