The state reports fewer than 600 new cases and one more death.
(Rick Egan | The Salt Lake Tribune) Nursing test for COVID-19 at the Test Utah site in Herriman, Friday, February 5, 2021.
Utah is “gradually starting to see some population immunity” – also known as herd immunity, said an infectious disease doctor at Intermountain Healthcare on Tuesday.
Dr. Brandon Webb pointed to the seven-day continuous average of about 1,000 new cases per day, which is roughly where the state was in October.
“A thousand a day is still very high,” said Webb. “But we are very pleased to see that this is decreasing” as a result of people’s social distance, wearing masks, being vaccinated – and because about 180,000 Utahns have recovered from COVID-19 in the past three months.
“We are probably somewhere below 20% [immunity] at this point. … It is not enough, but it is helping, ”said Webb. “And it is very important to see more and more of the immune population, because combining that with social distance [and] masking, is driving the countdown of our case. “
For the second consecutive day, the number of new COVID-19 cases reported in Utah is well below 1,000. After reporting 462 cases on Monday, the Department of Health reported 591 positive tests on Tuesday.
Webb said the state is in a “race between vaccines and variants”, adding: “We cannot go fast enough. This is the end result here. “
He said it is “difficult to know” whether Utah is being hit by coronavirus variants, because very few tests are being done for them. Health experts are monitoring rates of reinfection and vaccine failures, which provide indirect evidence of variants, and “at least at this point, we are not seeing strong signs that we have a dominant strain here in the state. But we continue to watch very carefully. “
Webb also cautioned people who received their first dose of a coronavirus vaccine to continue to take precautions – to distance themselves socially and to wear masks.
“We are seeing many cases of acute COVID in people who received their first dose. … You have very little immunity in the first two weeks after receiving your first dose, ”he said. The data, he added, show that “you are not fully immune until you have the full two-dose series for these MRNA vaccines. … With the availability of these vaccines, we still need people to be vigilant, even after the first dose and during the second series of doses. “
Vaccinations reported the day before / total vaccinations • 7,952 / 532,985.
Number of Utahns who received two doses • 164,775.
Cases reported the previous day • 591.
Deaths reported the day before • One – a man of 85 and over in Salt Lake County.
Hospitalizations reported the previous day • 272. That’s two below Monday. Of those currently hospitalized, 106 are in intensive care units – two more than on Monday.
Tests reported the day before • 4,015 people were tested for the first time. A total of 9,985 people were tested.
Percentage of positive tests • In the original state method, the rate is 14.7%. This is higher than the seven-day average of 13.7%.
His new method counts all test results, including repeated tests from the same individual. Today’s rate is now at 5.9%, slightly below the 7-day average of 6.4%.
Totals to date • 362,347 cases; 1,797 deaths; 14,239 hospitalizations; 2,129,525 people tested.