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SALT LAKE CITY — The Utah Department of Health and Human Services reported 6,872 new COVID-19 cases, as well as 13 additional deaths over the past week.
The average new case count for each day was just under 982 cases.
On Thursday, 259 patients were hospitalized with the coronavirus in Utah, an increase of 43 since the previous Thursday, June 30. Hospitalizations are now the highest they've been in Utah since March, though still not close to what the state saw during previous surges of the disease.
The omicron subvariant BA.5 now accounts for almost 54% of the country's COVID-19 cases, according to the latest estimates by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention through the week ending July 2. That variant makes up just over 50% of cases in the region of the U.S. that includes Utah.
The variant BA.5 is believed to be more transmissible than the stealth variant.
Some metrics showed decreases in the disease over the previous few weeks. Fewer wastewater testing facilities marked elevated or increasing levels of the virus — 64.7% compared to 82.4% of sites the previous week.
Salt Lake, Tooele, Summit and San Juan counties continue to experience high rates of disease, according to the CDC guidelines, but the rest of the state is seeing low or moderate case rates.
The numbers do not include results from any home tests.
To date, Utah has confirmed 989,767 COVID-19 cases and 4,847 deaths due to the disease.
Utah has seen more deaths confirmed through June and early July compared to the spring, according to state data, though rates remain significantly lower than other points of the pandemic.
