Lexington starts 2021 with 534 COVID-19 cases. Several factors cause new spike
Lexington started January off with 534 COVID-19 cases reported on Monday. There were also 26 new hospitalizations and three new deaths.
The Lexington-Fayette County Health Department reports weekend COVID-19 cases on Monday. There were 265 cases from Saturday and 269 from Sunday. The health department was closed Friday, so there were no cases reported.
“It’s likely a combination of things,” health department spokesman Kevin Hall said of the increase. “New cases at (the Federal Medical Center), case backlogs and cases from December gatherings.”
The Federal Medical Center is a federal prison facility on Leestown Road. The facility has had a coronavirus outbreak in recent weeks, with 329 inmates actively infected with the virus as of Thursday, according to the Bureau of Prisons.
Lexington was in the midst of a downturn in new COVID-19 cases before infections jumped at the end of December. The city’s rolling seven-day average of new cases has climbed to 204.9 due to the spike. That’s nearly 95 more cases per day than the rolling average one week ago.
Lexington’s incidence rate also increased by more than 70 percent in just five days as a result of the case spikes. Fayette County’s incidence rate Sunday evening was 56.9, more than twice the number needed to get out of the “red zone,” which the state Department for Public Health designates as the highest level of COVID-19 spread.
The surge in cases at the end of December nearly caused Lexington to set a new one-month record for cases in December despite drastically lower numbers earlier in the month. There were 5,991 new infections in December, 900 of which came in the final three days of the month. The city’s record for cases in a month is 6,070, which was set in November. To break that record, the city would have to have about 196 cases per day for the entire month of January.
Lexington’s one-month hospitalization record was smashed in December, with 349 residents hospitalized due to COVID-19 during the month. The previous record was 252, set in November.
Lexington reported 26 deaths in December, eight fewer than the city’s one month record set in November. But the December death toll is likely to increase in the coming weeks as the health department confirms pending deaths. The local health department said it investigates deaths to confirm they were caused by COVID-19 before adding them to the city’s total.
Lexington has reported 23,394 cases, 1,285 hospitalizations and 163 deaths caused by COVID-19 since the virus first reached Lexington in early March.
This story was originally published January 4, 2021 at 9:27 AM.