ICU availability in McHenry, Lake counties drops to 20% even as total COVID-19 patients continue to decline

The number of COVID-19 vaccine doses administered to McHenry County residents now exceeds 370,000, the Illinois Department of Public Health reported Thursday.

The news comes as the average number of doses administered each day continues to rise as well as the number of McHenry County residents becoming fully vaccinated each day climbs for the second day in a row.

For about two weeks, the number of McHenry County residents earning fully vaccinated status each day hovered around 150, but as of Wednesday, that number was 178, a Northwest Herald analysis of state data shows.

Another 1,618 doses were administered Wednesday to McHenry County residents, bringing the total number of shots administered to 370,547, IDPH reported.

A total of 177,737 county residents, or an estimated 57.60% of McHenry County’s population, now are fully vaccinated, meaning they’ve received all doses recommended for the vaccine they were given.

Statewide, 15,480,626 vaccines have been administered, according to state data.

Across Illinois, 81.1% of those age 12 and older have received at least one dose of a vaccine against COVID-19, and 63.5% are fully vaccinated, the IDPH reported Thursday. Those rates are 82.7% and 65.1% for people 18 and older and 97% and 79% for those 65 and older.

The McHenry County Department of Health reported 86 new cases and six new deaths Thursday, bringing the total number of cases in the county to 35,257 including 335 deaths and 32 deaths that likely were caused by COVID-19 but could not be confirmed.

The health department currently is reviewing historical death data, according to its website, meaning that the deaths being reported are ones that occurred over the past few months. The most recent deaths include two on Oct. 16 and three Oct. 14, according to the dashboard.

The number of new cases over the previous seven days fell to 129.67 per 100,000 residents Saturday, the most recent day for which data is available, according to the McHenry County Department of Health’s school metrics dashboard. The decrease marks the first after seven days of straight increases.

Under the thresholds set by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the incidence rate – measured as the total number of new cases over seven days per 100,000 residents – marks a “high” degree of transmission of COVID-19.

For spread to meet the less severe category “substantial,” the incidence rate would need to fall below 100 new cases over seven days per 100,000 residents and remain there for a week, according to the county’s health department.

Both the CDC and McHenry County health department use the incidence rate and positivity rate to categorize COVID-19 transmission. When the two metrics do not fall within the same transmission risk category, the higher one is chosen, according to the county health department.

McHenry County’s COVID-19 test positivity dropped to 2.5% Monday, according to the county. The county has been within the low transmission range of zero percent to 4.9% since early September.

Region 9, which is made up of Lake and McHenry counties, remained at 2.1% Monday, according to the IDPH.

Intensive care unit availability across McHenry and Lake counties fell to 20% Wednesday, the IDPH reported.

Twice this summer, the ICU care availability in the two-county region fell below 20%, a threshold previously used by the state during the COVID-19 pandemic as a trigger point for implementing more strict health mitigations on regions, something that hadn’t occurred during either last year’s fall peak of COVID-19 cases or the more recent spring surge.

The number of people hospitalized because of COVID-19 in both counties went down slightly to 75 Wednesday. The region saw the number of patients hospitalized decrease or remain stable nine of the past 10 days.

In McHenry County alone, 5.7% of medical and surgical beds and 29.8% of intensive care unit beds were available, according to the McHenry County health department. Hospitalizations have decreased or remained stable seven out of the past 10 days in McHenry County.

Statewide, the number of hospitalizations tied to COVID-19 decreased slightly Wednesday to 1,228, the IDPH reported. Of those hospitalized Wednesday, 289 patients were in the ICU and 139 were on ventilators.

The IDPH reported 2,601 new confirmed and probable cases of COVID-19 Thursday. Another 43 deaths also were logged Thursday, bringing the totals to 1,692,875 cases, 25,749 confirmed deaths and 2,842 probable deaths.

Neighboring Lake County’s health department reported a total of 72,846 cases and 1,094 deaths on Thursday, and to the south, Kane County’s health department reported a total of 68,870 cases and 942 deaths as of Thursday.

Among McHenry County ZIP codes, Crystal Lake (60014) has the highest number of COVID-19 cases with a total of 5,439 confirmed cases, according to county data. Woodstock (60098) follows with 4,006 cases.

The McHenry County health department reports ZIP code data only for parts within McHenry County, a department spokeswoman said. Any discrepancies between county and IDPH numbers likely are because of the data’s provisional nature and because each health department finalizes its data at different times, she said.

The following is the rest of the local breakdown of cases by ZIP code: McHenry (60050) 3,807; Lake in the Hills (60156) 3,260; Huntley (60142) 2,666; Algonquin (60102) 2,544; Cary (60013) 2,416; Johnsburg and McHenry (60051) 2,413; Harvard (60033) 1,826; Marengo (60152) 1,423; Crystal Lake, Bull Valley and Prairie Grove (60012) 1,205; Wonder Lake (60097) 1,164; Spring Grove (60081) 906; Island Lake (60042) 501; Fox River Grove (60021) 460; Richmond (60071) 400; Hebron (60034) 218; Barrington (60010) 187; Union (60180) 161; and Ringwood and Wonder Lake (60072) 93.