Kansas City metro sees significant spike in COVID-19 deaths, adds more than 250 cases
The Kansas City metropolitan area added 49 deaths on Thursday after health officials in Missouri conducted a weekly review of death certificates.
The area encompassing Kansas City and Jackson, Clay and Platte counties in Missouri and Johnson and Wyandotte counties in Kansas has recorded 1,927 deaths since the pandemic began.
The spike in deaths was in part caused by Missouri’s weekly analysis of death certificates, which added 219 deaths statewide including 29 in the metro. Kansas City added ten deaths, Jackson counted added 12, Clay and Platte counties added three and four, respectively.
However Johnson and Wyandotte counties on the Kansas side also reported 20 deaths collectively on Thursday. Johnson County added five deaths and Wyandotte County reported an additional 15.
The metro gained 264 new COVID-19 cases for a total of 137,039 to date.
The seven-day average for new cases was 210. One week ago, the average was 252 and two weeks ago, it was 424, according to data maintained by The Star.
The University of Kansas Health System reported 33 patients hospitalized for the virus, up by two from Wednesday. Eight patients were in the intensive care unit with two on ventilators.
“As far as capacity you know, the last few weeks, we’ve been fairly happy about that,” said Dana Hawkinson, medical director of infection prevention and control.
On Thursday, Missouri confirmed 473,459 cases and 7,695 deaths to date. The seven-day positive test rate was 7%.
The state said 939,810 doses of the vaccine have been administered, covering 10.9% of the population. The state has received 1,144,775 doses with 915,475 administered, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Numbers vary, health officials have said, due to a lag in reporting.
Kansas reported a total of 288,717 cases and 4,521 deaths. The monthly positive test rate was 5.3%.
A total of 581,975 vaccine doses have been distributed with 418,653 administered, which covers 10.4% of the population, according to the Kansas Department of Health and Environment.
Across the country, more than 27.8 million people have contracted the virus and 491,724 have died, according to Johns Hopkins University. Worldwide, more than 110 million people have had COVID-19.
