Allegheny County, Pennsylvania see covid hospitalizations go up again

While progress had been made for covid hospitalizations in the past month, numbers appear to be going up again.

Hospitalizations in the state and Allegheny County have been generally increasing over the past week, while Westmoreland County’s numbers tell a different story, according to state Department of Health data.

Hospitalizations

In the state, there were 1,631 covid-19 patients hospitalized Tuesday. That number was up from 1,577 on Monday and up more than 100 from Saturday’s count of 1,529.

Pennsylvania has seen two different stories unfold this month: one of decreasing numbers to start the month and one of increasing figures since then. On March 1, the state had 1,715 covid patients hospitalized. By March 14, that number has dropped to 1,433 (a low for the month and year), a net decrease of 282.

But from March 14 to Tuesday, that trend has ended, at least for now. With Tuesday’s hospitalization county of 1,631, there has been a net increase of 198 during that span.

A similar trend has been going on in Allegheny County recently. The county’s hospitalization high for the month came on March 4 with 178 hospitalized. That number dropped to 135 on March 16, the month’s low. But Tuesday’s hospitalized number increased to 177, nearly undoing the previous run of decreasing figures.

The story of Westmoreland County hospitalizations is the opposite of those currently being told through state and Allegheny County covid data. Westmoreland had figures in the 115 to 120 range for hospitalizations from March 3 to March 17. Then, the hospitalization number dropped from 117 on March 17 to 26 on March 18, with state officials attributing it to a yet-unidentified data error. Since March 18, Westmoreland County’s covid hospitalization number has remained in the low to mid 20s, with 26 hospitalized Tuesday.

Vaccinations

The state continues to progress in administering covid vaccines, as it continues to work through Phase 1A of its vaccine rollout plan.

As of Tuesday, there have been 1,388,872 people partially and 1,567,116 fully vaccinated in Pennsylvania. That number excludes Philadelphia County, which handles its own vaccine distribution and data. The number of people fully vaccinated has more than doubled since the beginning of the month, when the number of fully vaccinated individuals in Pennsylvania was 769,752.

In Allegheny County, there are 183,704 people partially and 179,155 fully vaccinated as of Tuesday. The number of fully vaccinated people means that 14.64% of the county is fully covered. The county started March with 74,891 people fully vaccinated.

There are now 48,311 people partially and 45,641 fully vaccinated in Westmoreland County as of Tuesday, with 12.5% of the county fully vaccinated. Westmoreland County started the month with 25,293 fully vaccinated.

Cases and deaths

Pennsylvania reported 3,515 additional covid cases and 39 deaths Tuesday, according to the Department of Health. Tuesday’s case count (2,399 confirmed and 1,116 probable) marks the eighth time reported cases have been over 3,000 this month.

The seven-day case average in the state is now 3,033, the highest it has been in March.

Of the deaths reported Tuesday, 32 are from March, four are from February, two are from January and one is from December.

An additional 364 covid cases were reported Tuesday in Allegheny County, per the county Health Department. No deaths were reported Tuesday.

Tuesday’s reported cases (197 confirmed and 167 probable) ranged in age from 6 months to 93 years, with a median age of 33. There have been three times in the past week now that more than 300 cases were reported, and four times total in March.

In Westmoreland County, there were 105 additional covid cases and one death reported Tuesday, per the Department of Health.

Tuesday’s cases (34 confirmed, 71 probable) mark the third time cases have been above 100 in the past week and the fourth time this month.