Here is Minnesota's COVID-19 update for Saturday, February 27

The latest forecast from MDH.

Author:

Adam Uren

covid-19, vaccine — Credit: Navy Medicine via Flickr

Saturday's COVID update from the Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) includes 812 new cases and 13 new deaths.

The newly reported deaths brings the state's total to 6,475 over the course of the pandemic.

Of the total deaths, 62.6% (4,053) were residents of long-term care, including eight of the latest 13 deaths.

Through Feb. 25, the state reported that 836,735 people have received at least 1 dose of the COVID-19 vaccine while 430,819 people have completed both doses of vaccine that are required for the vaccines' maximum effect.

MDH has a public dashboard to track vaccine progress in Minnesota, and you can view it here.

Hospitalizations

Hospitalization figures are not updated at the weekend.

Through Feb. 25, the number of people with COVID-19 hospitalized in Minnesota was 263 – down from 265 a day earlier.

Of those hospitalized, 60 are in intensive care and 203 are receiving non-ICU treatment.

Testing and positivity rates

The 812 positive results in Saturday's update were from 28,288 completed tests, creating a daily test positivity rate of 2.87%.

According to Johns Hopkins University, Minnesota's test positivity rate over the past seven days is 3.26%.

The World Health Organization recommends that a percent positive rate (total positives divided by total completed tests) of below 5% for at least two weeks is necessary to safely reopen the economy. That 5% threshold is based on total positives divided by total tests.

Coronavirus in Minnesota by the numbers

Total tests: 7,316,923 (up from 7,289,410)
People tested: 3,459,381 (up from 3,453,214)
People with at least 1 vaccine shot: 836,735 (up from 804,716)
People with 2 vaccine shots: 430,819 (up from 405,922)
Positive cases: 483,790 (up from 482,978)
Deaths: 6,475 – 270 of which are "probable*" (up from 6,462)
Patients no longer requiring isolation: 469,959 (up from 469,149)

* Probable deaths are patients who died after testing positive using the COVID-19 antigen test, which is thought to be less accurate than the more common PCR test.