The Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention on Saturday reported 58 new cases of COVID-19 and four additional deaths, adding to a continued rise in the seven-day average, which now stands at 36.4 cases.
A week ago, the seven-day average of new daily cases was 17.1. The past week’s increase brings averages closer to where they were in late October – above where they were at their lowest last summer, but far from the peaks that Maine saw in January and April. The all-time highest seven-day average in Maine was 624 cases, on Jan. 15.
Maine’s cumulative COVID-19 cases rose to 69,474 on Saturday. Of those, 50,812 have been confirmed by testing and 18,662 are considered probable cases of COVID-19. The 14-day average was 28.9 daily cases.
Eight hundred eighty-two people have died with COVID-19 in Maine since the pandemic began. Information about the four people reported Saturday to have died was not provided by the Maine CDC.
The University of Maine System, meanwhile, is planning to require COVID-19 vaccinations for staff and students once existing vaccines receive final approval from the Food and Drug Administration. The Pfizer, Moderna and Johnson & Johnson vaccines now have emergency use authorization from federal authorities.
Officials with the university system said the vaccine requirement would work in tandem with testing and quarantine restrictions to ensure a safer fall semester. The University of Maine System is planning a more traditional fall term, with most classes held in person.
“We want to make it clear as we prepare to start the academic year that in fact when a vaccine has regular approval we will in fact be requiring it,” Chancellor Dannel Malloy said in an announcement Friday. “It also ties to the fact students will be showing up relatively soon. The bulk of them will be with us in late August and we want to be very clear. If regular approval is granted at some point, then vaccination will be required. Don’t wait and have to scramble.”
By Saturday morning, Maine had given 801,238 people the final dose of a COVID-19 vaccine. Among people 12 and older, the population currently eligible for vaccination, 67.66 percent are now fully vaccinated.
County by county as of Saturday, there had been 8,460 coronavirus cases in Androscoggin, 1,928 in Aroostook, 17,333 in Cumberland, 1,400 in Franklin, 1,386 in Hancock, 6,643 in Kennebec, 1,164 in Knox, 1,093 in Lincoln, 3,667 in Oxford, 6,394 in Penobscot, 593 in Piscataquis, 1,477 in Sagadahoc, 2,296 in Somerset, 1,068 in Waldo, 950 in Washington and 13,622 in York.
By age, 18.9 percent of patients were under 20, while 18.2 percent were in their 20s, 15.2 percent were in their 30s, 13.4 percent were in their 40s, 14.5 percent were in their 50s, 10.2 percent were in their 60s, 5.3 percent were in their 70s, and 4.2 percent were 80 or older.
Maine hospitals on Saturday had 27 patients with COVID-19, of whom 11 were in intensive care and four were on ventilators.
Around the world on Saturday evening, there were 189.8 million known cases of COVID-19 and 4.07 million deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University. The United States had over 34 million cases and 608,870 deaths.
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