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Health officials count 90 new coronavirus infections in Hawaii

CINDY ELLEN RUSSELL / CRUSSELL@STARADVERTISER.COM
                                People dine and walk along the sidewalk at the International Market Place in Waikiki on Sunday.
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CINDY ELLEN RUSSELL / CRUSSELL@STARADVERTISER.COM

People dine and walk along the sidewalk at the International Market Place in Waikiki on Sunday.

TIM WRIGHT / SPECIAL TO THE HONOLULU STAR-ADVERTISER
                                The Yukio Okutsu State Veterans Home in Hilo has been the site of a major cluster of coronavirus cases.
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TIM WRIGHT / SPECIAL TO THE HONOLULU STAR-ADVERTISER

The Yukio Okutsu State Veterans Home in Hilo has been the site of a major cluster of coronavirus cases.

CINDY ELLEN RUSSELL / CRUSSELL@STARADVERTISER.COM
                                People dine and walk along the sidewalk at the International Market Place in Waikiki on Sunday.
TIM WRIGHT / SPECIAL TO THE HONOLULU STAR-ADVERTISER
                                The Yukio Okutsu State Veterans Home in Hilo has been the site of a major cluster of coronavirus cases.

Hawaii Department of Health officials today reported 90 new coronavirus-related infections statewide, bringing the total since the start of the pandemic to 12,203 cases.

No new deaths were reported by the state today, but Health Department has yet to officially count more than a dozen of the latest deaths at the Yukio Okutsu State Veterans Home in Hilo, which has been the site of a major COVID-19 cluster. Hilo Medical Center has reported that 26 of the Big Island’s 28 coronavirus-related deaths have been residents of the nursing home. The state has only verified coronavirus as a factor in 15 deaths from that island.

The state’s official death toll as of today is 132. In addition to the 15 Big Island deaths, the state’s official death toll includes 107 on Oahu, and nine on Maui, while one fatality was a Kauai resident who died on the mainland. The U.S. death toll is more than 205,000 today.

All of today’s 90 new infection cases were on Oahu, officials said.

Health officials said because of updated information three previous COVID-19 cases on Oahu were removed from the statewide count.

Today’s total coronavirus cases by county since the start of the outbreak are 11,026 on Oahu, 700 in Hawaii County, 388 in Maui County, and 59 in Kauai County. There are also 30 Hawaii residents diagnosed outside of the state.

As of today, 1,856 infections are considered active cases statewide, with a total of 10,215 patients now classified by health officials as “released from isolation,” or 84% of those infected, according to the state’s official count. The category counts those infected people who have met the criteria for being released from isolation. Officials reported 60 new releases today.

On Saturday, health officials significantly decreased it’s count of active infections, saying, “The Department of Health has been focused on redesigning procedures to maximize effectiveness of COVID-19 case investigation and contact tracing including making a variety of changes to data systems allowing them to be more automated, and to improve timeliness of data entry and validation. Isolation release data completeness was the focus of recent efforts, resulting in a substantial increase in the number of COVID-19 cases currently reported as released from isolation, from 5,397 to 10126.”

By county, Honolulu has seen 9,204 patients released from isolation, Hawaii County has had 592 releases, Maui has seen 363 patients released. Kauai has two active infections.

Of all the confirmed Hawaii cases, 819 have required hospitalizations, with three new hospitalizations on Oahu reported today, health officials said.

Two hospitalizations in the statewide count are Hawaii residents who were diagnosed and treated outside the state. Of the 817 hospitalizations in the state, 721 have been on Oahu, 55 on Maui, 40 on Hawaii island, and one on Kauai.

Lt. Gov. Josh Green said Sunday that there are 148 COVID-19 patients in Hawaii hospitals, which he said is one of the state’s lowest coronavirus hospitalization numbers in the last two months.

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Officials counted 1,302 new tests in today’s tally, with today’s 90 positive results representing 6.9% of the total tested.

Of the 294,864 coronavirus tests conducted so far by state and clinical laboratories in Hawaii since the start of the outbreak, a total of 4.1% have been positive.

Oahu’s seven-day average case count must stay below 100 and its positivity rate must be below 5% for 14 consecutive days to move to the next level of economic opening. As of today, Honolulu has five straight days under both benchmarks.

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