Utah is in “a good position” now in the battle against COVID-19, said an infectious disease physician at Intermountain Healthcare on Friday, while the Utah Department of Health reported another 422 new cases of COVID-19 and six additional deaths by the virus.
“This is a time to be optimistic,” Dr. Eddie Stenehjem told reporters during a virtual press conference with the region’s largest health care provider. Stenehjem said that while there are still very sick patients hospitalized with the deadly virus, the number of cases, rates of positive tests, hospitalizations and deaths are falling.
At the same time, the doctor said, more and more Utahns are being vaccinated against COVID-19.
As of Friday, a total of 1,450,263 doses of vaccine have been administered to Utahns, a daily increase of 40,049, the health department said. Almost 522,000 Utahns are now fully vaccinated, meaning that it has been at least two weeks since the final dose.
“This is a good place to be right now, here in Utah,” said Stenehjem, as the case count is accelerating in about 30 states, including Michigan. “We are not out of the woods at all, but man, we are in a much better place now than we were three months ago.”
While spring break activities could trigger a new outbreak of COVID-19 if partygoers are not wearing masks and social detachment, especially as more contagious variants of the virus continue to emerge across the county, he said an increase in cases could be very different than after the winter holidays.
About 80% of Utahns aged 70 and over have been vaccinated, said the doctor, “so even if we see this increase, we can see it mitigated in terms of hospitalizations and death,” said the doctor. In addition to protecting the vulnerable population, he said the warmer climate means that people spend more time away from home, where transmission is reduced.
Still, Stenehjem warned: “we are not going to let our guard down.” He said there was still “a good amount” of the virus circulating in Utah, so the same public health recommendations, including wearing masks, even after the state term ended on April 10, continue to apply. “It isn’t gone.”
Even children playing outdoors should wear masks, said Stenehjem, if they are around other people and the air is still. The first infant death from the virus in Utah, reported in March, was a boy from Salt Lake County between the ages of 1 and 14 who was hospitalized at the time of his death.
As vaccinations increase, the doctor said, Utah could “probably have slightly more relaxed public health measures as we move into the summer.” He said he and his family will continue to wear masks until science “tells us it is safe” to give up protection against the spread of the virus.
The new law that ends the mandate of the state mask on April 10 also removes other restrictions as soon as the state receives 1.63 million of the first doses of vaccine, if cases count and hospitalization rates remain low. This is expected to happen in mid-May, although the requirements for the K-12 mask will remain in effect until June.
The latest case count brings the total number of coronavirus cases in Utah since the pandemic began more than a year ago to 386,550. The seven-day continuous average for positive tests is now 407 per day, the department’s data shows, with another 5,761 Utahns doing COVID-19 tests and an additional 14,258 tests conducted since Thursday.
More than 2.4 million Utahns have done just under 4.3 million tests, and the seven-day continuous average for the positive test percentage is 3.4% when all results are included, the method used by the state to help calculate transmission levels, and 6.9% when multiple test results from an individual in the past 90 days are excluded.
Currently, 138 are hospitalized in Utah with COVID-19, increasing the total number of hospitalizations in the state to 15,573.
The number of deaths from the coronavirus in Utah is 2,131, with the six deaths reported on Friday. These deaths, which include four that occurred before March 1, are:
• A woman from Davis County, between 65 and 84 years old, residing in a long-term care institution.
• A man from Salt Lake County, aged 65 to 84, hospitalized.
• A woman from Millard County, aged 65 to 84, hospitalized.
• A man from Weber County, over 85 years old, residing in a long-term care institution.
• A woman from Salt Lake County, aged 65 to 84, hospitalized.
• A woman from Utah County, over 85, residing in a long-term care facility.