Henrico sets fourth single-day COVID-19 case record this month

Henrico County set another new one-day record Sunday for new COVID-19 cases, with 176 – 17 more than the previous high of 159, set Dec. 9. During the past four weeks, Henrico has set new single-day highs on four separate occasions.

The county is averaging 127 new confirmed cases of COVID-19 each day during the past week, according to updated Virginia Department of Health data. The average daily number of new cases peaked Dec. 12 at 148.

The recent case increases have come as testing also has increased in the county this month – by about 38% on average, from a combined total of 1,375 PCR and antigen (rapid) testing encounters during the week ending Dec. 1 to 1,905 during the week ending Dec. 17.

Rapid testing in particular has increased significantly this month – by about 72%, from an average of about 316 a day Dec. 1 to 545 a day Dec. 17.

The higher case counts, however, haven’t resulted in higher hospitalization counts. So far in December, a total of 64 Henricoans have been hospitalized with the virus – down from 75 during the first 21 days of November.

But 20 deaths in Henrico have been attributed to the virus this month, compared with just 15 all of last month. That doesn’t necessarily mean that each occurred during the month it was reported, however.

Henrico’s seven-day positivity percentage among PCR tests is 9.1% as of Dec. 17 and 7.9% among antigen tests as of the same date.

Both percentages are well below the state averages of 11.4% and 11.5% respectively.