Hawaii Health Department reports 6 more COVID deaths

The Hawaii Department of Health todayreported six additional COVID-related deaths, bringing the state’s COVID toll since the start of the pandemic to 2,183.

The reported deaths come after two consecutive weeks of no new COVID fatalities.

COVID metrics, meanwhile, continued to show an uptick in both daily average cases and average positivity rates as the “FLiRT” variants become dominant across the U.S.

DOH reported a daily average of 186 cases a day this week, up from 175 last week. The average positivity rate increased to 17.9%, up from 16.7% the previous week. In Honolulu, the average positivity ticked up to 21.0%.

The number of COVID patients in hospitals, however, eased to a weekly average of 119 compared with 126 the previous week.

Hawaii and California are among 15 states with high or very high levels of the coronavirus detected in wastewater, which also serve as an indicator of circulation in the community.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention continues testing wastewater from sewage sheds to track viral activity levels, as those infected shed it in their feces, with or without symptoms. CDC’s map shows Hawaii, New Mexico and Florida are among states with very high levels of wastewater viral activity levels.

The state Department of Health’s respiratory disease dashboard continues to categorize COVID as high, while influenza and RSV are low.

The percentage of emergency department visits for COVID also continued to rise over the past week.

The six deaths reported were all kupuna, including an Oahu man in his 60s who was hospitalized. The rest were women ages 70 and above.

Only one, a woman in her 80s on Kauai, was confirmed to have underlying conditions.