With the state of Illinois and the United States ending the Public Health Emergency declarations this past week for COVID-19, the Illinois Department of Public Health is shifting to a new format for reporting COVID data and will be releasing updates every other week, with the next update coming on May 26th, according to information from the IDPH’s website this morning. The end of the Public Health Emergency means the CDC has stopped reporting COVID-19 community levels for each county in the U.S. and will now be focused on hospital admission rates by county. The IDPH says it will continue to report COVID-19 data on the weekly number of people admitted to hospitals from Emergency Departments, deaths and vaccinations, as well as through the dashboard of the Illinois Wastewater Surveillance System.
The latest numbers this morning showed Illinois has recorded 4.139,537 cases of the coronavirus and 36,870 deaths in all of Illinois’ 102 counties since the start of the pandemic. For the week ending May 7th the state recorded 3729 new and probable cases and 20 deaths.
The CDC recommended a second bivalent booster for those who are age 65 and older to help fight COVID-19 if it has been at least four months since their first bivalent booster. The IDPH continues to urge the public to seek treatment quickly if they test positive for COVID-19.