TUESDAY UPDATES: Moniteau County Health Center reports 17th COVID-19 related death
Moniteau County Health Center is reporting the death of a resident in their 60's with COVID-19.
This is the 17th death in the county since March due to COVID-19.
According to the health center, there are 65 active cases in the county and 1,561 overall.
The county is reporting four residents to continue to be hospitalized and a total of 1,479 residents have recovered from coronavirus.
The county dashboard has shown cases in the past seven days account for five percent of all cases.
The health center is reporting 158 new cases this month so far, which is on pace to be the lowest case total since September.
Boone County reports lowest number new COVID-19 cases in a week
Columbia/Boone County Department of Public Health and Human Services is reporting 80 new active cases, a decrease of 11 cases from Monday. This is the lowest it has been in a week when Boone County reported 78 cases on Dec. 8.
The dashboard is currently reporting 887 active cases, a drop of 29 cases from Monday. The dashboard last reported active cases under 900 on Dec. 3.
The county now has a reported total number of COVID-19 cases of 12,130 since March.
The county has reported the total number of cases removed from isolation is 11,203, an increase of 107 cases from Monday.
The health department reported two more COVID-19 related deaths earlier today. That brings the total number of deaths this week to five and 40 overall.
Columbia/Boone County Department of Public Health and Human Services dashboard has reported the latest five-day average as 107.
The dashboard is reporting the positivity rate currently sits at 33.6% for Dec. 4 through last Thursday.
The health department is reporting the total hospitalizations in Boone County at 138 cases, a drop of seven from Monday.
The number of Boone County residents hospitalized is reported to be 34.
The dashboard is reporting 35 COVID-19 patients in the ICU and 14 patients on ventilators.
The hospital status is still currently in the 'yellow' zone.
99-year-old veteran among first to get coronavirus shot at Truman Hospital
A 99-year-old veteran was the first patient at Truman Memorial Veterans' Hospital to receive a coronavirus vaccine shot Tuesday.
The hospital said in a news release that Alvin "Bob" River, an Army veteran who served in World War II and lives in the hospital's long-term care wing, was the first patient to receive the vaccine. He will turn 100 on Christmas.
River is part of the first wave of vaccination against the novel coronavirus in Mid-Missouri. St. Mary's Hospital in Jefferson City was set to start administering its vaccine Tuesday afternoon and University of Missouri Health Care is getting its first shipment later Tuesday.
Truman began vaccinating its long-term care residents and staff against the coronavirus on Tuesday, the hospital said. Truman is one of 37 Veterans Affairs medical facilities to receive an initial shipment of the Pfizer vaccine, which was approved by the FDA last week. The sites were chosen because of their ability to vaccinate a large number of people and access to the extreme cold storage the Pfizer vaccine requires.
The release did not say how many doses the hospital received.
Boone County reports fifth COVID-19 death this week
Health officials reported Boone County's 40th coronavirus-related death Tuesday, the fifth one the health department has reported this week.
The Columbia/Boone County Department of Public Health and Human Services said on its social media accounts that it received reports of two deaths Tuesday -- a person between 65 and 69 years old and another over age 80.
Boone County health officials on Monday reported three deaths, with two of them reported to the health department over the weekend. Boone County has logged more than half of its COVID-19 deaths since the start of November after being the first county in the state to report a death in March.
Boone County had 916 active coronavirus cases Monday, according to the county health department's online dashboard. The county's hospitals reported 145 patients with COVID-19 with 34 in intensive care and 14 on ventilators.
Cole County R-V returns to in-person learning
Cole County R-V in Eugene returned to in-person learning on Tuesday.
The school district moved to virtual learning last week because of a staffing shortage.
A letter from Superintendent Dawna Burrow sent to parents on Monday said the district was deep-cleaned while students were away. Burrow said the building will be cleaned again Tuesday.
According to the letter, the district is giving out masks to all students. The school's homecoming events are being postponed to a later date.
As of Monday, the district's COVID-19 dashboard said three teachers and one middle school/high school student had tested positive for coronavirus.
Jefferson City hospital to receive first shipment of COVID-19 vaccine
SSM St. Mary's in Jefferson City will receive its first shipment of Pfizer's COVID-19 vaccine Tuesday morning.
An email from hospital spokeswoman Jessica Royston said the shipment is expected to arrive at 10:30 a.m. The hospital is scheduled to start vaccinating health care workers at 4 p.m.
Missouri Gov. Mike Parson announced Monday some statewide hospitals had received the vaccine -- it was FDA approved on Friday. It is a two-shot vaccine with the second dose to be administered
An ICU nurse at a New York hospital was among the Americans to receive the coronavirus vaccine on Monday.
Missouri reports 200+ new COVID-19 deaths
The Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services reported more than 200 new COVID-19 deaths in the state over the last day.
A majority of the fatalities were reported during the health department's weekly check of death certificates. An email from the health department sent early Monday morning said 208 deaths were added to the state coronavirus dashboard-- it's the largest increase of its kind since the health department started the weekly death certificates checks.
The release said 180 were attributed to November, 22 happened earlier this month, two happened in August and four in October.
On top of the weekly check, the state reported 32 deaths since Monday's dashboard update bringing the pandemic total to 4,754.
State health officials said 2,762 new coronavirus positive cases were added over the last 24 hours. It brings the total since the pandemic started to 350,365.
The dashboard said Missouri's seven-day positivity rate continues to decline. The rate was at 17.9 percent on Tuesday -- a 0.1 decrease from the day before.
State hospital officials say 2,543 people were hospitalized because of COVID-19 in Missouri as of Saturday. It's 111 fewer hospitalizations from the day before, according to the state dashboard.
The hospital officials included 593 were admitted to Missouri ICU beds on the same day. State coronavirus data said it's the first time in a month ICU admissions were below 600. Twenty-two percent of the state's ICU beds were still available on Saturday -- the remaining capacity has been lower than 20 percent recently.
