371 more COVID-19 cases, 4 deaths, 24K vaccinations reported Tuesday in Utah

SALT LAKE CITY — Utah’s number of COVID-19 cases has increased by 371 on Tuesday, with four more deaths and 24,329 vaccinations reported, according to the Utah Department of Health.

One of the deaths occurred prior to March 1 but was still being investigated by medical examiners, health officials said.

The state now estimates there are 9,798 active cases of the disease in Utah. It’s the second day in a row that estimate has been reported under 10,000. Before Monday, the last day there were under 10,000 estimated active cases was Sept. 15, when there were an estimated 9,777 active COVID-19 cases, according to state data.

The rolling seven-day average number of positive cases per day is now at 424, according to the health department. The positive test rate per day for that time period reported with the “people over people” method is now 6.7%. The positive test rate per day seven-day average calculated with the “test over test” method is now 3.4%.

A total of 1,331,862 vaccine doses have been administered in the state, up from 1,307,533 Monday. There are now 878,867 Utahns who have received at least one vaccine dose, while 487,418 are fully vaccinated. A total of 1,501,900 vaccine doses have been shipped to Utah so far.

The new numbers indicate a 0.1% increase in positive cases since Monday. Of the 2,380,237 people tested for COVID-19 in Utah so far, 16.2% have tested positive for COVID-19. The number of total tests conducted since the pandemic began is now 4,219,331, up 14,696 since Monday. Of those, 5,113 were tests of people who hadn’t previously been tested for COVID-19.

The four deaths reported Tuesday were:

• An Iron County woman who was between the ages of 45 and 64 and was a resident of a long-term care facility
• A Salt Lake County woman who was between the ages of 24 and 44 and was hospitalized when she died
• A Uintah County man who was over the age of 85 and was not hospitalized when he died
• A Utah County man who was between the ages of 65 and 84 and was hospitalized when he died

Tuesday’s totals give Utah 385,127 total confirmed cases, with 15,503 total hospitalizations and 2,118 total deaths from the disease. An estimated 373,211 Utah COVID-19 cases are now considered recovered, health department data shows.

Utah House Bill 294, also known as the state’s COVID-19 “endgame” bill, requires that all state and local Utah health orders related to the pandemic end on the day that the state’s 14-day case rate is less than 191 per 100,000 people, the seven-day average of COVID-19 intensive care unit usage is under 15%, and 1,633,000 prime doses of the COVID-19 vaccine have been allocated to Utah.

The state is only meeting the threshold in the second metric: the seven-day COVID-19 ICU usage is about 10.6%, up from 10.4% Monday. The state’s 14-day case rate is now 204.2, up from 199.5 Monday. State data shows 1,501,900 vaccine doses have been allocated to Utah so far.

Utah Gov. Spencer Cox and Lt. Gov. Deidre Henderson are scheduled to provide a COVID-19 pandemic update at their weekly news conference at 11 a.m. Thursday.