ST. LOUIS — On Wednesday, the St. Louis Metropolitan Pandemic Task Force reported the fewest number of COVID-19 patients in St. Louis area hospitals since the task force started tracking data in early April.
Data released by the task force Wednesday showed 232 people hospitalized across the major hospital systems in the area.
Some of the numbers reported by the task force showed single-day increases, but the seven-day averages continued downward trends across the board.
The full breakdown of data trends from the task force is below.
- New hospital admissions: 17, up from 10 Tuesday
- Seven-day moving average of new hospital admissions: 14, same as Tuesday
- Hospitalizations: 232, down from 250 Tuesday
- Seven-day moving average of hospitalizations: 246, down from 251 Tuesday
- Patients in the ICU: 57, down from 59 Tuesday
- Patients on ventilators: 31, down from 34 Tuesday
On Monday, Dr. Garza also presented data showing that Black communities are at a higher risk of testing positive and ending up in the hospital due to COVID-19.
According to task force data, Dr. Garza said Black residents in the St. Louis area are about four times more likely to test positive for COVID-19 and more than twice as likely to end up in the hospital due to COVID-19.
Dr. Garza said 60% of Black patients who test positive for COVID-19 get admitted into the hospital, compared to about 40% of white patients.
"Again, this tells a story that we've said before, that COVID disproportionately affects the black community much more than the non-black community, and we've finally been able to generate some numbers in order to show that discrepancy," Dr. Garza said.
The task force's next live briefing will take place on Monday, June 22 at 3:30 p.m.
Read more:
- 'It's more Black lives that we're losing': Task force releases more data showing racial disparity in COVID-19 cases
- Missouri is reporting an uptick in COVID-19 cases, so why is St. Louis-area data trending down?
- 'It's not the race itself, it's the communities and what impacts those communities' | A look at the racial disparity in COVID-19 cases in St. Louis