32 hospital patients, 10 in the ICU: Sedgwick County releases COVID-19 hospital data

The Eagle has compiled a list of news to know on the coronavirus pandemic for the Wichita area for Wednesday, July 8.

New Sedgwick County COVID-19 numbers

The Wichita area coronavirus status for hospitals was downgraded to “moderate” on Wednesday as the Sedgwick County Health Department released more detailed information on local COVID-19 hospitalizations.

The county’s online pandemic dashboard shows that 32 patients with COVID-19 were hospitalized as of Monday. County Manager Tom Stolz said in a video briefing on Wednesday that the information comes from “our two hospital providers,” presumably meaning Wesley Healthcare and Ascension Via Christi.

Intensive care units have admitted 10 of those 32 hospitalized patients. There are an additional 31 hospital patients who are under investigation.

Patients under investigation have COVID-like symptoms but have not yet been confirmed through testing. They may or may not have been admitted to hospitals, county officials said.

The 32 hospitalizations is up from 20 on June 29, which is a 60% increase, while the 10 ICU admissions is down 33% from 15. The 31 patients under investigation is up from 15. The county’s dashboard does not list hospital information prior to June 29.

The approximate number of ICU beds available, depending on staff available, increased from 20 to 25.

Wednesday was the first time the hospitalization section of the county’s dashboard indicated the area hospital status assessment is “moderate” with a yellow exclamation point. It had previously said “good” with a green check mark.

Garold Minns, the county health officer, said last week that hospital officials are concerned about the trajectory in cases. He said there has been “a slight shift to a younger population of people in the hospital, but there’s still older people in there, too.”

“As of July 6th Hospitals also are reporting a surge of potential COVID symptoms being detected at their satellite Urgent Care facilities,” a note on the dashboard states. “Additionally, there has been an increase in hospital staff who have contracted COVID, or are being quarantined as a result of COVID.”

The county’s dashboard does not list hospital information prior to June 29. It had previously listed hospital admissions and discharges by week, which did not provide the exact number of current hospitalizations or the hospital capacity.

The more detailed hospitalization information comes as the county health department reported 1,703 total cases of COVID-19, which is an increase of 51 from Tuesday. Epidemiologists have not identified the source of exposure for any of the 51 new cases.

Sunday was the first day in two and a half months where active cases outnumbered recoveries. On Wednesday, there were 890 active cases and 785 recoveries. There have been 28 local COVID-19 deaths. No new deaths have been recorded since June 25.

The county reported 533 more people have been tested, bringing the total to 34,748.

The percentage of tests that come back positive increased again. The rolling 14-day average percentage of positive tests went from 8.34% on Monday to 8.96% on Tuesday, which is the most recent day with data available.

New KDHE coronavirus numbers

The Kansas Department of Health and Environment reported 17,618 cases of COVID-19 statewide on Wednesday, which is an increase of 717 cases or 4.2% from Monday. The coronavirus pandemic death count increased by two to 282.

There have been 1,269 hospitalizations, which is up 34 over two days. About 7.2% of all patients have needed hospital care. Intensive care unit admissions went up by 13 to 397. Patients needing mechanical ventilation went up by two to 160.

There have been at least 879 discharges, which is an increase of 20, though there may have been additional discharges that haven’t been reported to state officials.

The state is now reporting the percentage of cases that were asymptomatic, though information on symptoms is not available in about 31% of cases. In the rest of the cases, about 60% of patients had symptoms of COVID-19 while about 9% of patients were asymptomatic.

The KDHE reported 16 new coronavirus clusters, putting the state’s total at 251. Of that number, 120 are active.

The outbreak categories showed two more nursing homes clusters, two more at private businesses, three more at daycares or schools, one more at a group home, one more at a health care facility and seven more at gatherings.

There have been 190,864 negative tests in Kansas, which is an increase of 5,516.

County comparisons

Cases have been identified in 98 of the 105 counties in Kansas, according to KDHE data. There are 16 counties with at least 100 cases.

While the Kansas case count increased 4.2% over two days, nine of the 16 counties had higher percentage changes in their tallies.

The counties with at least 100 confirmed cases are:

• Wyandotte County has 2,760 cases, which is an increase of 105 cases or 4%.
• Johnson County has 2,565 cases, which is an increase of 216 cases or 9.2%.
• Ford County has 2,021 cases, which is an increase of one case or 0.2%.
• Sedgwick County has 1,922 cases, which is an increase of 172 cases or 9.8%.
• Finney County has 1,552 cases, which is an increase of three cases or 0.2%.
  
  
• Leavenworth County has 1,200 cases, which is an increase of six cases or 0.5%.
• Seward County has 1,005 cases, which is an increase of three cases or 0.3%.
• Shawnee County has 878 cases, which is an increase of 53 cases or 6.4%.
• Lyon County has 501 cases, which is no change.
• Douglas County has 377 cases, which is an increase of 23 cases or 9.1%.
• Riley County has 301 cases, which is an increase of 15 cases or 5.2%.
• Crawford County has 294 cases, which is an increase of 16 cases or 5.8%.
• Saline County has 169 cases, which is an increase of 18 cases or 11.9%.
• Jackson County has 117 cases, which is an increase of one case or 0.9%.
• Reno County has 101 cases, which is an increase of five cases or 5.2%.
• Geary County has 101 cases, which is an increase of six cases or 6.3%.

In the Wichita area:

• Sedgwick County has 1,922 cases, which is an increase of 172 cases or 9.8%.
• Reno County has 101 cases, which is an increase of five cases or 5.2%.
• Butler County has 78 cases, which is an increase of seven cases or 9.9%.
  
  
• Cowley County has 77 cases, which is an increase of one case or 1.3%.
  
  
• Harvey County has 55 cases, which is an increase of three cases or 5.8%.
  
  
• Sumner County has 17 cases, which is an increase of one case or 6.3%.
• Kingman County has one case, which is no change.

Senior centers postpone reopening because of COVID-19 spike

On Wednesday, the Senior Services of Wichita announced it would push back its anticipated reopening of July 13 because of a spike of COVID-19 cases. The senior centers at Downtown, Linwood, Northeast and Orchard Park will reopen when Sedgwick County sees a “declining number of positive cases.” When it does reopen, the senior centers will have mandatory masks requirements and limits on gathering sizes.

Veterans group cancels 2020 meeting in Wichita

The Berlin Airlift Veterans Association Board of Directors canceled its 2020 reunion planned in Wichita due to the COVID-19 pandemic. For the last 30 years, the group has tried to hold its reunion as close as possible to the last flight of the Berlin Airlift on Sept. 30, 1949.

Contributing: Michael Stavola of The Eagle

This story was originally published July 8, 2020 at 5:00 PM.