A clinician cares for a COVID-19 patient in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) at Providence St. Mary Medical Center amid a sudden surge in COVID-19 patients in Southern California on December 23, 2020 in Apple Valley, California . (Photo by Mario Tama / Getty Images)
This is a regularly updated story with the latest information on the coronavirus and its impact in Arizona and beyond on December 24, 2020.
PHOENIX – Arizona health officials reported on Thursday 7,046 new cases of coronavirus and 115 additional deaths, while hospitalizations for COVID-19 again reached a new high.
The state’s documented totals increased to 480,319 COVID-19 infections and 8,294 deaths, according to the Arizona Department of Health Services panel.
The daily reports present data on cases, deaths and tests after the state receives the statistics and confirms them, which can take several days or more. They do not represent actual activity in the past 24 hours.
Several COVID-19 metrics in Arizona remain at or near pandemic levels.
The number of patients admitted to confirmed or suspected COVID-19 hospitals in Arizona peaked at 4,221 on Wednesday, the 11th daily record in the past 13 days.
The number of COVID-19 patients in the state’s ICU beds dropped to 965, seven below the previous day’s record level and the third highest ever.
Suspected or confirmed COVID-19 patients across the state occupied 50% of all hospital beds, a record, and 54% of all ICU beds.
Overall, the hospital beds were 92% occupied and the ICU beds were a pandemic record 93% filled. The state had 132 unused ICU beds, an increase from the record 119 beds the previous day.
Hospitalization data published every morning is reported electronically the night before by 100 hospitals across the state, as required by the executive order.
Arizona’s weekly positivity percentage for the COVID-19 diagnostic test, an indicator of how much the virus is spreading in the community, was 23% through 29,603 tests this week. If that holds true, it will break the record of 21% for the week that started on June 28th.
Official positivity rates are based on when samples are collected, not when they are reported, so the percentage of the past few weeks may fluctuate as laboratories update tests and results are documented by the state.
The seven-day moving average for the newly reported cases from the health department was 6,293.43 on Wednesday, according to the Associated Press tracking, above the previous day, but about 1,500 below the peak of 14 June. December.
The seven-day average of newly reported COVID-19 deaths dropped to 92.71 on Wednesday, down from the record high of 100.43 on Tuesday, but still the third highest ever .
COVID-19, the disease caused by the new coronavirus, has no impact on some people and is severely debilitating or fatal for others. Infected people without symptoms – which include, but are not limited to, cough, fever and difficulty breathing – are able to spread the virus.
Information about the test locations can be found on the Arizona Department of Health Services website.
Below are Thursday’s latest developments on the coronavirus pandemic across the state, country and world:
- House Republicans rejected a Democratic offer to approve President Donald Trump’s remote demand for direct payments of $ 2,000 for most Americans, while he ponders whether to sign a long-delayed COVID-19 relief project.
- Globally, there were about 78.84 million cases of COVID-19 and 1.73 million deaths on Thursday morning, according to research by Johns Hopkins University. The figures for the US are around 18.47 million cases and 326,000 deaths.