Sedgwick County coronavirus updates: 1 new death, 4 more clusters, 92 new COVID cases

The Sedgwick County Health Department reported 92 new cases of COVID-19 as the death count increased by one and four new coronavirus clusters were identified in the Wichita area.

The increases come as some of the pandemic indicators appear to be improving, the county’s online COVID-19 dashboard showed on Thursday.

“I say this about as cautiously optimistic as I can say,” County Manager Tom Stolz told county commissioners on Tuesday. “There’s actually a couple numbers moving the right direction on this board, for the first time in almost a month.”

The 92 new cases of COVID-19 put the county’s cumulative total at 3,962. The active case count increased by 91 and now totals 2,553. The one coronavirus patient who died increased the death tally to 39.

No new recoveries were reported, keeping the count at 1,370.

The rate of new cases in the last week has slowed compared to the first three-quarters of the month, based on the county health department’s data.

“You can see a flattening at the top of (the graph for) new cases,” Stolz said.

The 2,163 new cases reported between July 1 and July 23 is an average of about 98 cases per day.

The 349 new cases between July 23 and Thursday is an an average of about 50 cases per day.

The rate of new cases per day are significantly higher than the value for all of April, when many pandemic indicators peaked before the current spike. There were 339 new cases reported by Sedgwick County officials between April 1 and April 30, which is an average of fewer than 12 a day.

The positive test percentage has dropped for six days in a row. The Wednesday value was 12.28%, which is down from 12.56% on Tuesday and a peak of 13.82% on July 23.

“It went down slightly,” Stolz said. “Hopefully in a week we’ll see a trend starting this way.”

The positive test percentage, which is a rolling 14-day average, is still above the 10% threshold that some jurisdictions use to implement travel quarantines. It is also above the April peak of 12.06% and the July 1 value of 6.23%.

The county reported 53,324 residents have been tested as of Thursday, which is an increase of 857 in one day.

The rate of increase in active cases has also slowed.

On average, active cases increased by roughly 78 per day between July 1 and July 23. Since July 23, the average has been about 26 new active cases per day. The 181 new active cases in the past seven days represents less than an 8% increase.

Recoveries have not grown as fast as new cases. The 600 recoveries reported between July 1 and Thursday is an average of under 21 a day. That is a percent change of about 78% over 29 days.

Stolz said county officials are considering removing the recovery numbers — and by extension the active case numbers — because of a lag in reporting recoveries. That’s because epidemiologists have little time to follow-up with patients to determine whether they have recovered.

A lag in reporting recoveries impacts the accuracy of the active case count. But public health experts have also said cases are under-counted.

“Our best estimate right now is that for every case that was reported, there actually were 10 other infections,” Dr. Robert Redfield, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said last month, according to National Public Radio.

County Health Director Adrienne Byrne said the disease investigators are so “overwhelmed” with new cases that they have stopped contact tracing. Public health officer Dr. Garold Minns warned of that on July 2, when county commissioners first rejected the governor’s mask order.

Of the 92 new cases reported on Thursday, 89 are still under investigation for the source of exposure. The other three patients had been in close contact with another confirmed case. Nearly 62% of the 3,962 confirmed cases in the county have no known source of exposure and are still being investigated.

Most of the new patients are in the 20-39 and 40-59 years old age groups, which each added 35 cases. The infant to 19-year-old age group added 14, and eight more cases were in the 60-79 age group. No new cases were in the 80 and older age group.

Out of the 39 total deaths, 32 have been linked to a cluster. Four more clusters were identified in the county on Thursday. Three were at nursing homes and one was at a religious institution.

There have now been mass outbreaks at 14 long-term care facilities, eight businesses, four religious institutions and two correctional facilities.

The county health department only releases new hospitalization statistics from Ascension Via Christi and Wesley Healthcare on Mondays, but the latest Wichita hospital data showed smaller increases than previous weeks.

The 63 hospitalized COVID-19 patients as of Monday morning was an 8.6% increase from the previous week. The prior weeks had increases of 7.4%, 68.8% and 60%. The 32 coronavirus patients in intensive care was a 3.2% increase from last week. The prior weeks had ICU patients increase by 14.8% and 170% after a decrease of 33.3% the week before.

Four additional COVID-19 patients were hospitalized “basically in the ICU” at the Veterans Affairs hospital, which typically has zero, Stolz said. Those patients are not included in the county’s hospitalization numbers.