New Jersey reported another 2,820 confirmed coronavirus cases and 48 additional deaths on Tuesday, a day after Governor Phil Murphy announced that the state is set to significantly expand eligibility for the vaccine next month.
Teachers from pre-school to 12th grade, as well as daycare and transportation staff, will be eligible on March 15 and key frontline staff, including restaurant and grocery staff, will be eligible two weeks later, March 29.
There were 2.1 million doses of the COVID-19 vaccine administered in New Jersey on Tuesday morning. This includes 1.4 million first doses and 721,000 second doses.
That is more than 2.5 million doses the state has received, according to an ongoing count by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The state’s goal is to vaccinate 70% of its adult population – about 4.7 million people – in the coming months.
The Garden State seven-day average for new cases of COVID-19 is now 2,884, up 10% from the previous week, but down 26% from the previous month.
The number of coronavirus patients in New Jersey hospitals has increased slightly for the third consecutive day, rising to 1,915 on Monday night. Still, this represents a 51% drop from the recent peak of 3,872 on December 22.
The last statewide transmission rate increased to 0.97 from 0.94 the day before. Any rate below 1 means that the outbreak is decreasing, although the number has increased in the past few days.
New Jersey’s vaccination efforts are expected to be stepped up this week with the arrival of the first shipment of a single-dose coronavirus vaccine produced by Johnson & Johnson of New Brunswick. The state is scheduled to receive about 73,000 doses in its first batch, with a similar amount arriving in subsequent weeks. This is in addition to the weekly quota of two-dose vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna in the state.
The other New Jersey drugmaker, Merck & Co., will help rival Johnson & Johnson produce the vaccine to expand supplies more quickly, a federal official confirmed to the Associated Press on Tuesday.
Despite the new vaccine and increased eligibility, state officials on Monday emphasized that demand will continue to exceed supply in the coming weeks, so scheduling appointments can still be a challenge.
State health commissioner Judith Persichilli also warned that cases and hospitalizations may “increase a little” in New Jersey in the coming days because of the COVID-19 variants that have emerged. So far, only one variant has been confirmed in New Jersey – the B117 strain first discovered in the UK. The state has notified 63 cases of this strain.
CORONAVIRUS RESOURCES: Live Map Tracker | Newsletter | Home page
New Jersey now reported 707,099 confirmed cases of coronavirus in 10.7 million CRP tests in almost a year since the state reported its first case on March 4, 2020. There have also been 88,686 positive antigen tests. These cases are considered likely, and health officials have warned that positive antigen tests can override confirmed PCR tests because they are sometimes administered together.
The state of 9 million people reported that 23,321 residents died from complications related to COVID-19, including 20,990 confirmed deaths and 2,331 deaths considered likely.
COUNTY BY COUNTY NUMBERS (ranked by most new cases)
- Bergen County: 69,496 confirmed cases (347 new), 2,340 confirmed deaths (281 probable)
- Hudson County: 64,178 confirmed cases (316 new), 1,831 confirmed deaths (180 likely)
- Monmouth County: 52,051 confirmed cases (255 new), 1,285 confirmed deaths (122 likely)
- Middlesex County: 68,044 confirmed cases (224 new), 1,871 confirmed deaths (229 likely)
- Essex County: 67,907 confirmed cases (220 new), 2,414 confirmed deaths (269 likely)
- Passaic County: 52,362 confirmed cases (188 new), 1,525 confirmed deaths (173 likely)
- Morris County: 32,443 confirmed cases (185 new), 897 confirmed deaths (227 probable)
- Union County: 49,373 confirmed cases (181 new), 1,571 confirmed deaths (197 likely)
- Ocean County: 52,320 confirmed cases (180 new), 1,749 confirmed deaths (117 probable)
- Camden County: 39,656 confirmed cases (104 new), 1,070 confirmed deaths (84 likely)
- Burlington County: 31,082 confirmed cases (90 new), 692 confirmed deaths (54 likely)
- Mercer County: 26,325 confirmed cases (83 new), 838 confirmed deaths (39 probable)
- Somerset County: 18,831 confirmed cases (73 new), 683 confirmed deaths (102 probable)
- Atlantic County: 19,864 confirmed cases (69 new), 546 confirmed deaths (27 probable)
