ST. LOUIS — The Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services reported a record number of COVID-19 hospitalizations across the state Thursday, a number that increased by more than 100 in a single day.
On Thursday, the department reported 1,344 COVID-19 hospitalizations, the highest on a single day since the pandemic began. That number includes COVID-positive patients and patients suspected of having COVID-19. The number reported Thursday represents the hospitalizations on Oct. 7, according to the dashboard.
Single-day hospitalizations were added to the dashboard Thursday. The previous chart only included the seven-day average of hospitalizations in the state. According to the dashboard, the number of hospitalizations in the state increased from 1,241 on Oct. 6 to 1,344 on Oct. 7.
Each of the seven hospital regions in the dashboard showed single-day increases.
The seven-day average of COVID-19 hospitalizations for Oct. 7, which was reported Thursday, was 1,204, up from 1,180 reported for Oct. 6.
The department reported 137,156 confirmed COVID-19 cases and 2,259 deaths Thursday, a single-day increase of 1,505 cases and 23 deaths.
Tuesday was the eighth time in the last 10 days that the department reported more than 10 new COVID-19 deaths.
The department reported a total of 1,979,390 tests conducted, an increase of 20,929 in the last 24 hours. The state said a total of 1,387,139 people have undergone a PCR test, an increase of 8,471 in the last 24 hours.
The department uses the number of people who have had a PCR test to calculate the positivity rate. The department said the seven-day positivity rate in the state for Oct. 3 was 13.5%, down from 13.8% on Wednesday. The seven-day average is delayed by 72 hours to improve accuracy, so the number reported Thursday represents the seven-day average from Oct. 5.
The St. Louis area saw an increase in total hospitalizations while the seven-day averages for new admissions and total hospitalizations remained mostly unchanged.
Here is a full breakdown of the task force data from Thursday:
- New hospital admissions (data lagged two days) increased from 40 yesterday to 41 today.
- The seven-day moving average of hospital admissions (data lagged two days) remained the same at 34 today.
- The seven-day moving average of hospitalizations decreased – from 250 yesterday to 249 today.
- Inpatient confirmed COVID positive hospitalizations increased – from 258 yesterday to 274 today.
- Inpatient suspected COVID positive hospitalizations decreased - from 106 yesterday to 93 today.
- The number of confirmed COVID positive patients in the ICUs increased – from 76 yesterday to 80 today.
- The number of confirmed COVID positive patients on ventilators increased – from 46 yesterday to 47 today.
- Across the system hospitals, 39 COVID-19 patients were discharged yesterday, bringing the cumulative number of COVID-19 patients discharged to 6,628.