February 5, 2021

DOH: 1,154 new COVID-19 cases, 40 new deaths in last two days, as hospitalizations plummet

On Friday, the state Department of Health reported 589 new cases of COVID-19 and 23 deaths related to the disease. On Thursday, the state had reported 565 new COVID-19 cases and seventeen additional deaths. The number of those hospitalized for COVID-19 reached 396 on Friday, 80 fewer than reported on Wednesday. This could include those […]

Matthew Reichbach

On Friday, the state Department of Health reported 589 new cases of COVID-19 and 23 deaths related to the disease.

On Thursday, the state had reported 565 new COVID-19 cases and seventeen additional deaths.

The number of those hospitalized for COVID-19 reached 396 on Friday, 80 fewer than reported on Wednesday. This could include those from other states who are hospitalized in New Mexico, but would not include New Mexicans who are hospitalized in other states.

This is the lowest number of those reported as hospitalized for COVID-19 since Nov. 2.

The state has identified a total of 176,793 cases of COVID-19 since the beginning of the pandemic and 3,378 deaths related to the disease. DOH has designated 109,068 COVID-19 cases recovered.

One previously reported death in Bernalillo County on Jan. 31 was found to not be COVID-related and was removed from the totals.

DOH provided some information on each of the newly reported deaths on Friday:

A male in his 50s from Bernalillo County who had underlying conditions.
A female in her 60s from Bernalillo County who was hospitalized and had underlying conditions.
A male in his 70s from Bernalillo County who had underlying conditions.
A female in her 80s from Bernalillo County.
A female in her 90s from Bernalillo County who was hospitalized.
A second female in her 90s from Bernalillo County who had underlying conditions.
A female in her 60s from Colfax County who was a resident of the Colfax Long-Term Care Center in Springer.
A female in her 80s from Eddy County who had underlying conditions and was a resident of the Landsun Unit of Lakeview Christian Home in Carlsbad.
A male in his 70s from Lea County who was hospitalized and had underlying conditions.
A female in her 80s from Lea County who was hospitalized and had underlying conditions.
A female in her 80s from Los Alamos County who was hospitalized and was a resident of the Sombrillo Nursing & Rehabilitation Center in Los Alamos.
A male in his 40s from McKinley County.
A male in his 60s from McKinley County who was hospitalized and had underlying conditions.
A female in her 80s from Rio Arriba County.
A male in his 80s from Rio Arriba County who was hospitalized.
A male in his 70s from Sandoval County who was hospitalized and had underlying conditions.
A female in her 60s from San Juan County who was hospitalized and had underlying conditions.
A second female in her 60s from San Juan County who was hospitalized and had underlying conditions.
A male in his 50s from San Miguel County who was hospitalized and had underlying conditions.
A male in his 70s from Santa Fe County who had underlying conditions.
A male in his 80s from Torrance County who was hospitalized and had underlying conditions.
A female in her 40s from Valencia County who was hospitalized and had underlying conditions.
A male in his 70s who was hospitalized, had underlying conditions and was an inmate at the Lea County Correctional Facility

And those from Thursday:

A female in her 50s from Bernalillo County who was hospitalized and had underlying conditions.
A female in her 60s from Bernalillo County who was hospitalized and had underlying conditions.
A male in his 60s from Bernalillo County who was hospitalized and had underlying conditions.
A female in her 60s from Chaves County who was hospitalized.
A male in his 50s from Doña Ana County who was hospitalized.
A male in his 70s from Doña Ana County who had underlying conditions.
A female in her 90s from Grant County who was hospitalized.
A male in his 50s from Guadalupe County who was hospitalized and had underlying conditions.
A male in his 60s from Lea County who was hospitalized.
A male in his 70s from Luna County who was hospitalized.
A female in her 40s from McKinley County who was hospitalized and had underlying conditions.
A male in his 60s from Sandoval County who had underlying conditions.
A second male in his 60s from Sandoval County who was hospitalized and was a resident of the Genesis Rio Rancho Center in Rio Rancho.
A male in his 60s from San Juan County who was hospitalized and had underlying conditions.
A female in her 70s from San Juan County who was hospitalized.
A male in his 70s from San Juan County who was hospitalized and was a resident of the Bloomfield Nursing and Rehabilitation Center in Bloomfield.
A female in her 50s from Santa Fe County.

DOH does not disclose which underlying condition any of the deceased had, only if one was present before death.

The most common underlying condition for those who died with COVID-19 was hypertension, followed by diabetes and cardiovascular disease, according to the most recently available mortality update. Some of those who died had multiple comorbidities.

Gating criteria

The number of new cases on a seven-day rolling average reached 563 as of Jan. 29, the lowest number since Oct. 14. This number lags by about a week because some labs take longer to process and report results to the state.

The number of tests conducted on a seven-day rolling average was 13,673 as of Feb. 4, a decrease from the state’s peak on Feb. 2.

The test positivity rate reached 6.1 percent on a seven-day rolling average as of Feb. 4, about the same as the previous two days’ numbers. This is approaching the state’s gating criteria of 5 percent or lower.

The rate of spread was 0.88 as of Feb. 4, a slight increase from the previous few days. The rate of spread is the number of people someone with COVID-19 will spread the disease to, on average. Anything under 1.0 means the number of cases is dropping.

Testing details

The state coronavirus information page said the state had processed 2,402,484 tests as of Friday, 25,970 more than reported on Wednesday.

The number of positive tests in that same time period was 1,154, or 4.44 percent of the tests.

DOH provided the total number of cases by county.

DOH said that 11 previously reported cases were identified as duplicates (three in Bernalillo County, two in Luna County, two in McKinley County, two in Santa Fe County, one in Chaves County and one in Valencia County) and two previously reported cases in Eddy County were not lab confirmed. These have all been corrected.