Pritzker eases some COVID-19 vaccine and testing mandates as hospitalizations push up to February levels

The Illinois Department of Public Health announced 5,124 new confirmed and probable cases of COVID-19 and 12 additional deaths Wednesday.

As of late Tuesday, Illinois had 1,342 COVID-19 patients in the hospital, an increase of six patients from late Monday, and the highest number of total COVID-19 patients in the hospital since February 18. Of those, 150 were in intensive care units, the most since March 3, and 42 were on ventilators.

For Tuesday, the state administered 13,323 vaccines.

This comes as Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker announced in a news release Wednesday that he has amended his executive order to relax COVID-19 testing requirements and vaccine mandates in some business settings.

Under the amended order, long-term care facilities, including skilled nursing homes, will test staff who are not up to date with their COVID-19 vaccine weekly if they are located in an area of moderate community level transmission, and twice weekly in areas of substantial or high community level transmission.

Unvaccinated staff at hospitals and other healthcare facilities that are certified by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services will now be required to test weekly only if located in areas of high community level transmission.

Vaccine mandates for higher education employees and students and emergency medical service providers will not be reissued, according to a news release. Vaccination mandates will remain in place in K-12 schools, daycares, state-run 24/7 congregate care facilities, and any health care facilities not covered under the federal CMS vaccine mandate (including independent doctors’ offices, dental offices, urgent care facilities, and outpatient facilities).

“Vaccination continues to be the number one tool we have to fight COVID-19, and I’m proud that so many Illinoisans have taken advantage of this life-saving tool,” Pritzker said in a news release. “I continue to urge all Illinoisans to make sure they’re up to date on their COVID-19 vaccine to ensure the most at-risk populations and those unable to be vaccinated are protected from the serious side effects of this disease. As we continue to move toward living with this virus, my administration will relax some requirements while continuing to protect the most vulnerable and ensuring we can get every federal dollar our residents are eligible to receive.”

A.J. Wilhelmi, President and CEO of the Illinois Health and Hospital Association, backed Pritzker’s executive order in a news release.

“The Illinois hospital community appreciates the Governor’s actions today limiting the COVID-19 testing mandate for healthcare workers to high transmission counties,” Wilhelmi said. “This order will help hospitals maximize the use of resources for patient care, while simultaneously continuing to operate with reasonable and effective infection controls to remain safe places for patients, visitors and healthcare workers.”

From the IDPH’s data dashboard:

Case rate per 100,000: 38.5 (-0.4 from Tuesday)

Percentage of ICU beds available: 20%

COVID-19 diagnosed hospital admissions (7-day rolling average): 125 (+3 from Tuesday, most since February 18)

Weekly deaths reported: 48

Illinois has seen 3,486,089 total cases of the virus, and 34,232 people have died.

County-by-county update: As of mid-April, the IDPH will provide a county-by-county update focusing on the case rate per 100,000 people, the percentage of ICU beds available, a rolling seven-day average of COVID-19 diagnosed hospital admissions and weekly deaths.

The definition of a COVID-19 diagnosed hospital admission is as follows: The seven-day average of daily number of hospital admissions given a diagnosis of COVID-19 as measured using the Illinois Syndromic Surveillance System.

Illinois collects all emergency department and inpatient visits through syndromic surveillance from all acute care hospitals in Illinois in near-real time. Data is presented with a three-day lag to allow time for diagnosis to be reported.

At the county level, a visit is counted by where the patient resides. A patient with multiple visits will be counted for each visit. Admissions may not be because of COVID-19 as the primary cause. Syndromic surveillance data is not the same source used by CDC to report COVID-19 hospital admissions data.

Vaccine update: As of Wednesday, IDPH reported a total of 28,347,945 doses of COVID-19 vaccines have been distributed statewide, with 22,773,845 vaccines administered.

As of Wednesday, 8,309,237 Illinoisans have been fully vaccinated, or 65.22% of the population. Illinois has a population of 12,741,080 people.

CDC numbers:

Among Illinois residents 5 and older:

Fully Vaccinated: 8,747,860 (73.4%)

At Least 1 Dose: 9,662,195 (81%)

Among Illinois residents 12 and older:

Fully Vaccinated: 8,325,240 (76.8%)

At Least 1 Dose: 9,188,415 (84.8%)

Among Illinois residents 18 and older:

Fully Vaccinated: 7,683,827 (78%)

At Least 1 Dose: 8,486,122 (86.1%)

Among Illinois residents 65 and older:

Fully Vaccinated: 1,823,991 (89.3%)

At Least 1 Dose: 1,972,591 (95%)

There can be as much as a 72-hour delay in reporting from health care providers on vaccines administered.

In northern Illinois, here is the percentage of the population fully vaccinated by county:

Chicago: 68.92%

Suburban Cook: 72.73%

Lake: 70.26%

McHenry: 65.81%

DuPage: 75.49%

Kane: 66.40%

Will: 66.73%

Kendall: 69.15%

La Salle: 58.35%

Grundy: 57.73%

DeKalb: 56.63%

Ogle: 56.97%

Lee: 58.91%

Whiteside: 51.87%

Bureau: 56.77%