Public health officials in Illinois reported 6,363 new cases of COVID-19 on Thursday, setting yet another troubling record for the most infections ever confirmed statewide in a day.
A stunning viral resurgence is sweeping the state, with more than 102,000 people ha positive for the virus so far this month alone — about 12,000 more than were reported in Illinois during all of May and June, when the state rose and fell from its initial coronavirus peak.
And expanded testing doesn’t fully account for October’s sky-high caseloads. The new infections were confirmed among 83,056 tests submitted to the Illinois Department of Public Health.
That raised the state’s seven-day average testing positivity rate — a better gauge of how rapidly the virus is spreading — to 6.9%, its highest point since June 2.
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Under his coronavirus resurgence plan, Gov. J.B. Pritzker has implemented “mitigations” like indoor dining bans in regions seeing sustained increases in positivity or hospital admissions.
Those mitigations will be in place in nine of the state’s 11 regions by this weekend — including Chicago and all its suburbs — as the west-central portion of the state became the latest hit with restrictions by Pritzker’s health team on Thursday. The two remaining regions are on track to face restrictions soon as well.
Officials also attributed 56 more deaths to the virus, including a Cook County man in his 40s and 25 other Chicago-area residents.
Since March, more than 7.5 million coronavirus tests have been administered in Illinois, with 395,458 people confirmed to carry the virus and 9,675 of those dying.
The death toll is guaranteed to rise as Illinois hospitals treat the most coronavirus patients they’ve seen in almost five months. As of Wednesday night, 3,030 beds were taken up by COVID-19 patients, with 643 in intensive care units and 269 using ventilators.
“We can’t ignore what is happening all around us because without action, this could look worse than anything that we saw last spring,” Pritzker said Wednesday.
The governor will hold another daily coronavirus briefing at 2:30 p.m.
