Across Michigan, COVID positivity rate from tests falls below 3 percent, lowest infection rate in a year
DETROIT — Last April 6, 2020, St. John Ascension Detroit Hospital hit “peak COVID-19,” when 75 percent of its 400 beds were filled with 295 COVID patients.
On Monday morning, the hospital hit a new low for cases: only nine patients had COVID-19, with only one being serious enough to be kept on a ventilator. By Tuesday, the number of cases was seven.
“Detroit was the epicenter of the first wave of COVID around the country, and what we learned in Southeast Michigan we were able to share with other markets,” Dr. Kenneth Berkovitz, ministry market executive for Ascension Michigan, told Crain’s Detroit Business in an interview Monday.
Across Michigan, just 2 percent of the 19,000 COVID tests returned Monday came back positive, meaning just 98 percent of tests came back negative. As a result, state health officials reported 419 infections on Sunday but just 210 on Monday, the lowest rate since June 2020.
Statewide, just 783 people across Michigan were being treated for COVID on Monday compared to 876 on Friday. As a result, the total number of Michigan deaths since the pandemic began grew to 19,376 on Monday.
More than 4.6 million Michiganders have received at least one vaccination dose. Still, the rates fluctuate: more than 75 percent of Leelanau County has received at least one dose while just 37 percent of Detroiters have received one dose, and just 27 percent of Detroiters have received both doses.
As cases drop to new lows, new concerns arise
Today, as Michigan cases hit new lows, there are new concerns related to the aftermath of the pandemic:
- A COVID-outbreak in Taiwan just stopped operations at one of the world’s largest chip-testing operations at a time when chip shortages have disrupted auto sales around the globe. As a result, Detroit-based automakers have scrambled to meet demand.
- According to a new Detroit Regional Chamber poll, Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, the most recognized face of the state’s pandemic response, saw her approval ratings drop 8 percentage points between February and May.
- Michigan just reported its first case of hantavirus in neighboring Washtenaw County. The rare disease has a 40 percent fatality rate. It’s transmitted through the waste or saliva of rodents.
- On Monday, the neighboring Beaumont Health System put out an urgent call for blood donations since people began staying away from hospitals whenever possible during the pandemic.
“One of the things we learned with the first wave, as we told everybody to stay home, is that we probably overshot, so to speak. We cannot delay a lot of medical care,” Berkovitz added. “In addition to COVID-related deaths, there is increased risk of heart attack, stroke, and cancer presenting later. We have made our facilities safe so we can care for both COVID and non-COVID patients.”
Ascension is the largest Catholic hospital system. Blessed Solanus Casey died in St. John Detroit in 1957, attracting the nearby Catholic Men’s Fellowship, based at nearby St. Paul on the Lake in Grosse Pointe Farms, to organize daily prayer marches in front of the hospital. They called on Blessed Solaus, a healer, to intercede.
Just 54 days ago, in mid-April 2021, cases were more than 10 times higher: 101 patients, with eight on ventilators. Moreover, April’s 2021 peak was just a third the size of the April 2020 wave: April 14, 2020, was notorious for a record 72 COVID-19 patients requiring ventilators versus eight one year later.
The Detroit hospital has been a bellwether for cases throughout the pandemic, rising and falling with each of the three waves, peaking in the chilliest months of late spring, dropping with warmer temperatures.