Kansas City metro adds more than 1,000 new COVID-19 cases and over a dozen deaths
The Kansas City metropolitan area added more than 1,000 COVID-19 cases and 17 deaths on Wednesday.
The area encompassing Kansas City and Jackson, Clay and Platte counties in Missouri and Johnson and Wyandotte counties in Kansas gained 1,027 coronavirus cases for a total of 115,394 to date.
The seven-day average for daily new cases was 836. One week ago, it was 742 and two weeks ago, it was 875, according to data maintained by The Star.
Kansas City reported two deaths, Jackson County added two, Clay County reported four and Johnson County added nine. A total of 1,432 deaths have been reported in the metro since the pandemic began.
The University of Kansas Health System reported 69 patients being treated for the virus, down one from Tuesday. Twenty-five patients were in the intensive care unit with 13 on ventilators.
About 30% of the health system’s health care workers have declined the vaccine, said Chief Medical Officer Steve Stites.
That’s in line with other hospitals in the region, he said, but the vaccine’s safety needs to be emphasized.
“It is safe,” said Stites, who received the first dose of the Moderna vaccine earlier this week. ”Vaccination is not some scary, brand new therapy. It strikes me as so funny because people are so nervous about vaccination ... People aren’t dying from vaccination, but look at how many people are dying from coronavirus. So when you really weigh the two, there’s just no question about what is your better choice.”
On Wednesday, Kansas confirmed 236,818 cases including 3,027 deaths. The monthly positive test rate was 14.2%.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 131,750 vaccine doses have been distributed in Kansas with 31,938 administered. The state said earlier this week that number of administered vaccines was under-counted due to a lag in reporting.
Missouri reported 408,443 cases including 5,858 deaths. The seven-day positive test rate was 19.7%.
So far, 294,850 vaccine doses have been distributed and 105,173 have been administered in Missouri, the CDC said.
Across the country, more than 21.1 million people have contracted the virus and 359,445 have died, according to Johns Hopkins University.
