Nearly 5,000 new COVID cases reported in MS over the weekend as delta variant rages
Mississippi Health Officer Dr. Thomas Dobbs warned the public on social media Monday morning that the number of new cases of COVID-19 would be big, and they were startling.
Almost 5,000 new cases — 4,991 new cases and 13 deaths — were reported by the health department for Saturday through Monday.
Nearly all the cases in the state are reported to be from the Delta variant.
To show how the delta variant is spreading:
- From May 3-31, South Mississippi had 823 new cases
- From June 1 to June 30, South Mississippi had 876 new cases.
- From July 1 to July 30, South Mississippi had 4,829 cases.
A big portion of those new coronavirus cases reported Monday were in South Mississippi, where the six counties had 1,234 new cases and three deaths over the weekend.
The additional deaths were in Harrison, Pearl River and Stone counties.
The number of new cases in South Mississippi over the weekend by county are:
- George — 45
- Hancock — 100
- Harrison — 539
- Jackson — 365
- Pearl River — 140
- Stone — 45
Harrison County has 2,479 new cases and 13 additional deaths from July 1 to Aug. 2. The 25-39 age group has seen the biggest surge in daily cases in Harrison County, from 29 on June 26 to 183 on July 24. The second biggest increase was in the 58-64 age group.
Singing River Health System reported Sunday that 86 people were hospitalized with COVID-19 at its three hospitals in Pascagoula, Ocean Springs and Gulfport, 23 were in ICU and 15 were on ventilators.
The report said 98% of those hospitalized were unvaccinated, and the 2% who had the vaccine but were hospitalized had underlying conditions.
Memorial Hospital at Gulfport will begin seeing patients exhibiting cough, fever, and shortness of breath on Tuesday, Aug. 3. Hours for the drive-up clinic are Monday through Friday from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., and Saturday and Sunday from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. The location is Memorial Physician Clinics Screening Site at 1213 Broad Ave., Gulfport.
This story was originally published August 2, 2021 at 10:47 AM.
