‘Keep this up.’ Beshear reports lowest number of new COVID-19 cases since December.
Gov. Andy Beshear announced 1,003 new cases of COVID-19 on Monday and 40 virus-related deaths, raising the state’s total number of confirmed cases to 378,793 and lifting the death toll to 4,091.
Monday’s number of new cases is the lowest single-day increase since Dec. 26, the governor said in a live update. The deaths he announced included seven people from Barren County.
While the state’s death rate remains “too high,” all other coronavirus metrics are “moving in the right direction,” Beshear said. “We want to keep this up, because we do not want to lose this progress,” which he said was “fragile.”
The statewide positivity rate is at 7.78 percent — the lowest since Nov. 10. Ninety-five of the state’s 120 counties are listed in the “red zone,” where community spread is at a critical level.
Last week, Kentucky reported a drop in new coronavirus cases for the fourth week in a row — the first time that has happened since the beginning of the pandemic, Beshear noted on Monday. The positivity rate has also declined for four consecutive weeks.
Roughly 460,000 people across the state have received their first dose of either the Moderna or Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine to protect against the coronavirus. The governor touted the speed of the state’s rollout, noting that for the fifth week in a row, the state has administered more first doses than it has received from the federal government, “which means we are efficient.”
The state has administered upwards of 91 percent of all the first doses it has received. “Our only limitation right now is supply,” he said.
The lion’s share of first doses have been given to people age 70 and older — just under 160,000 Kentuckians in that age bracket have received at least their first dose, which Beshear said he is “generally pleased” about.
Second to this population, people between the ages of 40 and 59 have received the most doses.
Sixty percent of all Kentuckians who’ve gotten at least one shot are women.
Based on population, Black Kentuckians are getting vaccines at a disproportionately low rate, state Department for Public Health figures show.
At least 87 percent of first doses were given to white Kentuckians, who make up 87.5 percent of the state’s population, while 4.3 percent of doses have gone to Black Kentuckians, who make up 8.5 percent of the population. Just over 1 percent of the state’s Hispanic population have received a dose of the vaccine, though they make up almost 4 percent of the total population.
Beshear called this disparity “unacceptable,” and said the state would continue to track its progress. He said the state will strive for a “more equitable distribution of the vaccine,” be more intentional in its outreach to minority communities and work more concertedly to address “vaccine hesitancy.”
He also acknowledged that populations the state has chosen to prioritize are disproportionately white. The state has pushed to immunize all of its K-12 personnel, first responders and law enforcement, which have “an underrepresentation of minority communities,” Beshear said.
There are 1,163 people hospitalized with coronavirus (72 fewer than were reportedly hospitalized on Sunday). Of those, 274 are in intensive care (16 fewer) and 142 are on a ventilator (two more). In long-term care facilities, there are 19 new cases among residents and 20 new cases among staff, bringing the total number of active cases among those groups to 567.
This story was originally published February 8, 2021 at 4:31 PM.
