Maryland again adds over 1,000 cases

Hospitalizations increase slightly; three more people dead

For the second day in a row and sixth time in the last 8 days, Maryland health officials reported more than 1,000 new coronavirus cases across the state Thursday, as hospitalizations attributable to the illness continued to edge upward.

Here’s how the state’s COVID-19 indicators stacked up:

Cases

Maryland added 1,382 coronavirus cases Thursday, the most daily infections since Feb. 7, according to state health department data. The state’s pandemic case count climbed to 403,982.

The state has averaged 964 new infections daily over the last two weeks.

Deaths

Three more Marylanders were reported dead from COVID-19, bringing to 8,032 the number of fatalities since health officials began to track the disease in March 2020.

Hospitalizations

Four more people were hospitalized with the coronavirus compared to a day earlier. Of the 919 patients battling the virus in hospitals across the state, 223 required intensive care.

The number of hospitalizations has climbed for a week.

Testing positivity

The state’s testing positivity rate held steady at 4.59% after about two weeks of gradual increases.

Measuring the percentage of COVID-19 tests returned positive over seven days, the positivity rate has trended upward since hitting a trough in early March. It’s still less than half the 9.47% peak recorded Jan. 3 during a winter surge of the virus.

The counties of Baltimore (5.01%), Calvert (4.91%), Carroll (5.51%), Cecil (6.47%), Charles (6.71%), Dorchester (5.31%), Frederick (5.09%), Garrett (5.75%), Harford (6.45%), Prince George’s (5.3%), Queen Anne’s (4.6%), Washington (5.94%) and Wicomico (5.59%) are all above the state average. The World Health Organization recommends places achieve a positivity rate below 5% before relaxing coronavirus restrictions.

About 41,000 tests were completed across the state over the last 24 hours.

Vaccinations

Providers in Maryland administered 54,269 doses of COVID-19 vaccines Wednesday, bringing to 45,855 the average number of immunizations dished out daily in the state over the last week, health department data shows.

The majority of the vaccines shot into arms over the past 24 hours — 37,873 — were the first of two-dose immunization regimens made by Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna. About 15,000 got their final immunization, while 1,144 received Johnson & Johnson’s single-shot immunization.

About a quarter of Maryland’s more than 6 million residents have received at least one vaccine dose; 832,551 have been fully vaccinated, about 13.8% of the state’s population.

Vaccines by age: Almost 69% of Maryland residents 65 and older have received at least one dose of the coronavirus vaccine, according to health department data. The state began offering immunizations to anyone who is at least 60 years old Tuesday.

Vaccines by race: About 3.6 times as many white people have been fully vaccinated in Maryland compared to Black people, health department data shows. The demographic groups make up 58.5% and 31% of the state’s population, respectively.

Meanwhile, less than 4% of the people who’ve been fully vaccinated and whose ethnicity was known identified as Latino.

About 11% of Maryland’s population is Latino, according to U.S. Census Bureau estimates.

Vaccines by county: Prince George’s and Charles counties, both majority Black, continue to trail behind the rest of the state’s jurisdictions in terms of the percentage of their populations which have been fully vaccinated.

Just 8.03% of Prince George’s roughly 909,000 people have finished their immunization regimens, while 9.07% of Charles’ approximately 163,000 have completed theirs. They are the only two jurisdictions where less than 10% of their populations fully vaccinated. Combined, the two counties account for about 18% of Maryland residents.

Cecil County, which is almost 90% white, is not far ahead. Only about 10.8% of its approximately 103,000 people have completed their immunizations. Less populous, but more diverse, Somerset County has seen about 11.4% of its 25,000 people fully vaccinated.

About 11.8% of Baltimore’s 593,000 people have been fully vaccinated.

Meanwhile, the rural Eastern Shore counties of Kent and Talbot are the only jurisdictions whose populations are more than 20% fully vaccinated. About 21.5% of Kent’s 19,000 people and 20.9% of Talbot’s 37,000 residents have completed their immunizations.