New Jersey health officials reported another 1,026 COVID-19 cases and 9 confirmed deaths on Tuesday as 18 of the states 21 counties are considered to have high community levels of coronavirus.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) added eight new counties to the list of those with high community levels of the coronavirus on Friday. The CDC considers only three counties to have medium community levels of COVID-19: Sussex, Somerset and Mercer.
The states seven-day average for confirmed positive tests is 1,882, down 4% from a week ago and up 66% from a month ago.
While positive tests have been steadily rising, New Jersey has not seen a repeat of the surge in cases that occurred in December 2021. The seven-day average for Dec. 27, 2021, was more than 12,000 confirmed positive tests.
The statewide rate of transmission was 1.08 on Tuesday. A transmission rate of 1 means the number of cases have leveled off, while anything above 1 indicates the outbreak is expanding.
There were 1,424 patients with confirmed or suspected coronavirus cases reported across 69 of the states 71 hospitals Monday night. Of those hospitalized, 158 are in intensive care and 53 are on ventilators.
The statewide positivity rate for tests conducted Friday, the most recent day for which data is available, was 14.92%.
The CDC considers positivity rates above 10% to be high. New Jerseys statewide positivity rate is substantially lower than its peak of 40.83% on Jan. 1 during the height of the omicron variant.
TOTAL NUMBERS
New Jersey has reported more than 2.4 million total confirmed COVID-19 cases since it announced its first known case on March 4, 2020.
The Garden State has also recorded 461,012 positive antigen or rapid tests, which are considered probable cases. There are also numerous cases that were likely never counted, including at-home positive tests that are not included in the states numbers.
The state of 9.2 million residents has reported 35,434 COVID-19 deaths 32,318 confirmed fatalities and 3,116 probable ones.
New Jersey has the 10th-most coronavirus deaths per capita in the U.S. behind Arizona, Mississippi, Oklahoma, West Virginia, Alabama, Arkansas, New Mexico, Tennessee and Michigan as of December 21.
VACCINATION NUMBERS
More than 7.1 million people who work, live or study in New Jersey have reached fully vaccinated status. More than 8 million people have received a first dose since vaccinations began in the state on Dec. 15, 2020.
More than 4.3 million people in the state eligible for boosters have received one.
LONG-TERM CARE NUMBERS
At least 8,815 of the states COVID-19 deaths have been among residents and staff members at nursing homes and other long-term care facilities, according to the most recent state data.
Of the active outbreaks at 375 facilities, there are 8,815 current cases among residents and 5,929 cases among staff, as of the latest data.
GLOBAL NUMBERS
There have been more than 658 million COVID-19 cases reported across the globe, according to Johns Hopkins Universitys coronavirus database.
More than 6.68 million people have died because of the virus, the data shows. The U.S. has reported the most cumulative cases (more than 100 million) and deaths (at least 1.09 million) of any nation.
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Nicolas Fernandes may be reached at nfernandes@njadvancemedia.com