High virus case numbers continue in Tennessee
Published 11:37 am Tuesday, November 10, 2020
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...
|
NASHVILLE (AP) — Tennessee’s top health officials on Monday reported that the state saw more than 5,900 new cases of COVID-19, marking the highest jump in a 24-hour period.
The Department of Health also reported roughly 8,700 new cases over the weekend.
The health agency say the high case numbers were due in part to the clearing of a backlog of test results. The backlog was caused by the state’s surveillance system undergoing an update.
The latest average positivity rate in Tennessee is about 11%. State health departments are calculating positivity rates differently across the country, but for Tennessee The Associated Press calculates the rate by dividing new cases by test specimens using data from the COVID Tracking Project.
The seven-day rolling average of the positivity rate in Tennessee has risen over the past two weeks from 9.15% on Oct. 25 to 10.75% on Nov. 8. The White House has determined any state with an average 10% positivity rate to be a virus “red zone.”
Currently, there are 1,656 people hospitalized with COVID-19-related symptoms. Of those hospitalized, 204 are on ventilators.