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ROY – Utah leaders continued to hope for the end of the COVID-19 pandemic and beyond on Thursday as record numbers of new vaccinations were reported and the spread of the disease continued to decline.
The number of COVID-19 cases in Utah increased by 487 on Thursday, with three more deaths, according to the Utah Department of Health. Another 46,011 vaccinations have been reported, the highest number ever given in a single day, state officials say.
Governor Spencer Cox also announced that for the first time since the start of the pandemic, no county in Utah is at the high transmission level for COVID-19 in the state’s transmission index system. Beaver and Emery counties have moved from high to moderate level of transmission, meaning all counties in the state are rated at moderate or low transmission level.
“That means everything we do here in Utah… absolutely works,” Cox said at a press conference Thursday.
Additionally, it is likely that all state and local health orders related to COVID-19 will expire in the coming days, as required by Utah House Bill 294.
The bill, also known as the state’s COVID-19 end-of-game bill, requires all state and local Utah health orders related to the pandemic to end on the day where the state’s 14-day case rate is less than 191 per 100,000 population. , the seven-day average of COVID-19 intensive care unit use is less than 15%, and 1,633,000 first-order doses of the COVID-19 vaccine have been assigned in Utah.
The state’s 14-day average case rate is 181.1 on Thursday, the first time it has been reported below the threshold of HB294. The seven-day average COVID-19 ICU usage, which has been below the threshold for several days, is 10.4% on Thursday. And 1,628,520 primary doses of the COVID-19 vaccine have now been allocated in Utah, meaning less than 5,000 additional doses must be allocated to the state for HB294 to trigger the end of state and local health orders.
The state could reach that threshold by Friday or next week at the latest. Cox said 106,000 doses of the first-order vaccine, a record high, will be allocated to Utah next week, mainly due to a 40,000-dose increase in Johnson’s state vaccine allocation. Johnson.
“We have known from the start that vaccines are the fastest way to end this pandemic,” Cox said.
Although the statewide mask mandate ends on April 10, as required by HB294, the masks will still be needed in K-12 schools and at gatherings of 50 or more people. Private companies will also be able to require masks in their establishments and have been encouraged to do so, Cox said.
Utah state employees have been told masks will be required at their workplaces until the end of May, the governor added. As employers, state leaders felt they had a responsibility and a duty to protect their employees from the spread of the disease by continuing to demand masks, he said.
Gov. Lt. Gov. Deidre Henderson and Utah Department of Health State Epidemiologist Dr. Angela Dunn provided an update on the COVID-19 pandemic at a press conference Thursday they also announced a grant program designed to help employers get more Utahn back to work.
Henderson announced details of a $ 15 million grant funding round under the Learn and Work from his office program. Cox also announced an executive order that orders state agencies to create more programs that will help people return to work.
The Learn and Work program will fund training programs for the unemployed, underemployed and vulnerable workers in Utah, according to Henderson.
Henderson and Cox made the announcement at the Northrop Grumman facility in Roy. Beth Pitts-Madonna, vice president of human resources for Northrop Grumman Space Systems, and Greg Manuel, vice president and general manager of the strategic deterrence systems division of Northrop Grumman also spoke at the event.
Watch the replay of Thursday’s press conference below.
Demand for COVID-19 vaccines remains high, officials say
State leaders have been prepared to deal with the Utahn’s reluctance to get vaccinated, but demand for the vaccine has remained high throughout the state’s deployment, Dunn said.
There have been very few reports of serious side effects from the vaccine and no reports of deaths from the vaccine, she added.
“It’s really amazing,” Dunn said.
About 84% of Utahns aged 70 and older have now received at least one dose of the vaccine, and about 82% of Utahns 65 and older have received a dose, according to Cox.
A study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recently concluded that vaccines prevent about 95% of COVID-19 cases, Dunn said. Vaccines are also known to be very effective against serious illnesses and hospitalizations, according to health officials.
Several “groundbreaking cases” of COVID-19 have been reported in Utah, Dunn said Thursday. A groundbreaking case of COVID-19 is one that is diagnosed after a person is considered fully vaccinated, or at least two weeks after receiving their final dose of the vaccine, Dunn said.
A total of 97 groundbreaking cases have been reported so far in Utah, representing about 0.02% of the 521,686 fully vaccinated Utahns, she said.
The vaccine primarily prevented serious illness in these groundbreaking cases, Dunn said. In one case, a group of 15 groundbreaking cases were diagnosed in a long-term care facility, but none of the 15 people who tested positive for the disease exhibited any symptoms, she added.
Five of the people who had groundbreaking cases were hospitalized, Dunn said. However, all five were older adults who had underlying health issues, and it is not yet clear whether they were hospitalized due to their underlying conditions or due to COVID-19. she added.
New COVID-19 cases
The state now estimates that there are 9,489 active cases of COVID-19 in Utah, according to the health department.
The rolling average number of positive cases per day over seven days is now 411, according to state data. The positive test rate per day for this period of time reported with the “people over people” method is now 6.8%, down from 7.6% last week, according to Dunn. The seven-day average positive test rate per day calculated with the “test-to-test” method is now 3.4%, down from 3.8% last week, she added.
There are now 136 COVID-19 patients currently hospitalized in Utah, including 50 in intensive care, according to state data. About 67% of all intensive care unit beds in Utah are occupied Thursday, including about 70% of intensive care beds at the state’s 16 referral hospitals. About 54% of non-ICU hospital beds are now occupied, according to health department data.
A total of 1,410,214 doses of the vaccine were administered in the state, up from 1,364,203 on Wednesday. There are now 925,628 Utahns who have received at least one dose of the vaccine, while 521,686 are fully vaccinated, according to state data.
The new figures indicate a 0.1% increase in positive cases since Wednesday. Of the 2,394,649 people tested for COVID-19 in Utah so far, 16.1% have tested positive for COVID-19. The number of COVID-19 tests carried out since the start of the pandemic is now 4,254,688, up 18,760 since Wednesday. Of those, 7,661 were tests of people who had never been tested before for COVID-19, according to state data.
The three deaths reported on Thursday were:
- Salt Lake County man who was between 65 and 84 and was hospitalized when he died
- Washington County woman aged 65 to 84 admitted to hospital after death
- Weber County woman aged 65 to 84 admitted to hospital after death
Thursday’s totals give Utah 386,128 total confirmed cases, with 15,554 total hospitalizations and 2,125 total deaths from the disease. It is estimated that 374,514 cases of COVID-19 in Utah have now been recovered, according to state data.
Daggett, Garfield, Juab, Piute, Rich and Wayne counties are now at the moderate transmission level according to the Utah Transmission Index System. All other Utah counties are now at the moderate transmission level.
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