Here are the latest COVID-19 case numbers confirmed Wednesday in Washington state
The Washington state Department of Health reported 1,582 new cases of COVID-19 and seven deaths Wednesday.
Pierce County reported 101 cases Wednesday and no new deaths. The county has 516 deaths likely caused by COVID-19, according to the Tacoma-Pierce County Health Department.
Statewide totals from the illness caused by the coronavirus are 372,170 cases and 5,306 deaths. Those numbers are up from 370,588 cases and 5,299 deaths Tuesday. The case total includes 24,647 infections listed as probable. DOH revises previous case and death counts daily.
Washington’s population is estimated at about 7.6 million, according to U.S. Census figures from July 2019.
Hospitalizations
As of March 19, the date with the most recent complete data, 41 people with confirmed cases of COVID-19 were admitted to Washington state hospitals.
Preliminary reports indicate average daily hospital admissions were slightly increasing at 37 in late March.
Out of the state’s total staffed intensive care unit beds (1,240) approximately 77% (955) were occupied by patients Tuesday. Of those staffed ICU beds, 8.5% (105) held suspected and confirmed COVID-19 patients.
Case rates
For the past seven days, Washington has had a decreasing case rate of 97.4 per 100,000 people. Twenty states were lower.
The national rate for the same period was 133 per 100,000, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Michigan has the highest rate in the United States at 469. Arkansas is the lowest at 35.6.
Vaccine
According to the CDC, 4.09 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines have been administered in Washington.
Washington state is in phase 1B tiers 3 and 4 of vaccinations. On April 15, all Washington residents age 16 and older will become eligible for the vaccine.
On the national level, 225 million doses have been distributed and 171 million shots of the approved vaccines have been given, according to CDC statistics.
As of Wednesday, 24.9% of the adult U.S. population has been fully vaccinated.
Testing
On March 19, the most recent date with confirmed testing data, 16,425 specimens were collected statewide, with 3.9% testing positive.
The average positive test rate for the seven days prior was an upward trending 3.6%. More than 6 million tests have been conducted in Washington. The test numbers reflect only polymerase chain reaction tests, which are administered while the virus is presumably still active in the body.
County numbers
According to DOH data, King County, with the state’s highest population, continues to have the highest numbers in Washington, with 93,002 cases and 1,478 deaths. Pierce County, second in population, is second in cases, with 43,842. Pierce County has the second-highest number of deaths, at 617, according to DOH, which counts deaths differently than the Tacoma-Pierce County Health Department.
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.
U.S. and world numbers
There have been more than 30.9 million confirmed coronavirus cases and 559,066 deaths from the virus in the United States as of Wednesday, according to Johns Hopkins University. The United States has the highest total number of reported cases and deaths of any nation.
More than 2.88 million people have died from the disease worldwide. Global cases exceed 132 million.
This story was originally published April 7, 2021 at 5:01 PM.
