Due to the Labor Day holiday, data from Sept. 4-7 is included in today’s update. The numbers will be higher than usual because of the reporting lag.
Wednesday’s COVID-19 update from the Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) includes 5,777 new cases and 9 newly reported deaths, including three people in their 40s from Becker, Otter Tail and Ramsey counties. Seven of the nine deaths happened in August, with two occurring in September.
The state’s death toll is 7,865 since the start of the pandemic. Of the total deaths, 58.0% (4,555) were residents of long-term care.
As of Sept. 6, the state reported that 3,342,677 people have received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine, while 3,149,597 people have completed the vaccine series. The percentage of Minnesota’s population with at least one shot, based on age group:
- 12-15: 52%
- 16-17: 58%
- 18-49: 62%
- 50-64: 74%
- 65+: 92%
- Total population: 60%
56.6% of Minnesota’s total population, including children under the age of 12 who are not eligible for the vaccine, has completed the vaccine series. That jumps to 67.0% when excluding kids under the age of 12. MDH has a public dashboard to track vaccine progress in Minnesota, and you can view it here.
Hospitalizations
Through Sept. 7, the number of people with COVID-19 hospitalized in Minnesota was 654 (up from 615 reported Tuesday).
Of those hospitalized, 174 people are in intensive care and 480 were in general hospital care. The spring surge saw a high of 202 patients in intensive care and 517 people in general hospital care.
Here’s how many people are hospitalized based on regional location, though this doesn’t mean that each patient contracted the virus in these specific regions, as they may have been diverted depending upon available staffed beds.
- Metro: 93 ICU, 260 non-ICU
- Central: 28 ICU, 56 non-ICU
- Southeast: 24 ICU, 66 non-ICU
- Northeast: 13 ICU, 28 non-ICU
- Northwest: 5 ICU, 14 non-ICU
- South-central: 5 ICU, 36 non-ICU
- Southwest: 2 ICU, 13 non-ICU
- West-central: 4 ICU, 7 non-ICU
Testing and positivity rates.
The 5,777 positive results in Wednesday’s update were from 81,167 completed tests, creating a test positivity rate of 7.11%.
According to Johns Hopkins University, Minnesota’s test positivity rate over the past seven days is 6.56%.
The World Health Organization recommends that a percent positive rate (total positives divided by total completed tests) of below 5% for at least two weeks is necessary to safely keep the economy open.
Coronavirus in Minnesota by the numbers
- Total tests: 11,684,659 (up from 11,603,529)
- People tested: 5,199,753 (up from 5,152,429)
- People with at least 1 vaccine shot: 3,149,597 (up from 3,332,860)
- People who have completed vaccine series: 3,134,652 (up from 3,134,652)
- Positive cases: 663,248 (up from 657,492)
- Deaths: 7,865 – 433 of which are “probable*” (up from 7,856)
- Patients no longer requiring isolation: 642,434 (up from 635,784)
* Probable deaths are patients who died after testing positive using the COVID-19 antigen test, which is thought to be less accurate than the more common PCR test.