MONDAY UPDATES: Missouri DHSS adds 97 COVID-19 related deaths to state dashboard
Missouri DHSS has added 97 COVID-19 related deaths after state’s disease surveillance system analyzed several death certificates.
Officails say the deaths will be captured and reported publicly through the dashboard Tuesday morning.
Thirty-two of these deaths occurred in November, and 65 occurred earlier in December.
Officials at DHSS report the weekly activity typically causes a sharp increase in the deaths added to Missouri’s total the following day. DHSS is now regularly analyzing death certificates on Mondays.
Officials say the state does not track probable or pending deaths.
Two Randolph County residents die due to COVID-19; Cole County reports 92 new cases
The Randolph County Health Department is reporting two COVID-19 related deaths. That brings the total to 25 deaths since the middle of July.
The county is reporting a 13 case increase in active cases from 91 to 104 from last Thursday.
That brings the total number of cases to 1,692; a 36 case increase.
The number of new recoveries is 21 cases bringing the total number of recoveries to 1,563.
Currently, there are nine residents that have been hospitalized with the coronavirus.
In Cole County, the health department is reporting 92 new cases. That brings the total number of cases to 6,837.
Boone County reports COVID-19 related death, active cases drop by 254 cases
Columbia/Boone County Department of Public Health and Human Services is reporting one new coronavirus related death. The person that died was in the 80+ age group.
The health department is reporting 93 new COVID-19 cases for Monday.
The dashboard is currently reporting 686 active cases, a 254 case decrease from Sunday.
The county now has a reported total number of COVID-19 cases of 13,470 since March.
The county has reported the total number of cases removed from isolation is 12,730, an increase of 346 cases.
Columbia/Boone County Department of Public Health and Human Services dashboard has reported the latest five-day average as 82, the lowest its been since Nov. 4 when it was 91.
The dashboard is reporting the positivity rate of 32.4% for Dec. 11 through Dec. 17. It currently sits at 29.9% for Dec. 18 through last Thursday.
The health department is reporting the total hospitalizations in Boone County at 129 cases.
The number of Boone County residents hospitalized is reported to be 37, an increase of six from last Thursday.
The dashboard is reporting 28 COVID-19 patients in the ICU and 13 patients on ventilators.
The hospital status is still currently in the 'yellow' zone.
Boone County health department reports Christmas weekend coronavirus cases
Boone County health officials reported 155 cases of coronavirus over the holiday weekend.
The Columbia/Boone County health department on Monday updated its COVID-19 dashboard to reflect cases reported to the department between Friday and Sunday. Boone County logged just three new cases on Christmas Day, 95 on Saturday and 57 on Sunday.
With the weekend numbers, the county's five-day average of new cases dropped below 100 for the fourth time in the past week as the rate of new positive results continues to decline from its early November peak. Boone County remains under health orders that force bars to stop selling alcohol early and require masks county-wide until at least Jan. 19.
Boone County has now reported 13,377 coronavirus cases since the pandemic started in March. The county has 940 active cases.
The health department has not updated its hospital data since Thursday. Updated hospital numbers are expected when Monday case numbers are released late in the afternoon.
The county's positivity rate -- the percentage of tests that get a positive result -- continues to decline, as well. That rate was 29.9% for the week that ended Thursday, down from 32.5% the previous week.
Missouri awaiting federal guidance on unemployment benefits
The Missouri Department of Labor said Monday that it is waiting on more information from the federal government after the president signed a bill extending pandemic unemployment benefits.
"We are ... required to wait for guidance from the United States Department of Labor on the interpretation and proper implementation of the new legislation," the department said Monday.
President Donald Trump on Sunday signed a $900 billion coronavirus stimulus package that Congress approved last week. The legislation extends unemployment assistance programs through March 14 and provides an extra $300 per week for people unemployed because of the pandemic. Those programs expired Saturday but will be restarted under the legislation.
The state labor department promised to provide updates and encouraged unemployed workers to continue to file claims each week. The department said it has no other information about the programs at this time.
More than 130,000 Missourians were unemployed last month, according to the latest figures available. Missouri had one of the nation's lowest unemployment rates last month at 4.4% but that rate was still a full point higher than the same time last year.
More than 15,000 workers in Boone County and more than 5,700 in Cole County have filed unemployment claims related to COVID-19 since the pandemic began.
The legislation also provides households with $600 per person.
State reports fewer than 2,000 new COVID-19 cases for third straight day
Missouri's Department of Health and Senior Services added 1,522 cases of COVID-19 to its dashboard Monday. Monday marks the third consecutive day the state reported fewer than 2,000 new cases.
There have now been 383,616 total cases of the novel coronavirus in Missouri.
DHSS also reported four additional deaths due to COVID-19, bringing the total number of deaths in Missouri to 5,316.
The 7-day positivity rate went down slightly, now at 16.8 percent.
