Arkansas covid cases jump by 441; patients on ventilators fall to 3

Nurse Joyce Moore gives a dose of the Pfizer vaccine to Maqbool Bhati at a UAMS vaccine clinic in University Park in Little Rock on Monday, March 8, 2021. (Arkansas Democrat-Gazette/Stephen Swofford)
Nurse Joyce Moore gives a dose of the Pfizer vaccine to Maqbool Bhati at a UAMS vaccine clinic in University Park in Little Rock on Monday, March 8, 2021. (Arkansas Democrat-Gazette/Stephen Swofford)

Arkansas' count of coronavirus cases rose Tuesday by 441 - the second-highest one-day increase since March - even as the number of the state's virus patients who were on ventilators fell to a new 26-month low.

After topping 70 on Monday for the first time in more than a month, the number of covid-19 patients in the state's hospitals fell Tuesday by one, to 72.

Arkansas' death toll from the virus, as tracked by the Department of Health, rose by five, to 11,451.

The increase in cases on Tuesday was about five times the size of the one on Monday and larger by 154 than the one the previous Tuesday.

Except for the spike of 462 cases on Wednesday, it was the largest one-day increase since March 22, a time when the state's new case numbers were inflated by a backlog of reports faxed in by providers weeks earlier, during a surge of infections from the omicron variant.

The average daily increase in the state's case count over a rolling seven-day period rose Tuesday to 307, the first time it had been above 300 since the week ending March 27.

After dipping a day earlier, the number of cases in the state that were considered active rose by 175, to 3,253, as new cases outnumbered recoveries. It was the largest active case total since March 6.

Dropping for the second day in a row, the number of the state's virus patients who were on ventilators fell from six as of Monday to three.

It was the smallest number since at least March 25, 2020, when the Health Department reported that the state had four patients on ventilators out of a total of 12 who were hospitalized.

The number who were in intensive care, which rose the previous two days, fell by five, to 15, which was tied with the number on April 26, April 30, May 1, Thursday and Saturday for the smallest number since at least May 2020.

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