An additional 4,686 COVID-19 cases and 26 deaths were announced on Sunday, as vaccination appointments in New Jersey remained difficult to secure.
The state recently expanded the vaccine’s eligibility to people over 65, residents with certain health conditions and smokers, creating an accumulation of consultations when the vaccines promised by the federal government did not materialize.
“Governors received guarantees of @HHSGov that we would receive additional vaccines from the national reserve for our elderly, health professionals and first responders, ”wrote Murphy on Saturday on Twitter. “We need answers on why this inventory doesn’t exist and our allocations have been reduced than we expected.”
Murphy added that the vaccine would be distributed to those at “highest risk” for severe cases of COVID-19 due to age and underlying conditions.
“Our first priority is to vaccinate those most at risk for severe COVID due to age and chronic health factors – and have the infrastructure ready to rapidly increase distribution when federal supply meets demand,” Murphy wrote on Twitter.
The 7-day average for new confirmed coronavirus cases is now 5,367, an increase of 4% over the previous week and 13% over the previous month.
Sunday’s hospitalization data was not immediately available. There were 3,677 patients hospitalized in New Jersey with confirmed or suspected cases of COVID-19 on Friday night. That was 134 more than the night before and an increase after two days, when the number of people hospitalized fell.
The state’s 9 million residents have already lost 20,439 residents in the COVID-19 outbreak – 18,348 confirmed deaths and 2,091 considered likely, according to state data. New Jersey has already announced 1,252 confirmed deaths this month, after 1,890 in December.
New Jersey reported 565,097 confirmed cases in more than 8.6 million tests administered since the authorities announced the state’s first case on March 4. There were also 62,124 positive rapid antigen tests, which the state began reporting publicly earlier this month, although officials warned that they could override confirmed PCR tests.
The state COVID-19 transmission fee remained stable at 1.12. A transmission rate above 1 indicates that the outbreak is expanding.
The positivity rate for tests administered on Wednesday, the most recent day available, was 10.12% on 54,903 tests. The positivity rate has been at 10% or more since December 22, before dropping to less than 10% on Monday.
The New Jersey chief health officer warned on Wednesday that the state is preparing for an “increase” in hospitalizations due to the latest increase in cases that may occur as early as next week and could trigger a new round of restrictions, particularly involving elective surgeries.
Although hospitalizations remained between 3,500 and 3,900 for weeks – well below the peak of more than 8,000 in the spring – state health commissioner Judy Persichilli said hospital staff were concerned about the weeks ahead due to staff availability.
“What we will not have is the appropriate level of personnel that people are familiar with, conventional personnel,” said Persichilli earlier. “So, we will be working with our hospitals if they need to progress to what we call a contingency team and, hopefully, never an emergency team.”
Murphy warned that hospitalizations of more than 5,000 patients would likely trigger new restrictions – particularly involving elective surgeries, which include procedures such as the removal of tumors.
VACCINATIONS
More than 348,414 doses of the vaccine have been administered in the state as of Sunday, according to the state’s COVID-19 panel. Of these, 308,874 were the first of the two doses that people will receive, while 39,330 were the second, according to the panel.
The single-day discharge so far was January 8, when 24,482 doses were administered, according to the state.
New Jersey administered an average of about 9,500 injections per day during the first 30 days of the program, including Christmas Day, when no doses were administered. The state has averaged about 17,000 shots a day for the past seven days, state records show.
The state has faced criticism for implementing vaccines too slowly. The authorities emphasize that there may be a lower count of the number of vaccines administered due to delays in reporting and New Jersey, like other states, depends on the federal government for its supply.
Murphy announced on Wednesday that people age 65 and older, as well as people with chronic health conditions and smokers, can now receive vaccines.
Authorities said the doses should be available to the general public in April or May. Health officials said they expect to vaccinate 70% of the state’s adult residents – about 4.7 million people – by the end of May.
In recent days, New Jersey has opened the first three of the six “mega-sites” planned for mass vaccination. Vaccines are also currently available at 130 locations across the state, including local health departments, ShopRite stores and pharmacies.
More than 1.5 million people have registered to receive the vaccine.
