Local COVID update

The State of North Carolina tracks four primary metrics to determine whether to relax guidelines on reopening the economy.

The rate of growth in the State’s key metrics is increasing.   Both the number of new cases as well as the number of deaths now are coded red by the Federal Government Guidelines.  Similarly, the number of new cases continues to accelerate in Wake County and exceeded 100 in Zip Code 27587 this past week.  However, the number of deaths in our area and county remain modest.

The data in this column have included only Molecular Positive cases in the past.  The data has been adjusted historically to also add Antigen cases.  This increases the historical number of tests by about 3% and cases by 4%.  The Antigen data was reported initially on September 21.

Despite the increase in most metrics, North Carolina’s metrics remain good compared to the majority of states.   It remains 27th among the 50 states for the number of cases on a per capita basis.  It moved back to 32nd for deaths from the virus from 31st.  It also had the 28th highest rate of tests, down from 27th last week.

The number of new cases increased from 14185 last week to 155477 this week.  The weekly growth was about 10%, up from 6% the prior week.  The number of deaths increased slightly from 176 last week to 213 for this seven day period, growth of more than 20%.

The 14 day moving average for most metrics continues to increase.  This average for tests will set a record on October 28.  Similarly,  the percentage of positive cases have resumed growth, a level last seen on August 26.  The moving average for hospitalizations has risen steadily since September 25.

Key metrics were mixed in Wake County.  New cases increased from 681 last week to 1130 this week and the number of new deaths remained very low.

The number of cases in our Zip Code 27587 rose by 116 in the last seven day period, up from 44 the prior week .  No new deaths have been reported since September 19.  The State’s health website reports a cluster of eight cases at a shelter near Route 401 in Wake Forest.

Zip Code 27571 (Rolesville) reported 9 new cases this past week, the same amount as for the previous week.  Zip 27596 (Youngsville) rose by 24 cases, an increase from 6 cases reported for the previous week.  Zip 27571 has reported no deaths; Zip 27596 continues to report a single fatality.

Federal Guidelines

The federal Coronavirus Task Force has developed stoplight charts for the states on three metrics which have not been officially published but the data is available.  North Carolina is currently rated “red” for the number of new cases for the last four weeks.  However, the number of deaths turned red during the past seven days.   Both Wake County and Zip 27587 rated red for the number of new cases this week.