More than 16,000 Delaware County have now contracted the coronavirus (COVID-19), the Delaware Public Health District said this week.
The April 21 numbers show 16,049 total cases (11,377 confirmed by testing and 4,672 probable by symptoms), 215 total hospitalizations, 266 cases placed in isolation within the last 10 days, and 110 deaths.
“We are saddened to release another death has been reported to us,” the health district posted on Facebook. “We send our heartfelt condolences to the family during this very difficult time.”
For the second week in a row, Friday’s Trends Report from DPHD said the average new cases per day were 15 per 100,000 population.
Delaware County is colored red on the state of Ohio’s latest COVID-19 advisory map, while neighboring Franklin County is the only county in the state at the worst level, purple. Delaware, like many counties in the state, also has an “H” on the map, which stands for High Case Incidence, said the Ohio Department of Health.
The purple Level 4 Public Emergency indicates “severe exposure and spread. Only leave home for supplies and services.” Many counties are like Delaware, at Level 3 or red. This means “very high exposure and spread. Limit activities as much as possible.” Other counties are at Level 2 or orange, meaning “increased exposure and spread. Exercise high degree of caution.”
Only two southern Ohio counties — Gallia and Meigs — are at the lowest alert Level 1 or yellow, “active exposure and spread.”
Delaware County has met three of the ODH’s seven indicators to merit the red alert. First is new cases over the past two weeks (435) per the county’s population (209,177) for nearly 208 cases per 100,000. Second is non-congregate cases over the past three weeks, which means “greater risk of community spread.” Third is an upward trend in emergency department visits in the past three weeks.
Four other indicators — new cases increase, outpatient visits, hospital admissions and percentage of ICU patients with COVID — were not met by the county.
The Ohio Department of Health’s Coronavirus (COVID-19) dashboard on Thursday afternoon indicated there were 1,060,119 cases, up 10,000 over the last week. There are 1,002,936 people presumed recovered, with 55,446 hospitalizations and 19,033 deaths.
Delaware County remains having the 14th-most cases of coronavirus of Ohio’s 88 counties. The ODH data has Delaware County at 18,198 cases, 287 people hospitalized and 130 deaths. The DPHD has noted the discrepancies in totals between it and the ODH are because the portions of Columbus, Dublin, and Westerville that are in Delaware County are being handled by either Columbus Public Health or Franklin County Public Health.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s COVID-19 Data Tracker said Thursday there are 31.6 million total cases due to coronavirus in the United States. There have been 566,494 Americans who have died from the coronavirus, more than 4,000 over the last week. Cases and deaths are trending down in the U.S. in the last 30 days, the CDC charts indicate.
The global pandemic has struck 144.8 million people worldwide, the The Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Dashboard said Friday morning. That is up 5.4 million from a week ago. More than 3 million people in the world have died from the infectious disease.
On Wednesday, U.S. President Joe Biden said 200 million shots had been given to Americans by his 92nd day in office.
Biden also praised Patty Young, a hair salon owner in Springfield, Ohio, whose small business has helped schedule more than 200 shots for their customers.
