PORTSMOUTH, Va. (WAVY) — The Virginia Department of Health is reporting 646 additional confirmed cases of COVID-19 and 7 new deaths related to the virus.
As of Saturday morning, June 13, Virginia has an overall number of 53,869 COVID-19 cases since the start of the outbreak. Of the 658 cases reported from Friday, 646 have been confirmed by testing. Another 12 were probable cases, in which a patient who shows symptoms is diagnosed without testing.
The Tidewater area reported 76 new cases for Saturday which is the highest in the region this week. Of the 7 deaths reported statewide, one was from Accomack and another was from Portsmouth.
Friday saw the state’s percent 7-day average of percent of positive cases reach an all-time low of 8% after about 43,000 mostly negative new PCR tests were added to the state’s official count (448,172) since Thursday morning, when only 405,025 total were reported. The Virginia Department of Health says this major jump in testing numbers is due to two laboratories beginning to electronically report their backlog of tests this week.
About 31,500 of the 43,000 new tests were backlogged from those labs with the rest representing regular daily reporting numbers.
Positive results were hand entered into the system and reported to VDH when they were received, but this large chunk of negative results weren’t displayed on VDH’s website until Friday.
This major increase comes days after VDH announced it was also adding a backlog of about 13,000 mostly negative tests from a Richmond-area lab to the state’s official count. At the time, VDH said the entry of those results alleviated their backlog by about half. The Richmond lab had been sending results to via fax to VDH, which prioritized added positive results to the state’s data.
Here are the latest numbers for Tidewater:
Accomack: 989 cases, 59 hospitalized, 14 deaths (+2 cases, +1 hospitalized, +1 death)
Chesapeake: 650 cases, 100 hospitalized, 16 deaths (+14 cases, +1 hospitalized)
Franklin: 44 cases, 3 hospitalized, 2 deaths (+ 1 case)
Gloucester: 36 cases, 9 hospitalized, 1 death (+1 case)
Hampton: 234 cases, 37 hospitalized, 5 deaths (no icreases)
Isle of Wight: 154 cases, 15 hospitalized, 8 deaths (+4 cases)
James City County: 231 cases, 56 hospitalized, 15 deaths (+1 case)
Mathews: 5 cases, 2 hospitalized, 0 deaths (no increases)
Newport News: 357 cases, 42 hospitalized, 10 deaths (+6 cases, + 1 hospitalized)
Norfolk: 643 cases, 74 hospitalized, 7 deaths (+13 cases, +6 hospitalized)
Northampton: 261 cases, 34 hospitalized, 27 deaths (+2 cases)
Poquoson: 11 cases, 2 hospitalized, 0 deaths (no increases)
Portsmouth: 375 cases, 57 hospitalized, 12 deaths (+5 cases, +1 hospitalized, +1 death)
Southampton: 155 cases, 7 hospitalized, 2 deaths (no increases)
Suffolk: 341 cases, 53 hospitalized, 33 deaths (+4 cases, +1 hospitalized)
Virginia Beach: 869 cases, 107 hospitalized, 27 deaths (+22 cases)
Williamsburg: 49 cases, 11 hospitalized, 5 deaths (no increases)
York: 91 cases, 10 hospitalized, 3 deaths (+1 case)
According to the Virginia Hospital and Healthcare Association, 959 residents in Virginia are currently hospitalized due to the virus. That number is a combination of confirmed positive COVID-19 patients and hospitalized patients whose COVID-19 test results are still pending.
