Daily coronavirus updates: Daily positivity rate below 2% for first time in two months; 68% of Connecticut residents fully vaccinated
Connecticut’s daily positivity rate dropped below 2% for the first time in two months and the state reported no new hospitalizations Friday, continuing a recent trend of overall declines.
Dr. Ajay Kumar, Hartford HealthCare’s chief clinical officer, said Friday he shared the “cautious optimism” expressed this week by Department of Public Health commissioner Dr. Manisha Juthani about Connecticut’s COVID-19 trajectory.
“We’ve seen some positive signs,” he said. “We’ve seen a decrease in positivity rate, we have seen some decline in hospitalizations.”
Kumar added that the current peak of COVID-19 had taken longer than expected to taper off, but he said he was “optimistic that this would improve over time.”
The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Thursday endorsed booster shots for Americans who received the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, including people age 18 to 64 who are at risk of exposure to COVID-19 due to health or their jobs. Late Thursday CDC director Dr. Rochelle Walensky overruled an advisory panel recommendation, opening eligibility for third doses to front line workers, including teachers and health care workers.
Eric Arlia, pharmacy system director for Hartford HealthCare, said midday Friday that the health system was finalizing its online scheduling system for booster shots, which he said would be open to the new eligibility group by the end of the day.
Hartford HealthCare has 17 COVID-19 vaccine clinics in the state poised to administer the Pfizer boosters, he added.
Case and positivity rate
Connecticut reported 470 COVID-19 cases Friday out of 24,960 tests administered, for a daily positivity rate of 1.88%, the lowest single-day positivity rate the state has recorded since July. The state’s weekly positivity rate dipped to 2.22% Friday, also the lowest it has been since July.
The state has now averaged 484 daily COVID-19 cases over the past week, fewest in a seven-day period since early August.
As of Thursday, 81 of Connecticut’s 169 towns qualified for the state’s red alert category, triggered by an average of 15 or more daily cases per 100,000 residents.
Seven of Connecticut’s eight counties currently have “high” COVID-19 transmission as defined by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Middlesex County, the one outlier, has “substantial” COVID-19 transmission, a slightly lower level of transmission.
Hospitalizations
Connecticut reported 282 patients hospitalized with COVID-19 Friday, unchanging from the day before.
According to state numbers, about 75% of people hospitalized with COVID-19 in Connecticut are unvaccinated. Hospital officials say many of the vaccinated people who are hospitalized with COVID-19 were admitted for other reasons and do not have severe coronavirus symptoms.
Josh Geballe, the state’s chief operating officer, estimated Thursday that only about 10% of those hospitalized with significant COVID-19 symptoms are vaccinated.
Deaths
Connecticut reports coronavirus-linked deaths once a week. On Thursday, the state reported 36 COVID-19 deaths over the past week, bringing its total during the pandemic to 8,483.
The United States has now recorded 685,389 COVID-19 deaths, according to the Coronavirus Resource Center at Johns Hopkins University.
Vaccinations
As of Friday, 75.7% of all Connecticut residents and 86.8% of those 12 and older had received at least one COVID-19 vaccine dose, while 68.3% of all residents and 78.3% of those 12 and older were fully vaccinated, according to the CDC.
Vaccine providers in Connecticut administered 38,818 doses from Sept. 12-18, up slightly from the previous week.
Eliza Fawcett can be reached at elfawcett@courant.com. Courant staff writer Alex Putterman contributed to this report.
