Number of Arizona COVID-19 coronavirus cases jumps to 27
Mar 18, 2020, 9:11 AM | Updated: 9:49 am
(Facebook Photo/Arizona Department of Health Services)
(Facebook Photo/Arizona Department of Health Services)
PHOENIX – The number of COVID-19 coronavirus cases in Arizona jumped to 27, the Arizona Department of Health Services announced Wednesday morning.
The department’s Tuesday morning report listed 20 cases, and a 21st was revealed later that day.
Wednesday’s six new Arizona cases of COVID-19, the disease caused by the novel coronavirus, are the most reported in a single day.
While the national death toll approached 100, Arizona has yet to report a death from the virus.
The AZDHS has been updating its coronavirus web page with the number of cases each morning.
Of the new cases, three are in Pinal County, two in Maricopa County and one in Pima County.
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Maricopa County is up to 11 cases total, with Pinal at eight, Pima at five, Navajo at two and Graham at one.
The new Phoenix-area cases are a woman in her 40s and a man in his 70s, both of whom are recovering in isolation at home.
They were reported a day after Phoenix, the state’s largest city, declared a state of emergency and ordered all bars to close and all restaurants to cease dine-in service.
It’s not known how many tests have been given and how many results are pending because the state doesn’t provide the data from tests done in commercial labs. AZDHS does report the positive tests from commercial labs.
The state health lab has diagnosed 14 of the cases, and private labs have reported 13 positive tests.
Four new Arizona cases had been reported Tuesday, three in the state’s morning report and a case reported by Navajo County that evening.
One case was taken off the board Tuesday, a Maricopa County man in his 90s whose presumptive positive test was later determined to be negative.
In a Wednesday update, the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention reported 7,038 cases and 97 deaths nationwide. That was up from 4,226 cases and 75 deaths a day earlier.
Federal officials said an increased capacity to administer and process tests will result in a sharp increase the rate of new cases in the coming days.
Tuesday’s situation report by the World Health Organization included more than 179,000 cases and more than 7,400 deaths globally.
