'A Sad Number': 23 More COVID-19 Deaths Reported In CT This Week

CONNECTICUT — The state has reported 23 new coronavirus-associated deaths over the past seven days.

"It's a sad number," Gov. Ned Lamont said, "but it's worth noting that we have just about the lowest amount of fatalities per capita in the country." The COVID-19 death toll in Connecticut now stands at 8,330.

Lamont made his remarks during his first formal coronavirus briefing since May. He said he had hoped the state was "in the last innings at that point... but delta has thrown us a curveball."

The 15,865 tests reported by DPH are about half as many tests as were performed daily during the peak of the pandemic, but twice as many as a at the start of the summer.

The coronavirus positivity rate has been about 3.3 percent over the past two weeks, "and I take no great comfort in that, except we don't have the 'hockey stick,' we have a sense we are able to manage this infection rate."

As he has done numerous times, Lamont stressed that his key metric for evaluating the pandemic's true dread at any one moment is hospitalizations. That number declined by four beds overnight, to 344.

Lamont said he expects the number of hospitalizations to continue to climb as that statistic is an indicator that lags behind the rising infection rate.

Lamont favorably compared his state with the "highly infected" Louisiana, Florida and Alabama, where some hospitals are "close to being overwhelmed."

"We're not going to let that happen in Connecticut," the governor said.

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