PA COVID Cases Falling Despite UK Variant's Arrival [Latest Data]

PENNSYLVANIA — Pennsylvania residents and officials alike have expressed concern over the new United Kingdom variant of coronavirus, which is more contagious and which has been detected in local communities in recent weeks.

But thus far, even as officials acknowledge there are probably more cases of the variant in the community than they've confirmed, the new variant has done nothing to interrupt Pennsylvania's ongoing steady decline in new cases.

There have now been several consecutive weeks of decline in all six key coronavirus metrics tracked by the state's Early Warning Monitoring System Dashboard.

“We are reporting another week of lowered statewide positivity, which is an encouraging sign of as we continue our COVID-19 response,” Gov. Tom Wolf said Tuesday, when updated statistics, covering the seven-day period of Feb. 5 through Feb. 11, were released.

The total number of new cases over that period decreased by nearly 6 percent, down from 20,815 to 19,621. The incidence rate also fell from 162.6 to 153.3.

As a comparison, as recently as Jan. 4, the state had nearly twice as many weekly cases (40,407) and an incidence rate more than twice as high (315).

The overall percent positivity rate on all COVID-19 tests has also fallen to 8 percent, down from 8.6 percent last week.

It's not yet clear exactly how many cases of new variant of the virus have been confirmed in Pennsylvania. The Department of Health said they do not track the total number of these cases (the CDC does), but at least five cases have been found in Montgomery County, with handfuls popping up in several other counties statewide.

"We know the UK variant is in Pennsylvania and other states," a spokesperson for the Department of Health told Patch. "We also know that the existing mitigation efforts: hand washing, masking, and social distancing all work to prevent the spread of COVID and variants."

Some counties have begun to fall out of the "substantial" category of transmission. And there are now no counties which have a positivity rate of more than 20 percent.

A total of 28 of the state's 67 counties are below 8 percent, including some of the most densely populated counties like Philadelphia, Allegheny, Delaware, Chester, and Montgomery.

A total of 51 counties do remain in the substantial transmission category. The substantial level includes counties with more than 100 new cases per 100,000 residents over a seven day period, or a percent positivity rate above 10 percent over seven days.

Healthcare metrics have also fallen across the board.

The average daily number of hospitalizations is down to 2,806, from 3,269 last week.

Similarly, the average number of patients on ventilators has fallen from 400 to 307, and the percentage of all emergency room visits due to coronavirus symptoms remains steady at 0.6 percent.

The case decrease comes with warmer weather approaching, and the vaccine becoming more widespread in local communities. A total of 1,210,194 partial doses, and 378,567 full doses had been administered as of Tuesday afternoon.

See the Pennsylvania Department of Health's Early Warning Monitoring System Dashboard online here.