30 new COVID cases in the county in past two days

By KENT THOMPSON
The Iowa Department of Public Health and Humboldt County Public Health have identified 30 new positive COVID-19 cases in the past two days.
Nineteen cases were identified on Thursday and another 11 cases today (Friday, Nov. 13), bringing the total number of positive cases in the county since the pandemic began to 568. Of those cases, 365 have recovered and there have been three deaths in the county. The active positive case count is 200.
Of the 11 new cases reported Friday, three were in the 18-40 age group, five were people ages 41-60, two were people ages 61-80 and one was 81-years-plus.
According to the Iowa COVID-19 website, there are seven active positive cases at the QHC Humboldt South Care Center. The number has been the same since Tuesday.
Administration at the Care Center would not confirm or deny the existence of the virus at the facility. Visitation is not being allowed at the center and testing protocols of staff and residents are being adhered to.
Statewide, there are 100 senior living facilities with 2,914 total positive cases. Of that number, 1,295 have recovered.
Case numbers and hospitalization due to COVID continue to climb in the state. According to the COVID-19 website, there are 928 Iowans hospitalized with a COVID-19 primary diagnosis and another 333 with COVID as a secondary diagnosis, for a total of 1,261 patients hospitalized. That figure has grown dramatically in the past two months after stable numbers from July through mid-September.
While there are 246 COVID-19 patients in intensive care units statewide, only 37 of them are patients in the 20-county region of northwest Iowa, of which Humboldt County is in the extreme eastern part. The region reports 201 hospitalized patients including 31 new patients admitted in the past 24 hours. The region reports 361 patient beds available in the 20-county area and 77 ICU beds. Seventeen patients in the region are on ventilators and there are 82 ventilators available.
According to the state’s website, 28 percent of all hospitalized patients are ages 80 and older, 23 percent are in their 70s, 18 percent are in their 60s and 13 percent are ages 50-59. People ages 49 and younger account for 16 percent of hospitalizations combined, with juveniles making up only 1 percent of those hospitalized.
Humboldt County’s percent of positivity rate for the past 14 days has remained steady this week at 24.4 percent. Webster County (26.7 percent) and Pocahontas (25.1 percent) have now surpassed Humboldt in positivity rate.

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