MS Health Department reports 16,484 new COVID cases, 16 deaths after processing delay
The Mississippi State Department of Health published the weekend’s COVID-19 update on Tuesday, delayed from trouble processing the “large amount” of data amid omicron variant spread: 16,484 new cases across the state and 16 deaths.
Omicron now accounts for all the new cases in the state, the health department said on Twitter.
In South Mississippi, Jan. 5-8 time period saw 2,259 new cases and three deaths — two in Hancock County and one in Jackson County.
The Jan. 7-9 data dump comes after MSDH twice held back on publishing the numbers Monday because of the increased volume. Averaging about 5,494 new cases a day, the COVID update is consistent with the past few weeks of surging positivity rates across Mississippi due to the highly transmissible new virus strain.
MSDH later reported that Monday’s numbers totaled 5,737 more cases and 20 deaths. The state’s COVID totals are now 608,768 cases, 10,563 deaths. South Mississippi had 988 new cases reported Tuesday afternoon and 2 more deaths in Hancock County.
George County recorded 95 new cases, Hancock had 217, Harrison reported 953, Jackson had 691, Pearl River had 219 and Stone had 84.
The six southern counties now have recorded 96,987 cases and 1,496 deaths.
The health department reports the numbers of people hospitalized in the state and being treated in intensive care are close to double the rates on Jan. 1:
▪ Those hospitalized in the state was 1,211 on Jan. 10 from 641 on Jan. 1. The peak was 1,667 on Aug. 19, 2021.
▪ Those in ICU with COVID increased to 240 from 133. The peak was 486 on Aug. 17, 2021.
▪ Those on ventilators increased to 93 from 51. The peak was 354 on Sept. 3, 2021.
Over the past two-week period, almost 50,000 cases have occurred in the state, Mississippi State Epidemiologist Paul Byers said during a press conference on Friday.
Mississippi in recent days has consistently hit record numbers of single-day cases recorded since the delta variant’s fourth wave.
On Wednesday, the Mississippi Department of Health reported 6,592 new coronavirus cases, the most the state has seen in a single day since the start of the pandemic. On Friday, the state reported an additional 6,774 cases.
“Over the last several days, we’ve been reporting out over 6,000 to 7,000 additional cases on a daily basis,” Byers said on Friday.
This story was originally published January 11, 2022 at 9:18 AM.
