Another Carroll County resident has died in the past week from complications related to COVID-19, but the number of active cases showed a slight seven-day decrease.
The additional death — included in the July 29 report from the Arkansas Department of Health — raised the local death toll to 108 since the pandemic began. Statewide, the death toll attributed to the novel coronavirus increased by 39 during the seven-day period ending July 29, rising to 11,699.
The additional deaths come as the number of active cases of COVID-19 in Carroll County and across the state show slight decreases.
On July 8, the ADH reported 112 active cases of COVID-19 in Carroll County, the first time in months the number of active cases had topped 100. On July 29, the state health department reported 132 active cases in the county — down slightly from the 139 reported July 22 — with an increase of 60 new cases, a slight decrease over the 76 reported on July 22.
Statewide, the number of active cases reported July 29 was 16,012 — down from the previous week’s reported total of 16,833 — and an increase of 8,660 in the overall case count. Since April 4, the number of confirmed cases of COVID-19 has increased by 68,001.
The overall case count in Carroll County increased to 6,609 since the pandemic began, along with 6,369 “recoveries,” meaning they are no longer being monitored by the health department. Statewide, the number of confirmed cases now stands at 901,129 with 873,267 recoveries.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention rated Carroll County’s community transmission level in its weekly report as “medium,” with a case rate of 243.13 per 100,000, with new COVID-19 hospital admissions per 100,000 at 3.7 and 1 percent of staffed, inpatient beds in use by patients with confirmed COVID-19.
On July 29, the state health department reported 417 COVID-positive hospital admissions, with 84 in intensive care. Of those, 24 required the aid of a ventilator.
On July 22, the number of hospitalizations was 414, with 63 in intensive care and 16 on a ventilator.
Since the pandemic began, hospitalizations in Arkansas have included 1,463 children under the age of 18 including 175 who had been in intensive care.
On July 15, the state health department reported 2,410 active cases among children — down from the 2,538 reported July 22 — more than 20 percent of the statewide total.
The age group with the most active cases was 65-and-older with 3,209, followed by those 25-34 with 2,424 and those 35-44 with 2,182, all of which are down slightly since July 22. The 55-64 age group is close behind with 2,074 reported active cases.
Since Jan. 1, the number of overall cases of the novel coronavirus in the state has increased by 327,987, with the majority of those occurring among unvaccinated individuals. The number of active cases in Arkansas this year peaked on Jan. 21, when 102,576 were reported.
On the vaccination front, the state health department reported July 29 the number of Arkansans aged 5 and older who are fully vaccinated had increased by 3,001 Arkansans to 1,650,463 — a total of 142,424 since Jan. 1 — with another 287,664 listed as partially vaccinated and 799,447 listed as having received a third-dose booster.
Combined, those numbers represent approximately 68.1 percent of Arkansans aged 5 and older.
In Carroll County, 29,783 doses of the various vaccines had been administered by Jan. 1. As of July 29, that number had increased to a reported 35,764 doses.
According to the state health department, 54 percent of Carroll County residents aged 5 and older have been fully immunized and another 7.3 percent are partially immunized.
Combined, those numbers represent approximately 61.3 percent of the county’s population that is eligible to receive a vaccine.
