Arkansas’ covid hospitalizations fall Friday for first time in nearly a week

State covid death tolls rises 8 to 11,707

Sharaina Smiley, a Patient Care Technician at Jefferson Regional Medical Center in Pine Bluff, puts on PPE before entering a patient's room in the covid ward of the hospital on Friday, Feb. 18, 2022. (Arkansas Democrat-Gazette/Stephen Swofford)
Sharaina Smiley, a Patient Care Technician at Jefferson Regional Medical Center in Pine Bluff, puts on PPE before entering a patient's room in the covid ward of the hospital on Friday, Feb. 18, 2022. (Arkansas Democrat-Gazette/Stephen Swofford)

Arkansas' count of coronavirus cases rose Friday by 1,178 -- the smallest daily increase since Monday -- as the number of people hospitalized in the state with the virus fell for the first time in almost a week.

The state's death toll from the virus, as tracked by the Department of Health, rose by eight, to 11,707.

State Epidemiologist Mike Cima said six of the deaths reported Friday happened within the past month. The other two were from earlier in June, he said.

The increase in cases on Friday was smaller by 400 than the one on Thursday and by 358 than the rise the previous Friday.

After rising slightly a day earlier, the average daily increase in the state's case count over a rolling seven-day period fell to 1,186, the first time it had been below 1,200 since the week ending July 8.

With recoveries outnumbering new cases, the number of cases in the state that were considered active fell by 220, to 15,795, after rising the previous two days.

The number hospitalized, which rose the previous five days, fell by 18, to 417, which was still up by 19 from its level a week earlier.

Because it can take several days for someone to become sick enough to be hospitalized, Cima said the number hospitalized could rise again even as the state's new case numbers decline.

"I wouldn't be surprised at all if we see some increases [in the number hospitalized] in the early parts of next week because of the fact that it is a lagging indicator, and there is still quite a bit of infection going around," Cima said.

He said it's likely that other measures of severe illness, such as the number of covid-19 patients who are on ventilator and the number of deaths reported each day, will likely continue rising for a while.

Over the past week, a total of 41 covid-19 deaths have been reported, the most over a seven-day span since late May.

"Certainly those are the most lagged variables," Cima said of the number of patients on ventilators and the number of deaths reported each day.

"We've had an increased number of cases. We had an increased number of hospitalizations, albeit at a much lower level, so I would expect the same within those two measures, [patients on] ventilators and deaths."

Growing for the third straight day, the number of the state's virus patients who were on ventilators rose Friday by two, to 24, its highest level since March 30.

After reaching a four-month high a day earlier, the number who were in intensive care fell by four, to 84.

CASES BY COUNTY

Pulaski County had the most new cases, 146, on Friday, followed by Washington County with 103 and Craighead County with 63.

The state's cumulative count of cases since March 2020 rose to 902,307.

Mercy Fort Smith had 17 covid-19 patients on Friday, including four in intensive care, spokeswoman Mardi Taylor said.

The hospital's total number of covid-19 patients, while remaining well below the peaks it reached during previous surges, has "fluctuated a bit" over the past several weeks, she said.

"It's gone up. It's gone back down, and now it's currently back up again," Taylor said.

"We've been on kind of a roller coaster with our numbers."

According to the Health Department's online coronavirus dashboard, the number of hospitalized covid-19 patients in the nine-county Arkansas Valley region in western Arkansas, including Fort Smith, had almost doubled in the past week, from 48 as of July 22 to 94 on Friday.

Over the same period, the number rose by 10, to 48 in the 17-county Southwest region and by three, to 31, in the 13-county North Central region.

In the other four regions listed on the dashboard, the number of hospitalized covid-19 patients fell.

The largest drop was in the six-county Metro region in Central Arkansas, where the number fell by 30, to 126.

The number fell by five, to 14, in the 10-county Southeast region; by four, to 49 in the six-county Northwest region; and by one, to 55, in the Northeast region, which has 14 counties.

At its 11 hospitals around the state, Baptist Health had 96 covid-19 patients on Friday, CEO Troy Wells said in a statement. That was up from 89 in the middle of last week.

"Though this strain of COVID-19 is extremely contagious, we aren't seeing the large numbers of inpatients we were seeing earlier this year," Wells said.

"We remain nowhere near our record of 368 patients hospitalized with COVID-19 back in January; however, we prepared and have the experience to respond to an influx of patients."

The patients on Friday included 18 who were in intensive care and seven who were on ventilators, Wells said.

"We are seeing an increase in patients with COVID-19 at our Fort Smith hospital, though this is not creating capacity issues," Wells said.

Meanwhile, he said 126 of Baptist Health's 11,000 employees were out on Friday for reasons related to covid-19, down from 137 a week earlier.


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