State's virus cases rise by 1,072

Registered nurses Amanda Velasquez (left) and Ursula Dixon take swabs from a couple in April 2020 at a drive-up coronavirus testing site at Arkansas Surgical Hospital in North Little Rock. (Arkansas Democrat-Gazette file photo)
Registered nurses Amanda Velasquez (left) and Ursula Dixon take swabs from a couple in April 2020 at a drive-up coronavirus testing site at Arkansas Surgical Hospital in North Little Rock. (Arkansas Democrat-Gazette file photo)

​​​​​The daily increase in Arkansas' count of coronavirus cases on Thursday topped 1,000 for the first time this week while falling short of the increase on the same day a week earlier for the second day in a row.

The tally of confirmed and probable cases rose by 1,072.

The state's death toll from the virus, as tracked by the Department of Health, rose by 19, to 1,894.

After falling Wednesday from a record high, the number of covid-19 patients hospitalized in the state rose Thursday by four, to 666.

That was still short of the 676 patients who were hospitalized as of Tuesday, however.

The patients on Thursday included 100 who were on ventilators, up from 99 a day earlier.

In a statement, Gov. Asa Hutchinson noted that the increase in cases was smaller than the 1,202 that were added the previous Thursday.

"This decrease was also recorded with an increase in total testing from this time last week," Hutchinson said.

"While these numbers may provide some encouragement, we know that we still have a long way to go to beat COVID-19."

The cases added to the state's tallies on Thursday included 837 that were confirmed through polymerase chain reaction, or PCR, tests.

The other 235 were "probable" cases, which include those identified through less-sensitive antigen tests.

The state's cumulative case count rose to 109,712.

That comprised 101,588 confirmed cases and 8,124 probable ones.

After falling for three days, the number of confirmed or probable cases that were considered active rose by 163, to 9,466, as 890 Arkansans were newly classified as having recovered.

The active case total remained below the state's peak of 9,766 such cases as of Sunday, however.

The state's death toll rose by 18, to 1,732, among confirmed cases and by one, to 162, among probable cases.

Following a pattern in which -- possibly due to slowdowns in testing on weekends -- the state's daily increases in cases have tended to peak on Thursday or Friday, Thursday's increase was the biggest so far this week.

But over a rolling seven-day period, the average number of confirmed and probable cases added to the state's tallies each day fell Thursday for the second straight day to dip below 1,000 for the first time this week.

From a peak of 1,034 as of Tuesday, the average daily increase fell to 1,006 as of Wednesday and 988 as of Thursday.

The 4,394 cases that have been added to the state's tallies this week as of Thursday were still slightly more than the 4,376 that had been added at the same point last week, however.

Read Friday's Arkansas Democrat-Gazette for full details.

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