Utah Administers More Than 100,000 Vaccines In 1 Week
Feb 11, 2021, 11:05 AM | Updated: 2:05 pm
SALT LAKE CITY, Utah – Gov. Spencer Cox on Thursday expressed optimism about the efforts to battle the COVID-19 pandemic in Utah.
The governor made the comments at the state’s weekly coronavirus update.
“We’ve lost far too many lives, we’ve worked so many hours,” he said. “Hundreds of state employees are working on this response. But during our Wednesday operational briefing this week with those employees, we felt a shift.”
“It feels like we’re in the fourth quarter of the pandemic,” he added.
Cox specifically noted the state’s vaccination campaign. In one week’s time, Utah administered more than 100,000 doses of the vaccine – the state’s largest number so far.
He said 89% of long-term care facility residents are getting vaccinated, and almost half of people age 70 or older have been immunized.
The White House this week announced the number of vaccines sent to each state is increasing, with up to 11 million doses going out each week nationwide. Utah will see an additional 4,200 doses each week.
The governor asked residents to “be committed” to keeping their appointments for the second dose of the vaccine to ensure they’re fully immunized.
This article is being updated. For more information, visit coronavirus.utah.gov.
Testing
The Utah Department of Health reported a total of 2,103,616 residents have been tested so far, which is an increase of 8,807 people tested since yesterday.
Of those, a total of 358,581 Utahns have tested positive for COVID-19. That’s an increase of 1,242 cases from Wednesday’s report.
The rolling 7-day average for positive tests is 1,049 per day. The rolling 7-day average for percent positivity of “people over people” is 14.8%, which is a decrease by almost 2 percentage points since last week.
The rolling 7-day average for percent positivity of “tests over tests” is 6.7%.
Click here to read more about the measures of testing.
Hospitalizations
There are currently 327 people hospitalized with confirmed cases of COVID-19, and 128 of those people are in intensive care units. Another 36 patients are hospitalized with suspected cases of COVID-19.
The state’s ICU beds are 83.5% full. The ICU beds in Utah’s referral centers are 87.7% full.
Referral Centers are the 16 hospitals in Utah with the capability to provide the best care for patients with COVID-19. Because most patients are transferred to these facilities, their utilization is the best reflection of the true hospital capacity in Utah when looking at ICU beds.
Deaths
Nine more Utahns have died as a direct result of COVID-19. To date, 1,774 residents have been killed by the virus.
The following individuals’ deaths were reported Thursday:
- Male, between 65-84, Weber County resident, not hospitalized at time of death
- Male, between 45-64, Salt Lake County resident, hospitalized at time of death
- Male, between 65-84, Morgan County resident, long-term care facility resident
- Male, older than 85, Weber County resident, long-term care facility resident
- Female, older than 85, Tooele County resident, long-term care facility resident
- Female, older than 85, Utah County resident, long-term care facility resident
- Male, older than 85, Weber County resident, not hospitalized at time of death
- Male, older than 85, Washington County resident, not hospitalized at time of death
- Male, older than 85, Utah County resident, not hospitalized at time of death
Vaccinations
Utah has administered 462,720 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine so far. A total of 335,077 have received the first dose, and 127,643 Utahns have been fully immunized with both doses.
More than half a million vaccines have been delivered to the state.
For more information, visit coronavirus.utah.gov.