Arkansas' new covid-19 case numbers continued to decline Friday from last month's peak. The average daily increase in the state's new-case count over a rolling seven-day period fell to the lowest level since July 5.
With 7,149 new coronavirus cases reported to the Arkansas Department of Health over the past week, the average daily increase over a rolling seven-day period fell to just over 1,021. The last time the count was lower was the Fourth of July holiday weekend, when fewer test results were reported.
The state's death toll from the virus, as tracked by the state Health Department, rose by eight, to 11,753.
The number of people hospitalized with covid-19 in Arkansas fell Friday by four for the second consecutive day. The total has fallen from 412 on Wednesday, to 408 on Thursday, and to 404 on Friday. The number as of Friday was still up from the recent low of 386 that it reached on Sunday and Monday, but down from the 417 covid-19 patients who were in the state's hospitals the previous Friday.
In the past five months, the highest number of covid hospitalizations reported by the state Health Department was 442 on July 20.
The state's count of cases rose by 1,066, which was smaller by 372 than the increase on Thursday and by 112 than the one the previous Friday.
After rising slightly a day earlier, the number of cases that were considered active fell Friday by 210, to 13,713, as recoveries outnumbered new infections. The total number of active cases as of Friday was the smallest since July 7.
Growing for the second consecutive day, the number of the state's covid-19 patients who were in intensive care rose by four, to 66.
The number of Arkansas covid patients on ventilators also grew for the second consecutive day, rising by two to 19.
Since the pandemic reached Arkansas in March 2020, the state Health Department has reported 909,456 cases of the coronavirus. Of those, 883,760 are considered recovered.
More details in Saturday's Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.