Kansas City metro adds over 180 new COVID-19 cases and two deaths Friday
The Kansas City metropolitan area added more than 180 new COVID-19 cases Friday, pushing the rolling average up again.
The area encompassing Kansas City and Jackson, Clay and Platte counties in Missouri and Johnson and Wyandotte counties in Kansas added 183 new cases for a total of 145,551 cases to date.
The seven-day rolling average for new cases rose to 157, according to data tracked by The Star. One week ago, the average was 132 and two weeks ago, it was 103.
“In the United States, I think the numbers are a lot better. I mean, they are continuing to go down,” said Dana Hawkinson, medical director of infection prevention and control at The University of Kansas Health System. “But locally in the metro, we know that the daily case rate, the seven-day average is continuing to rise.”
He encouraged people to get vaccinated and to continue wearing masks indoors and where social distancing isn’t possible.
“We want to (get back to normal),” Hawkinson said. “The virus hasn’t gotten that memo yet, so we still need to take those precautions and those recommendations to keep each other safe because we can do it, and we can get back to continuing to open up the economy and keep people working, but it has to be in that thoughtful manner.”
The health system had 17 patients hospitalized for the virus, up from 13 on Thursday. Nine were in the intensive care unit with three on ventilators.
“For the longest time we have been now on just one unit,” Hawkinson said. “But now we had to kind of spill over into a second unit again. We haven’t had to do that for quite some time, a few months.”
Kansas City added two deaths, raising the metro’s total to 2,138.
On Friday, Kansas confirmed 309,130 total cases including 4,982 deaths. The monthly positive test rate was 3.1%.
The state has distributed 2,577,770 doses of COVID-19 vaccine. Of those, 1,909,112 have been administered, with 38.4% of the population initiating vaccination.
Missouri reported 501,639 total cases including 8,741 deaths. The seven-day positive test rate was 4.9%.
The state has received 3,879,055 doses of vaccine, with 37.4% of the population initiating vaccination. The state has received 5,325,495 doses, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said.
Across the country, more than 32.3 million people have contracted the virus and 575,746 have died, according to Johns Hopkins University.
