McHenry County reports 302 new COVID-19 cases, no additional deaths

McHenry County hospital bed availability a little less than 2%, according to McHenry County health department

Registered nurses Carolyn Doetsch, left, and Justine Heggem put on personal protective equipment prior to entering a patient's room at Northwest Medicine Huntley Hospital on Wednesday, June 23, 2021, in Huntley.

Just 2% of hospital beds remain available on average, the McHenry County Department of Health reported Wednesday.

While the county’s hospital bed availability sits at 1.9% hospital beds, its intensive care unit bed availability was better, at 17.5%, according to the seven-day rolling average reported by the McHenry County Department of Health. Hospitalizations have decreased or remained stable for seven of the past 10 days in the county.

The two-county region comprised of McHenry and Lake counties remained below the 20% threshold for hospital intensive care unit capacity for the fifth day, remaining at 16% as of Tuesday, the Illinois Department of Public Health reported Wednesday.

Multiple times since the summer, the two-county area 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. That didn’t occur during either last year’s fall peak of COVID-19 cases or this year’s spring surge.

Overall, COVID-19 hospitalizations have continued to climb across the two counties, with 17 straight days of COVID-19 patient increases over the past 10 days, according to the IDPH. The seven-day average for COVID-19 hospitalizations hit 185 Tuesday.

Statewide, the number of hospitalizations tied to COVID-19 rose Tuesday to 3,105, the IDPH reported. Of those hospitalized Tuesday, 641 patients were in the ICU, and 284 were on ventilators.

McHenry County’s COVID-19 test positivity rate dropped slightly to 8.3% Sunday, the last date for which data is available, according to the McHenry County health department. That’s down from a peak of 9.4% that the McHenry County health department reported on Dec. 1.

The positivity rate for the region including both McHenry and Lake counties fell to 6.2% Sunday, according to the IDPH. That’s down from levels exceeding 7% early this month and late last month.

The level of COVID-19 transmission in McHenry County still was at a “high” level Wednesday, as the incidence rate rose after declining in the final days of November, according to the McHenry County health department.

The incidence rate was 507.29 new cases over seven days per 100,000 residents as of Friday, the last day for which data is available, according to the county’s dashboard. It’s the highest number the county has seen since the data began being tracked.

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 McHenry County health department.

Both the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and McHenry County health department use the incidence and positivity rates 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.

An additional 2,077 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine were administered to McHenry County residents Tuesday, according to the IDPH, bringing the total number administered locally to 428,812. The state reported 53,681 booster shots had been administered in McHenry County.

A total of 184,601 county residents, or an estimated 59.82% of McHenry County’s population, now are fully vaccinated, meaning they’ve received all doses recommended for the vaccine they were given.

Statewide, 17,850,055 vaccines have been administered, according to state data.

Across Illinois, 74.4% of those age 5 and older have received at least one dose of a vaccine against COVID-19 and 66.4% are fully vaccinated, the IDPH reported Wednesday. Those rates are 79.4% and 72.1% for those age 12 and older, 81% and 73.6% for people 18 and older, and 94.4% and 86.4% for those 65 and older, respectively.

Statewide, the IDPH tallied 6,658 total new cases of COVID-19 Wednesday. Another 15 deaths also were logged, bringing the totals to 1,867,912 cases, 26,712 confirmed deaths and 3,022 probable deaths.

The McHenry County health department reported an additional 302 COVID-19 cases on Wednesday. That brings the total to 40,874 cases in McHenry County, including 345 deaths and 34 deaths that likely were caused by COVID-19 but have not been confirmed. No additional deaths were reported.

Neighboring Lake County’s health department reported a total of 79,854 cases and 1,121 deaths Wednesday. To the south, Kane County’s health department reported 75,680 cases and 908 deaths.

Among McHenry County ZIP codes, Crystal Lake (60014) has the highest number of COVID-19 cases with a total of 6,332 confirmed, according to county data. Woodstock (60098) follows with 4,709 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) 4,478; Lake in the Hills (60156) 3,676; Huntley (60142) 3,064; Algonquin (60102) 2,877; Cary (60013) 2,798; Johnsburg and McHenry (60051) 2,762; Harvard (60033) 2,074; Marengo (60152) 1,720; Wonder Lake (60097) 1,420; Crystal Lake, Bull Valley and Prairie Grove (60012) 1,394; Spring Grove (60081) 1,031; Island Lake (60042) 556; Fox River Grove (60021) 554; Richmond (60071) 474; Hebron (60034) 244; Barrington (60010) 210; Union (60180) 192; and Ringwood and Wonder Lake (60072) 117.