Positivity Rate And New COVID Cases Start To See Dip In Montco

MONTGOMERY COUNTY, PA — As Montgomery County continues to battle through the COVID-19 surge heading into the holidays, there are some encouraging signs.

While still high, numbers in several key coronavirus metrics tracked by the state's Early Warning Monitoring System Dashboard have either head steady or declined in the most recently available data, which covers the week of Dec. 11 to Dec. 17.

The overall number of new cases declined from 3,307 to 3,011, which is the first time the county has seen in a fall in months. The surge had steadily risen since September.

The hospitalization rate is up again to an average of 526 patients per day, according to the dashboard. That's an increase over last week's average of 486.

>>Montco COVID Updates: Towns With Most, Least Recent New Cases

However, looking beyond the weekly average calculated by the state dashboard, the last several days have seen a decrease in Montgomery County: as of Sunday, the number hospitalized was 440,down from 531 on Dec. 17, according to statistics updated by the county on Monday.

Another metric which has fallen is incidence rate per 100,000 residents: the past week has seen an average of 363.4, compared to 399.1 the week previous.

One of the most oft-cited metrics, the percent positivity rate on all tests, remains quite high at 11.4 percent. That's more than double the CDC threshold for "concerning," which is 5 percent. However, 11.4 is a decrease from the high point of 11.9 percent the week before.

Ventilator usage has slightly risen to 52.7, from 51.9. However, the county says that 439 ventilators still remain available for usage at local hospitals.

A final metric, emergency room visits due to COVID-19, dropped slightly from 1.3 percent to 1.1 percent.

Most of Montgomery County's latest numbers on the dashboard were notably better than Pennsylvania's overall numbers, although the state is also finally seeing some decreases as well. Statewide, new case numbers were down by 4,371 last week. The state's incidence rate was about 445 per 100,000 people and test positivity rate was 15.8 percent, while hospitalizations and patients on ventilators both increased.