COVID-19 test percentage continues to fall

We’ve talked through the pandemic about how health experts want to see the positivity rate for COVID-19 tests to be below five percent. Over the past week, South Dakota has seen that figure drop to 4.3 percent over the past seven days, down from 4.9 percent a week ago. That PCR test positivity rate sits at 3.6 percent in Pennington County over that period.

South Dakota is reporting numbers just once a week and the state is reporting a total of 154 new cases over the past week. That figure includes 25 new cases in Pennington County. The number of active cases falls by another 103 to 2,323. The number of COVID patients in the hospital drops by 21, down to 43. The Department of Health says three of those are in the Monument Health system, with none in the ICU. There are three more deaths in this week’s report, two in Pennington County.

Wyoming puts out their numbers on Tuesdays and Fridays. They reported a total of 124 new cases over the past week on Tuesday. They’re down to 55 lab-confirmed active cases, twelve fewer than last week. Wyoming listed a dozen COVID patients in the hospital last Thursday. There are eight more deaths reported since last week, with two of those in Campbell County.