Minnesota's COVID-19 update for Wednesday, September 29

The latest data from MDH.

Author:
Adam Uren
Publish date:
Sep 29, 2021

Wednesday's COVID-19 update from the Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) includes 2,077 new cases and 31 newly reported deaths.

The state's death toll is 8,140 since the start of the pandemic. Of the total deaths, 56.9% (4,634) were residents of long-term care.

Of the latest deaths, 28 are from this month, while 2 were from August, and 1 has been added from November 2020.

As of Sept. 27, the state reported that 3,398,906 people have received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine, while 3,227,882 people have completed the vaccine series. The percentage of Minnesota's population with at least one shot, based on age group:

12-15: 53%
16-17: 59%
18-49: 63%
50-64: 75%
65+: 91%
Total population: 61.1%

58% of Minnesota's total population, including children under the age of 12 who are not eligible for the vaccine, has completed the vaccine series. That jumps to 68.6% when excluding kids under the age of 12. MDH has a public dashboard to track vaccine progress in Minnesota, and you can view it here.

Hospitalizations

Through Sept. 28, the number of people with COVID-19 hospitalized in Minnesota was 800 (up from the 767 reported Tuesday). Of those hospitalized, 206 people are in intensive care and 594 were in general hospital care.

Here's how many people are hospitalized based on regional location, though this doesn't mean that each patient contracted the virus in these specific regions, as they may have been diverted depending upon available staffed beds.

Metro: 105 ICU, 288 non-ICU (yesterday was 105, 291)
Central: 29 ICU, 92 non-ICU (was 31, 75)
Southeast: 33 ICU, 69 non-ICU (was 26, 57)
Northeast: 14 ICU, 57 non-ICU (was 10, 54)
Northwest: 13 ICU, 18 non-ICU (was 12, 18)
South Central: 6 ICU, 36 non-ICU (was 6, 43)
Southwest: 2 ICU, 14 non-ICU (was 2, 14)
West Central: 4 ICU, 20 non-ICU was 3, 18)

Testing and positivity rates.

The 2,077 positive results in Wednesday's update were from 35,135 completed tests, creating a test positivity rate of 5.91%.

According to Johns Hopkins University, Minnesota's test positivity rate over the past seven days is 7.18%.

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 keep the economy open.

Coronavirus in Minnesota by the numbers

Total tests: 12,463,002 (up from 12,427,867)
People tested: 5,617,668 (up from 5,599,254)
People with at least 1 vaccine shot: 3,398,906 (up from 3,396,209)
People who have completed vaccine series: 3,227,882 (up from 3,225,345)
Positive cases: 708,220 (up from 706,158)
Deaths: 8,140 – 465 of which are "probable*" (up from 8,109)
Patients no longer requiring isolation: 682,682 (up from 680,339)

* 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.