Vaccines: As of Wednesday, more than 47,000 people in Kalamazoo County have received at least one dose of the coronavirus vaccine.
As vaccination efforts continue to ramp up in the county, more people are being inoculated at a faster rate. Facilities in the county vaccinated 2,667 people on Wednesday, bringing the total of people completely vaccinated to almost 28,000.
Vaccination rates are also rising in the state as a whole. As of Wednesday, more than 1,547,000 people had received at least one dose of the vaccine, with more than 880,000 people having completed both doses.
So far, an expected influx of half-a-million doses of vaccines has yet to materialize. As of Tuesday, the state had only received about 90,000 doses and that was made up almost entirely of doses of the new Johnson & Johnson vaccine, which only requires one dose to achieve immunity.
Michigan: New infection numbers continue to rise in the state.
On Thursday, state health officials reported 1,526 new cases of COVID-19, bringing the seven day moving average up to 1,132 new cases per day. That average has been rising pretty consistently for nearly two weeks.
The state also reported the deaths of 37 people from COVID-19. Of those deaths, 29 came as a result of reviewing previous death records. The state is averaging 21 deaths per day over the past week, which is the lowest it’s been since late October.
Hospitalizations rose again on Thursday. The state reported 890 people being treated for COVID-19 in hospitals in the state. That’s eight more than on Wednesday.
Kalamazoo County: An anomaly in the county’s publicly available infection data means we don’t know how many new cases of COVID-19 were discovered on Thursday. Officials reported a decrease of 24 total infections in the county between Wednesday and Thursday. It isn’t clear if the count is a typo or due to some reassessment of total infection numbers.
The county did report than one more person has died due to the coronavirus. The seven day average stayed steady at 0.3 deaths per day.
Hospitalizations due to the virus remain low in the county when compared with previous weeks, however both Kalamazoo hospitals remain close to full capacity.
Bronson Methodist Hospital reported it was treating 14 people for COVID-19 on Thursday. At the same time it reported it was operating at 93% capacity. Ascension Borgess Hospital was treating 12 coronavirus patients and was at 95% capacity.
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