COVID-19 In Maryland: Hospitalizations Top 1,700; Positivity Rate Up To 16.54%
BALTIMORE (WJZ) -- Maryland's COVID-19 hospitalizations surpassed 1,700 on Monday, according to the latest Department of Health data.
The percentage of people testing positive climbed to 16.54%, increasing by 0.69% since Sunday.
Health department data show that cases went up by 5,376, after rising by more than 25,000 over the holiday weekend, bringing the total number of cases to 668,790.
COVID-19 hospitalizations rose to 1,714, an increase of 130 patients over the past 24 hours. Of those hospitalized, 1,349 are adults in acute care and 348 are adults in the ICU. Thirteen children are in acute care and another four are in the ICU.
Last Thursday, hospitals statewide were directed to launch their pandemic plans to free up bed space and maximize resources after the state surpassed 1,500 COVID-19 hospitalizations.
One hospital, Upper Chesapeake Medical Center in Bel Air, declared a hospital disaster and shifted to crisis standards of care after seeing its cases surge by 733% in the past four weeks.
Since the pandemic began, there have been a total of 668,790 confirmed cases of COVID-19 and 11,022 deaths in Maryland. The number of deaths has not been updated since Dec. 4.
There are 4,247,566 Marylanders fully vaccinated against COVID-19.
The state has administered 10,222,424 doses. Of those, 4,449,979 are first doses, with 1,469 administered in the last day. Officials have given out 3,920,944 second doses, 855 of them in the last 24 hours.
A total of 326,622 Marylanders have received the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, 29 over the last 24 hours.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data show 91.3% of all Marylanders age 18 and older have received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine.
Even as officials monitor cases of the new Omicron variant, which is believed to be more transmissible than other strains, Gov. Larry Hogan said he does not plan to impose any lockdowns.
Instead, residents are asked to socially distance, wear masks in public and get vaccinated.
In Maryland, everyone age 16 and up is eligible to get the booster dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine.
To date, the state has administered 1,524,879 additional or booster vaccine doses, according to the most recent data.
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