What Do More Positive COVID-19 Cases Really Mean for Montanans?
Gallatin County is showing a rise in positive tests for COVID-19, but at the same time, hospitalizations do not seem to be rising substantially with them. We do currently have one hospitalization as a result of the coronavirus in the county, which is the first one in weeks. Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic back in March, Gallatin County has seen only 6 hospitalizations and 1 death due to the coronavirus.
According to stats provided by the Gallatin City-County Health Department, 589 tests were conducted for COVID-19 between June 16 - June 22. Out of those tests, 28 came back positive for the coronavirus. That's works out to a 4.7% positive test rate.
Tests Conducted Positive Cases
6/16 - 99 1
6/17 - 120 4
6/18 - 79 2
6/19 - 123 4
6/20 - 50 10
6/21 - 48 5
6/22 - 70 2
6/23 - No Numbers Given 2
6/24 - No Numbers Given 8
As of June 25, the Health Dept is reporting 29 active cases of COVID-19 in Gallatin County, with only one person needing hospitalization. To date, 5,827 tests have been conducted in the county. The positive test rate is 3.9%. The hospitalization rate is 2.9%
The state of Montana reported 37 new cases on Thursday from 3,266 tests (1% positive test rate). This is the highest total since March 13th.
According to Johns Hopkins University, the number of coronavirus deaths per 100,000 population is about 37 for the United States, compared with 65 in the United Kingdom, 61 in Spain, and 57 in Italy.
Locally, the death rate in Gallatin County due to COVID-19 is 0.004; for the state of Montana it's 0.026, which breaks down to 2 per 100,000 people. Montana's death rate per 100,000 people currently ranks #2 (tied with Alaska) in the United States behind only Hawaii.
So, what does all this mean? The sudden uptick of coronavirus cases was not unexpected. Governor Steve Bullock said earlier this month that they expected positive cases to go up with more testing. However, the percentage of positive cases, according to John Hopkins University, is also on the rise, which is something to keep our eye on. Here's the good news: looking at where the rest of the country is in regards to COVID-19, Montana seems to be handling the virus better than just about all the other states.