Lancaster’s COVID-19 death toll climbs by 4 over weekend, marking 8 deaths in 7 days
Four more COVID-19 deaths were reported in Lancaster County over the weekend, bringing the number to eight people in the county who have died from the virus in the last seven days, South Carolina health officials said.
In July, the county had seven coronavirus-related deaths, according to official numbers.
Three of the residents who died over the weekend were 65 or older. All three died near the end of August after contracting COVID-19, the Department of Health and Environmental Control said. The fourth resident, between 35 and 64, died Friday, DHEC reported.
The county has had 36 confirmed coronavirus-related deaths since the start of the pandemic, and 58% of them have been 81 or over, according to DHEC.
A death was also reported Saturday in York County. The resident was 65 or older and died at the beginning of August, DHEC officials said. Based on DHEC’s count, there have now been 47 confirmed coronavirus-related deaths in York County.
Also in York County, 51% of those who have died from the virus have been 81 or over.
DHEC officials said Sunday that 1,019 more people had tested positive for the virus across the state, marking the second consecutive day that more than 1,000 new cases were reported in South Carolina. Those cases brought the total of South Carolinians diagnosed with coronavirus to 116,697.
The agency also announced that 11 more people have died after contracting COVID-19, bringing the death toll to 2,574.
More coronavirus cases
Cases in all three counties followed the recent trend of declining daily case counts.
Lancaster County added a total of 33 cases over weekend, according to DHEC. The county has had a total of 1,593 cases.
About 17% of those infected with the virus in Lancaster County are between 31 and 40, and about 16% are between 41 and 50, according to recent DHEC data.
Chester County now has had a total of 861 confirmed cases after it added 19 over the weekend. About 16% of those with the virus in Chester County are between 51 and 60, according to DHEC data.
York County’s daily case count continues to drop. The county reported 67 cases over the weekend, for a total of 4,173 cases, DHEC officials said.
In July, York County averaged 60 coronavirus cases a day. In August, the county has reported more than 60 cases on three days.
About 18% of those infected with the virus in York County are between 21 and 30, and about 17% are between 41 and 50, according to DHEC data.
In South Carolina, about 20% of those infected with the virus are between 21 and 30, and about 16% are between 31 and 40, DHEC officials reported.
There’s less testing
With 4,730 individual test results reported Sunday, the percentage of positive tests was 21.5, DHEC said. That’s a higher percentage than what health officials were reporting in April and May.
In recent weeks, the percentage of tests coming back positive has ranged from 10 to 18, but it has continued to decline since July, when the average percentage was around or more. In May, at its lowest point, the percentage of positive tests ranged from 2% to 4%.
The number of tests completed across the state since March has topped one million. DHEC said Sunday that labs in South Carolina have done 1,006,606 tests.
In York County, a total of 40,371 tests completed since March, and about 13.7% have come back positive. DHEC officials reported that 14,783 tests have been done in Lancaster County since March, with 14% being positive.
Chester County has the highest percentage of positive tests among the three counties. Of the 6,789 tests completed in the county since March, about 16.5% have been positive.
DHEC officials said in recent weeks that fewer people are getting tested for the virus. The state averaged about 10,800 tests a day in July, and this month, the number of people tested daily has reached below 3,000.
Starting in September, DHEC plans to have at least one free testing site each week in all 46 counties, officials said.
Hospitalized patients rising
Hospitals in York and Lancaster counties are filling up.
About 85% of York County’s beds are in use, and 89% in Lancaster County are occupied. There are nine hospital beds available in the county, DHEC said.
Officials did not say how many of those beds were used for COVID-19 patients.
However, the number of hospitalized coronavirus patients across the state peaked at more than 1,700 at the end of July, and has slightly decreased since.
Of the 956 people hospitalized across the state with confirmed or suspected cases of COVID-19, 250 are in intensive care and, of those, 143 are on ventilators, state health officials said Sunday.
Of the state’s 10,070 total inpatient hospital beds, 2,146 are available, meaning about 79% of the state’s beds are in use.