- Gloucester County: 21,196 confirmed cases (68 new), 516 confirmed deaths (28 probable)
- Sussex County: 8,031 confirmed cases (39 new), 209 confirmed deaths (64 probable)
- Cumberland County: 12,240 confirmed cases (37 new), 343 confirmed deaths (27 probable)
- Warren County: 6,410 confirmed cases (37 new), 198 confirmed deaths (19 probable)
- Hunterdon County: 6,359 confirmed cases (36 new), 105 confirmed deaths (54 likely)
- Salem County: 4,263 confirmed cases (13 new), 152 confirmed deaths (12 probable)
- Cape May County: 3,724 confirmed cases (6 new), 155 confirmed deaths (26 probable)
VACCINATIONS BY COUNTY
- ATLANTIC COUNTY – 69,009 doses administered
- BERGEN COUNTY – 240,521 doses administered
- BURLINGTON COUNTY – 110,865 doses administered
- CAMDEN COUNTY – 125,484 doses administered
- CAPE MAY COUNTY – 32,021 doses administered
- CUMBERLAND COUNTY – 30,399 doses administered
- ESSEX COUNTY – 172,533 doses administered
- GLOUCESTER COUNTY – 79,326 doses administered
- HUDSON COUNTY – 98,989 doses administered
- HUNTERDON COUNTY – 29,184 doses administered
- MERCER COUNTY – 69,917 doses administered
- MIDDLESEX COUNTY – 170,446 doses administered
- MONMOUTH COUNTY – 166,337 doses administered
- MORRIS COUNTY – 160,190 doses administered
- OCEAN COUNTY – 138,650 doses administered
- OUT OF STATE – 60,168 doses administered
- PASSAICO COUNTY – 95,874 doses administered
- SALEM COUNTY – 14,089 doses administered
- SOMERSET COUNTY – 88,046 doses administered
- SUSSEX COUNTY – 33,320 doses administered
- UNION COUNTY – 107,547 doses administered
- UNKNOWN COUNTY – 17,672 doses administered
- WARREN COUNTY – 21,568 doses administered
HOSPITALIZATIONS
There were 1,915 hospitalized patients with confirmed or suspected cases of COVID-19 in 70 of New Jersey’s 71 hospitals on Monday night – 14 more than the night before, according to the state panel.
This included 395 in critical or intensive care (one more than the previous night), with 230 in ventilators (two more).
There were also 147 patients with COVID-19 were discharged on Monday.
Hospitalizations peaked in more than 8,000 patients during the first wave of the pandemic in April.
SCHOOL CASES
New Jersey reported 152 outbreaks of coronavirus in schools, which resulted in 737 cases among students, teachers and school staff this school year, according to the state panel.
The state 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 the school. These figures do not include students or staff believed to have been infected outside of school or cases that cannot be confirmed as outbreaks at school.
There are about 1.4 million public school students and teachers across the state, although teaching methods in the midst of the outbreak have varied, with some schools teaching in person, some using a hybrid format and others remaining entirely remote.
Murphy said on Monday that, with teachers soon qualified to receive the vaccine, authorities are “fully expecting” that New Jersey schools will return to personal learning “safely and responsibly” when the next school year begins. September, if not earlier.
“I would be very surprised and disappointed if it weren’t,” he said.
AGE DISSOLUTION
Separated by age, those aged 30 to 49 constitute the highest percentage of New Jersey residents who caught the virus (31%), followed by those aged 50-64 (23.3%), 18-29 (19.5%) ), 65-79 (10.9%), 5-17 (8.4%), 80 and older (5%) and 0-4 (1.7%).
On average, the virus was more deadly for older residents, especially those with pre-existing illnesses. Almost half of the deaths from COVID-19 in the state occurred among residents aged 80 and over (47.25%), followed by those 65-79 (32.76%), 50-64 (15.58%), 30- 49 (4.02%), 18-29 (0.37%), 5-17 (0%) and 0-4 (0.02%).
At least 7,911 of the state’s COVID-19 deaths occurred among residents and staff members in nursing homes and other long-term care institutions.
There are currently active outbreaks in 337 facilities, resulting in 6,329 active cases among residents and 6,471 among employees.
GLOBAL NUMBERS
As of Tuesday afternoon, there were more than 114.6 million positive COVID-19 tests worldwide, according to a count running by Johns Hopkins University. More than 2.5 million people died of coronavirus-related complications.
The United States reported the majority of cases, with more than 28.6 million, and the majority of deaths, with more than 515,000.
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Brent Johnson can be contacted at [email protected].