Oklahoma hits new milestones in COVID-19 cases and deaths

Oklahoma has surpassed 200,000 positive COVID-19 cases since the start of the pandemic as a backlog of cases arises.

The state reported 54 deaths today for the period October 24 to November 30, with the majority of them occurring last week.

Oklahoma has one of the highest rates in the country for positive tests and has now exceeded 200,000 infections and more than 1,800 deaths in this pandemic.

Related story: Latest White House COVID-19 Report Shows Oklahoma In Red Zone

In a Wednesday morning briefing by a COVID-19 expert from Oklahoma State University, the prediction was increasing hospitalizations at least until early January. It’s a wave of infections, then hospitalizations – then death.

As of Wednesday, there were 859 new cases of COVID-19 in Oklahoma, with 1,782 people hospitalized. This led to 54 more Oklahomans dying of the disease, with another flare expected early next week.

“The scary thing about this one, even being clinically prepared to care for these patients, when you have an older population, you end up being hospitalized and a subgroup will be seriously or seriously ill,” said Dr. Jennifer Clark from Oklahoma State University. .

If the forecasts hold, cases and hospitalizations will double in early January. 54 deaths reported Wednesday was a new record, with a death rate of 1%, that would be 80 people who would die each day by then.