North Carolina reports its highest daily number of COVID-19 cases

Published 5:02 pm Saturday, January 2, 2021

: This illustration, created at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), reveals ultrastructural morphology exhibited by coronaviruses. Note the spikes that adorn the outer surface of the virus, which impart the look of a corona surrounding the virion, when viewed electron microscopically. In this view, the protein particles E, S, and M, also located on the outer surface of the particle, have all been labeled as well. A novel coronavirus, named Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), was identified as the cause of an outbreak of respiratory illness first detected in Wuhan, China in 2019. The illness caused by this virus has been named coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19).

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North Carolina has reported its highest daily number of COVID-19 cases so far during the pandemic.

The state reported 9,527 confirmed cases New Year’s Day. That went over the state’s previous high by more than 1,000 cases.

On Saturday, the state’s health department reported 9,356 cases. Cases for two days were released by the health department on Saturday.

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The last two days of reporting raised the number of cases in the state by a total of more than 18,800. It brings the total number of confirmed cases in the state to 558,437 cases during the pandemic.

Records were also set for the percent of tests that were positive and hospitalizations. On Saturday, 15.5 percent of tests were positive, the highest rate since the start of the pandemic. In addition, 3,479 people were hospitalized with COVID-19 and 783 people were in the intensive care unit.

“We begin 2021 in our most dangerous position in this pandemic,” Dr. Mandy Cohen, the state’s health secretary, said in a statement.

The state reported Saturday that there were 144 deaths over the last two days. That brings the total number of deaths from the virus in North Carolina to 6,892.

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