US breaks record of COVID-19 deaths in third week, hospitalizations fall

(Reuters) – The United States lost more than 23,000 lives to COVID-19 last week, setting a record for the third consecutive week, although the number of new infections and the number of patients in hospitals have dropped from the previous seven days.

The country reported more than 1.5 million new cases of COVID-19 in the week ended January 17, down 12% from the previous week, and only eight of the 50 states reported an increase in new infections, according to a Reuters analysis of the state and county reports.

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The average number of COVID-19 patients in hospitals fell 2% from the previous week to about 128,000, the first drop since October, according to a Reuters analysis of data from the COVID Tracking Project, run by volunteers.

While some health officials have expressed concern about the spread of a more contagious variant of the virus across the United States, California Secretary of Health and Human Services, Dr. Mark Ghaly, has taken comfort in the fact that California hospitals admit 2,500 patients with coronavirus every 24 hours, against 3,500 per day.

Ghaly told reporters last week that it was “the biggest sign for me that things are starting to flatten out and potentially improve”.

Cumulatively, nearly 400,000 people died from the new coronavirus, or one in 822 residents in the United States. The country set a single-day record with 4,336 deaths recorded on January 12, according to Reuters analysis of state and municipal reports.

Alabama had the highest per capita mortality rate last week with 16 per 100,000 residents, followed by Arizona with 15.5 per 100,000 people.

The United States set a record on January 15, with more than 2.2 million COVID-19 tests performed in a single day. Last week, 11% of the tests were positive for the virus, against 13.3% in the previous week, according to data from the COVID Screening Project. The highest positive test rates were in Iowa at 46%, Idaho at 40% and Pennsylvania at 35%.