Nevada only state in US with all counties at ‘low’ COVID levels

COVID-19 in Nye County and the entire state has plummeted to low levels, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, as hospitalizations and reported new cases declined for the sixth straight week.

Nye County had an average of three new cases in the past seven days, according to CDC data, which is considered a low level. When a community is at low levels, the agency recommends that people get tested if they have symptoms and stay up to date on vaccinations.

When levels are high, the CDC recommends that everyone wear a mask in public indoor spaces.

Last week, only White Pine County was at low levels in Nevada, with Churchill County and Carson City remaining at high levels. Nye County and the rest of the state were at medium levels.

Nevada is the only state in the country with all its counties at low levels, according to the most recent CDC data. Nationwide, just 19.8 percent of counties are at low levels, with 40.55 at medium levels and 39.65 percent at high levels.

The COVID-19 community level is based on new hospital admissions, staffed inpatient beds occupied by COVID patients and levels of new cases per 100,000.

In neighboring Clark County where most COVID patients in the state are treated, there were 8.6 new hospital admissions per 100,000 population and 3.7 percent of staffed inpatient beds were filled by patients with confirmed cases of COVID-19. There were 112.85 new cases per 100,000 population.

Hospitalizations in the county fell over the past week to 178 from the previous week’s 226, according to data released Wednesday by the Nevada Department of Health and Human Services. Statewide, hospitalizations fell to 235 from 286.

The two-week average of daily new cases declined in the county to 244 from 326, the state data indicates. Statewide, cases fell to 330 from 433.

Authorities caution that actual case numbers are at least several-fold higher than confirmed cases, as people increasingly test using at-home rapid tests, whose positive results are not included in official tallies.

In total, there have been 8,431 confirmed cases of COVID-19 in Nye County and 772,676 in the state. There have been 278 deaths in the county and 11,353 statewide.

Contact Mary Hynes at mhynes@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0336. Follow @MaryHynes1 on Twitter. Brent Schanding contributed to this report.