State: Over 6K new cases on Wednesday
Seven-day average reaches new high
The daily number of new cases of COVID-19 in Michigan continued to trend higher with another day of more than 6,000 cases added.
The state announced 6,008 new cases Wednesday, which again pushed the seven- day average higher — hitting 5,313. It was 3,507 just one week earlier, then a high.
The coronavirus was seen to be spreading faster throughout the state, far exceeding the caseloads seen in October.
Just 11 days into November, the
state was on the verge of passing the full month of October in the number of new cases confirmed.
Also, in Metro Detroit, more than 2,000 cases have been confirmed each of the last two days. Oakland County was on the verge of passing Wayne County in the number of confirmed cases. And Kent County became the fourth county to have more than 20,000 cases.
As of Wednesday, Michigan has seen 51,105 cases reported, meaning Thursday will likely see the state pass October’s caseload of 53,483.
The trends showed no signs of slowing down.
In October, the month had five days with more than 3,000 new cases, all coming after Oct. 24.
So far in November, Michigan has had three days with more than 6,000 cases.
National trends
Worldwide, more than 51.7 million cases have been reported and nearly 1.3 million have died. The update on Wednesday came as the nationwide total number of deaths surpassed 240,000 and the total caseload neared 10.3 million, according to Johns Hopkins University data.
Reuters reported late Tuesday that the week-long run saw seven straight record-breaking days of new COVID-19 infections, averaging 120,000 new cases a day.
State trends
In Michigan, the sevenday average shot to over 5,000 cases on Tuesday, after having crossed the 4,000- case threshold on just Saturday, Nov. 7. It had crossed the 3,000case threshold on just Monday, Nov. 2.
On Monday, Oct. 26, the state saw a seven- day average exceeding 2,000 for
the first time.
Michigan has had 229,285 confirmed cases since the pandemic arrived in the state in March, and it has recorded 7,766 deaths.
On Wednesday, the state reported 42 new deaths.
So far in November, 426 deaths have been recorded relating to COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus. In October, 578 deaths were recorded, while in September, there had been 278.
Count ing probable cases, Michigan has had 251,872 cases of COVID-19 and 8,136 deaths.
Testing
The positivity rates continued to inch higher even as more tests are being given to find the coronavirus.
On Tuesday, the positivity rate was 13.8 percent, down slightly from Monday’s 14.3 percent.
Since the start of November, positivity rates — the percentage of tests that have come back positive — have exceeded 10
percent most days. At the start of October, the rate was between 3 and 5 percent, but in the second half of the month, the daily positivity rate crept higher.
On Tuesday, nearly 55,000 tests were recorded, up from the more than 44,000 on Monday.
Local trends
The tri- county area in Metro Detroit saw 2,172 new cases added on Wednesday, one day after 2,248 were added.
Oakland County added 778 cases on Wednesday, pushing its total confirmed number of cases to 27,313 — just 124 cases being the county with the most in the state.
Oakland County could soon pass Wayne County, excluding Detroit, in the number of total cases, after Wayne County added 648 cases to end the day at 27,437.
Macomb County was up by 613 cases and had 23,622.
Detroit added just 133 cases and was at 16,713 cases since the pandemic arrived.
Genesee County was nearing 8,000 cases, having added 293 to reach 7,989.
In western Michigan, Kent County was up 381 cases to reach 20,178, while to the north, Ottawa County jumped by 296 cases for a total of 7,993.
In mid-Michigan, Ingham County was up by 153 to reach 5,837 cases.
To the north, Gratiot County was up by 13 to land at 793 cases, but the hike was bigger in the Mt. Pleasant area as Isabella County saw 55 cases added to reach 1,367. Clare County has found 18 new cases to reach 401.