Hawaii records 33 new coronavirus infections, bringing the statewide total to 26,500

Hawaii Department of Health officials today reported 33 new coronavirus infections, bringing the state’s total since the start of the pandemic to 26,500 cases. State officials conducted fewer COVID-19 tests over the weekend.

State health officials reported no new coronavirus-related deaths today as the statewide death toll remains at 418.

The state’s official coronavirus-related death toll includes 335 fatalities on Oahu, 53 on Hawaii island, 26 on Maui, one on Kauai, and three Hawaii residents who died outside the state.

The U.S. coronavirus-related death toll is more than 464,000 today.

Today’s new statewide infection cases reported by the Health Department include 20 on Oahu, seven on Maui, four on the Big Island, and two residents diagnosed outside of Hawaii, officials said. As a result of updated information, one case from Oahu was recategorized to Hawaii island and one case from Hawaii island was removed from the counts.

The statistics released today reflect the new infection cases reported to the department on Saturday.

The total number of coronavirus cases by island since the start of the outbreak are 21,361 on Oahu, 2,198 in Hawaii County, 1,870 on Maui, 179 on Kauai, 109 on Lanai and 25 on Molokai. There are also 758 Hawaii residents who were diagnosed outside of the state.

Health officials also said today that of the state’s total infection count, 1,165 cases were considered to be active. Officials say they consider infections reported in the past 14 days to be a “proxy number for active cases.” The number of active cases in the state decreased by 82 today.

By island, Oahu has 845 active cases, Maui has 245, the Big Island has 69, Kauai and Lanai have three each, according to the state’s latest tally. Molokai has no active COVID cases.

Health officials counted 3,662 new COVID-19 test results in today’s tally, for a 0.90% statewide positivity rate. The state’s 7-day average positivity rate is 1.7%, according to the Hawaii COVID-19 Data dashboard.

Of all the confirmed Hawaii infection cases, 1,751 have required hospitalizations, with two new hospitalizations reported today by state health officials.

Four hospitalizations in the statewide count are Hawaii residents who were diagnosed and treated outside the state. Of the 1,1747 hospitalizations within the state, 1,531 have been on Oahu, 104 on Maui, 99 on the Big Island, seven on Kauai, five on Lanai and one on Molokai.

According to the latest information from the department’s Hawaii COVID-19 Data dashboard, a total of 64 patients with the virus were in Hawaii hospitals as of Friday morning, with 17 in intensive care units and 13 on ventilators.

Health officials said that as of Jan.31, 157,018 vaccines have been administered of the 227,600 received by the state. The administered vaccinations by county are Honolulu, 105,500; Maui, 14,391; Hawaii, 15,035 and Kauai, 11,755. The total also included several thousand administered under the federal pharmacy program. State officials release the verified updated vaccination numbers each Wednesday.

Oahu moved to the less-restrictive Tier 2 of Honolulu’s four-tier economic recovery plan on Oct. 22. To gauge whether Honolulu will move to a different tier, the city takes a “weekly assessment” of two key COVID-19 numbers each Wednesday. To move to Tier 3 from Tier 2, the 7-day average of new cases must be below 50 on two consecutive Wednesdays. Also, the 7-day average positivity rate must be below 2.5% on those two Wednesdays.

Today’s seven-day average case count for Oahu is 54 and the seven-day average positivity rate is 2.2%, according to Honolulu Mayor Rick Blangiardi. Blangiardi has said he hoped to stay in Tier 2, a four-tiered framework established by former Mayor Kirk Caldwell. Under Tier 3, social gatherings of up to 10 would be allowed, up from 5 under Tier 2, and retail businesses would be able to operate at full capacity, rather than 50% capacity under Tier 2.

This breaking news story will be updated as more information becomes available.