KC metro surpasses 100,000 total COVID-19 cases in week that saw more than 80 deaths
The Kansas City metro area leaped past a total of 100,000 COVID-19 cases Friday during a week when the death toll rose by more than 80, according to data from health officials.
With 1,074 new COVID-19 cases reported Friday, at least 100,323 people have been infected with the novel coronavirus in the metro area, which encompasses Kansas City and Jackson, Clay and Platte counties in Missouri and Johnson and Wyandotte counties in Kansas.
The increase was the second day in a row where the number of new infections was above 1,000 cases. So far this month, an additional 17,741 people have tested positive for the coronavirus.
That compares to 17,348 cases reported for the same period in November, which so far has been the month with the highest number of new cases since the start of the pandemic. A total of 29,873 new cases were reported in November.
With six new deaths reported Friday — two each in Johnson and Wyandotte counties , and one each in Jackson and Platte counties — a total of 1,211 people from the metro area have died from the disease.
December is closing in on the highest number of deaths. There have been 200 deaths reported so far this month. There were 227 deaths reported last month.
The seven-day rolling average for new cases in the Kansas City metro sits at 906. One week ago, it was 1,074. Two weeks ago, it was 886.
During a COVID-19 media briefing Friday, Dr. David Wild, vice president of performance improvement for the The University of Kansas Health System, said with Kansas being in the top 10 for the highest number of cases per million of population and for highest number of deaths per million this week, the state is not over the hump.
In describing the impact COVID-19 has had on the health system, Wild said that since the beginning of the pandemic, 1,727 people have been admitted.
Monthly hospital admissions had been fairly steady until a spike during the summer. In October, admissions were up to 210 patients, but in November the number of admissions jumped to 451. December’s admissions are on pace to pass 500.
The more sobering number, Wild said, is the number of deaths at the hospital. In November the health system saw its highest number of deaths: 30. Already this month, there have been 32 people who have died.
“So just over halfway through the month of December, we’ve seen more deaths than our previous high,” he said. “And unfortunately, we expect that number to increase as well as we approach the end of the month and the end of the year.”
State-wide in Missouri, there have been more than 360,330 cases to date, including nearly 4,853 deaths. The seven-day positive test rate was 17.2%.
On Friday, the Kansas Department of Health and Environment reported a total of 200,426 cases, including 2,341 deaths. The monthly positive test rate was 14.2%.
Across the country, more than 17.3 million people have contracted the virus and more than 312,524 have died, according to Johns Hopkins University. Globally, more than 75.4 million people have tested positive for the virus and more than 1.6 million have died.
