Nov. 30 COVID-19 update: Hospitalizations reach new high mark in Minnesota

There are fewer than 100 staffed ICU beds available in Minnesota.

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coronavirus — Credit: North Dakota National Guard via Flickr

Another 15 people have died from COVID-19 in Minnesota, with the Monday update from the state health department also revealing more than 5,800 new cases.

The death toll from the virus is now at 3,593. Of those, 2,413 fatal cases involved residents of long-term care facilities, including five of the 15 newly reported deaths Monday.

November has far and away been Minnesota's deadliest month, with 1,140 fatal cases. That's nearly triple the 423 people who died from the disease in October.

Hospitalizations

Through Nov. 29, the number of people with COVID-19 hospitalized in Minnesota is 1,840, which is a new all-time high for Minnesota. Of those hospitalized, 392 patients were in intensive care and 1,448 are receiving non-ICU treatment.

The state's COVID-19 dashboard now says there are 90 available staffed ICU beds, just 25 of them in the metro.

Screen Shot 2020-11-30 at 11.16.47 AM — Credit: MDH

Note: Hospital totals are preliminary and are subject to adjustment in the days ahead.

Testing and positivity rates

The 5,801 positive results in Monday's update were from a total of 43,481 completed tests, creating a daily test positivity rate of 13.34%.

Those completed tests were from 16,983 people. People are often tested more than once, so the test positivity rate when dividing positives by people tested is 34.16% today.

The World Health Organization recommended in May 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.

According to Johns Hopkins University, Minnesota's percent positive over the past seven days is 10.28%, and that number has been dropping all week since peaking around 15.4%.