Iowa’s long-term care facilities see third day of no new COVID outbreaks

While one COVID-19-related death was reported Saturday for a long-term care facility, Iowa for the third consecutive day saw no new outbreaks at any of its 429 centers, according to Iowa Department of Public Health data.

The decline was notable in that long-term care residents have accounted for more than 39 percent - 2,225 individuals - of all the 5,674 Iowans who have died from the virus over the past 12 months.

'The past year, it's almost been like they've been at war with COVID-19,” Lori Ristau, Iowa Health Care Association senior vice president of strategic communications, told The Gazette earlier this month.

Hospitalizations

Hospitalization counts in Iowa continued to fluctuate slightly, but they proceeded along their overall downward trend statewide - since their peak in mid-November at 1,527 - with 172 patients reported for Saturday morning, according to the public health department and as analyzed by The Gazette.

The state reported 38 patients in intensive care - down six as of Friday morning.

Twenty people were on ventilators, which is one fewer than the day before.

Confirmed deaths

In all, two COVID-19-related deaths statewide were recorded - both for people above the age of 80 - for the 24-hour period.

The CDC has counted 538,261 deaths across the United States since the virus first was reported a year ago.

Vaccinations

The state public health department reported 466,816 Iowans were fully vaccinated as of early Saturday afternoon. That's about 14.8 percent of the population.

Not quite 1.3 million total doses have been given, according to Gazette analysis of state data.

In Linn County, more than 16 percent of its total population has received all necessary doses, for 36,838 residents. And Johnson County has reached slightly more than 19 percent of its population for full vaccination, with 28,854 individuals.

As of April 5, all adult Iowans will be eligible for vaccination, assuming federal allotments are fulfilled, Gov. Kim Reynolds announced Wednesday. Pfizer-BioNTech's vaccine is approved for those 16 and older. Moderna and Johnson and Johnson's vaccines are authorized for those 18 and older.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention as of Saturday morning reported that nationwide some 121 million total vaccines had been administered.

New cases

The Iowa public health department recorded 448 new cases of the virus on Saturday. The state's positivity rate for the previous two weeks stood at 3.9 percent.

Children under the age of 18 saw 69 new cases statewide. Two new cases were reported for those in education-connected occupations.

Linn County added a dozen new COVID-19 cases as of Saturday morning, for a seven-day average of 15 cases.

Johnson County was slightly higher, with 16 new cases. That county had a seven-day average of 11.

The top 10 counties in total cases as of Saturday morning were:

1. Polk - 53,349

2. Linn - 19,697

3. Scott - 17,474

4. Black Hawk - 15,137

5. Woodbury - 14,242

6. Johnson - 13,313

7. Dubuque - 12,553

8. Dallas - 10,450

9. Pottawattamie - 10,084

10. Story - 9,837.

The CDC listed 29.5 million total cases nationwide of as Saturday morning.

The Gazette Digital Coach Katie Brumbeloe contributed to this report.