Coronavirus updates: Sedgwick County active cases continue to rise

The Sedgwick County Health Department reported an increase of 67 COVID-19 cases Saturday, bringing the total to 1,499.

The death toll stayed at 28. Most of the deaths have been attributed to clusters at long-term care facilities.

The active case count, which does not include recoveries and deaths, continues to climb. It hit a record-high of 734 on Saturday.

Cases will continue to increase, but health officials say better indicators of community spread are the percent testing positive and hospitalizations. Both of those are increasing.

The percent positive hit a high of 12% on April 19, then dropped before rising again to about 11.8% on April 28. It then dropped below 1% on May 27 before starting to climb. It was about 6.75% on Friday, the latest day available.

May 27 is when the Sedgwick County Commission voted to drop all restrictions.

Health department hospitalization data isn’t available for this week but officials said during meetings this week that hospital officials were concerned as cases climbed into the upper 20s.

The Kansas Department of Health and Environment reports statewide figures on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. The latest figures showed 15,919 cases and 277 deaths. Kansas is also trending up in daily cases, hospitalizations and deaths, according to KDHE trend lines.