(Al Seib / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images)
This is a regularly updated story with the latest information, news and updates about the coronavirus and its impact in Arizona and beyond for Saturday, July 4.
PHOENIX — The Arizona health department reported 2,695 new coronavirus cases and 17 deaths Saturday morning.
That brings the state’s documented totals to 94,553 COVID-19 cases and 1,805 fatalities.
The single-day pandemic highs were 4,878 cases and 88 deaths, both reported Wednesday.
The Arizona Department of Health Services has been providing case and testing updates on its website each morning. The dashboard includes, among other information, testing trends, updated hospital capacity and a ZIP code map of cases.
The daily reports present data after the state receives statistics and compiles them, which can lag by several days. They aren’t meant to represent the actual activity over the past 24 hours.
With cases rising and hospitals filling up, Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey on Monday put the state’s reopening plans into reverse, shutting down bars, nightclubs, gyms, movie theaters and water parks for at least a month and pushing back the start of on-campus K-12 schooling for at least two weeks.
Ducey said to expect case counts to keep increasing for several weeks before the impact of the new policies shows up in the data.
New cases have been increasing at a faster rate than testing has been increasing, indicating community spread of a virus that has no impact on some people and is seriously debilitating or fatal for others. Infected people who don’t show symptoms are still capable of spreading the coronavirus.
The positive percentage of PCR tests, which detect active infections, continues to soar.
There have been more than 589,000 PCR tests given in Arizona, including 11,121 added to the total Saturday. Of the total, 12.9% have come back positive as of Saturday. The positive rate was 12.8% a day earlier and just 6.7% on the last day of May.
The weekly positive rate for PCR tests has risen every week since the week starting May 10, when it was 5%.
Of the PCR samples collected last week that have been processed, a pandemic-high 20% have come back positive. So far this week, that figure is 22%.
ICU bed usage reached 90% in Arizona on Friday, according to the latest state data, with the available supply at 171 beds. Thursday saw the largest usage rate (91%) in the state.
Overall inpatient bed usage was at 85%, 1 percentage point below the pandemic high last seen June 26.
The capacity data on the health department’s website doesn’t include surge beds on the ready for emergency use.
The number of confirmed or suspected COVID-19 patients currently in Arizona hospitals reached another all-time high at 3,113 on Friday, when 1,443 COVID-19 patients were seen in emergency rooms.
The capacity data on the health department’s website doesn’t include surge beds on the ready for emergency use.
In other notable hospital data from Friday related to confirmed or suspected COVID-19 patients:
- 413 were on ventilators, a decrease of 76 from the previous day.
- 796 were in ICU beds, a record-high an increase of 55 from the previous day.
- 425 were discharged, 84 more than the previous day and three more than the previous high on Wednesday.
For all articles, information and updates on the coronavirus from KTAR News, visit ktar.com/coronavirus.