VACCINE DOSES ADMINISTERED BY THE COUNTY
- ATLANTIC COUNTY – 11,485 doses administered
- BERGEN COUNTY – 39,504 doses administered
- BURLINGTON COUNTY – 16,936 doses administered
- CAMDEN COUNTY – 19,691 doses administered
- CAPE MAY COUNTY – 5,107 doses administered
- CUMBERLAND COUNTY – 5,575 doses administered
- ESSEX COUNTY – 27,451 doses administered
- GLOUCESTER COUNTY – 12,319 doses administered
- HUDSON COUNTY – 15,064 doses administered
- HUNTERDON COUNTY – 5,744 doses administered
- MERCER COUNTY – 8,151 doses administered
- MIDDLESEX COUNTY – 25,934 doses administered
- MONMOUTH COUNTY – 27,141 doses administered
- MORRIS COUNTY – 18,251 doses administered
- OCEAN COUNTY – 25,122 doses administered
- PASSAICO COUNTY – 15,882 doses administered
- SALEM COUNTY – 1,704 doses administered
- SOMERSET COUNTY – 14,010 doses administered
- SUSSEX COUNTY – 6,084 doses administered
- UNION COUNTY – 16,609 doses administered
- WARREN COUNTY – 3,641 doses administered
- OUT-OF-STATE RESIDENTS – 16,458 doses administered
- UNKNOWN COUNTY – 10,551 doses administered
HOSPITALIZATIONS
There were 3,677 patients hospitalized in New Jersey with confirmed or suspected cases of COVID-19 on Friday night. There were 134 more than the night before, a peak after two days when hospitalizations fell.
It included 651 in critical or intensive care (25 more than the previous night), with 427 in ventilators (11 less).
There were 437 patients with COVID-19 discharged on Friday, according to the state’s COVID-19 panel.
Saturday’s data was not immediately available.
SCHOOL CASES
There have been 111 outbreaks of coronavirus in schools in New Jersey, involving 564 students, teachers and staff since the beginning of the school year in late August, according to the state panel.
These figures do not include students or staff believed to have been infected outside the school or cases that cannot be confirmed as outbreaks within the school. Although the numbers continue to rise each week, Murphy said the school outbreak statistics remain below what state officials expected when schools reopened for face-to-face classes.
New Jersey defines school outbreaks as cases in which contact trackers determined that two or more students or school staff picked up or transmitted COVID-19 in the classroom or during academic activities at school.
The number of school districts in New Jersey with totally remote education has increased with students returning from winter holidays, Murphy said on Monday.
There are 339 districts that started 2021 remotely – an increase from 18 remote districts as of December 21. Only 77 school districts are returning with full face-to-face instruction (compared to 82 on December 21), and 348 are returning with a face-to-face or remote instruction hybrid (out of 362).
Another 47 districts are using some combination of face-to-face, hybrid or completely remote in several buildings – one more than on December 21.
AGE DISSOLUTION
Sorted by age, those aged 30 to 49 make up the highest percentage of New Jersey residents who contracted the virus (31.2%), followed by those 50-64 (23.7%), 18-29 (19.3%), 65-79 (11.1%), 80 and older (5.4%) , 5-17 (7.5%) and 0-4 (1.6%).
On average, the virus was more deadly for older residents, especially those with pre-existing illnesses. Almost half of COVID-19 deaths in the state occurred among residents aged 80 and over (47.55%), followed by those aged 65-79 (32.36%), 50-64 (15.63%), 30 -49 (4.09%), 18-29 (0.36%), 5-17 (0%) and 0-4 (0.02%).
At least 7,644 of COVID-19 deaths in the state occurred among residents and staff members in nursing homes and other long-term care institutions. That number has increased at a more pronounced rate in recent months, with deaths in state nursing homes nearly tripling in December.
There are currently active outbreaks in 426 facilities, resulting in 6,802 active cases among residents and 7,368 among employees.
GLOBAL NUMBERS
As of Sunday morning, there were more than 94.59 million positive COVID-19 tests worldwide, according to an ongoing count by Johns Hopkins University. This week, the world has reached a dismal benchmark, exceeding 2 million deaths from coronavirus-related complications.
The United States reported the majority of cases, with more than 23.7 million, and the majority of deaths, with more than 395,800.
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