McHenry County incidence rate shows slight rise, but remain close to mid-July lows

McHenry County’s COVID-19 incidence rate rose back up to 54.92 new cases per 100,000 residents over the past seven days as of Thursday, which still is on par with numbers from last July, the McHenry County Department of Health reported Tuesday.

Statewide, another 44 deaths also were logged on Tuesday, the second-highest total this month. This brings the totals to 3,057,078 cases, 33,260 confirmed deaths and 4,274 probable deaths. No additional deaths were reported Monday in McHenry County.

McHenry County now has seen 75,745 total cases, including 469 deaths and 44 deaths that likely were caused by COVID-19 but have not been confirmed. That tally is up 42 cases from Monday.

Hospitalizations in the two-county region, measured by a seven-day rolling average, remained at 27 COVID-19 patients as of Monday, IDPH data shows. This weekend marked the end of a 62-day period, starting Jan. 16, where hospitalizations either declined or remained stable.

The level of transmission in McHenry County remained low under the newest framework released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, county data shows.

That means the county saw fewer than 200 cases per 100,000 residents over the past seven days; the number of people being admitted to the hospital for COVID-19 was fewer than 10 per 100,000 residents, also over seven days; and the percentage of staffed in-patient beds occupied by COVID-19 patients was less than 10%, as measured by a seven-day average, according to the CDC.

The hospital intensive care unit availability rose to 29% on Monday after four straight days of declines. The latter mark is still around the same level as last July and early August, according to the IDPH.

Statewide, the number of hospitalizations tied to COVID-19 increased to 562 patients as of Monday, the IDPH reported. Of those hospitalized, 76 patients were in the ICU and 35 were on ventilators.

McHenry County crossed a vaccination threshold over the weekend, with more than 200,000 residents now fully vaccinated, state data shows.

An additional 100 vaccines were administered in McHenry County on Tuesday, bringing to the total 509,352 in the county as of Tuesday, the IDPH reported. The state reported that 103,786 booster shots have been administered in the county.

A total of 200,044, or an estimated 64.83% of McHenry County’s population, are now fully vaccinated, meaning they’ve received all doses recommended for the vaccine they were given.

Statewide, 21,289,890 vaccine doses have been administered, according to state data.

Across Illinois, 81% of those age 5 and older have received at least one dose of a vaccine against COVID-19, and 72.2% are fully vaccinated, the IDPH reported Tuesday. Those rates are 84.8% and 75.8% for those age 12 and older, 86.2% and 76.9% for people 18 and older, and 95% and 87.7% for those age 65 and older, respectively.

Statewide, the IDPH tallied 1,442 new cases of COVID-19 on Tuesday.

Neighboring Lake County’s health department reported a total of 123,128 cases and 1,355 deaths through Monday. To the south, Kane County’s health department reported 125,374 cases and 1,118 deaths as of Monday.

Among McHenry County ZIP codes, Crystal Lake (60014) has the highest total number of COVID-19 cases over the course of the pandemic with a total of 12,349 confirmed, according to county data. McHenry (60050) follows with 8,656.

The McHenry County health department reports ZIP code data only for parts within McHenry County, a department spokeswoman said. Any discrepancies between county and IDPH numbers likely are because of the data’s provisional nature and because each health department finalizes its data at different times, she said.

The following is the rest of the local breakdown of cases by ZIP code: Woodstock (60098) 7,765 cases; Lake in the Hills (60156) 7,286; Huntley (60142) 6,055; Cary (60013) 5,737; Algonquin (60102) 5,358; Johnsburg and McHenry (60051) 4,617; Harvard (60033) 3,755; Marengo (60152) 2,747; Wonder Lake (60097) 2,672; Crystal Lake, Bull Valley and Prairie Grove (60012) 2,670; Spring Grove (60081) 1,534; Fox River Grove (60021) 1,170; Island Lake (60042) 970; Richmond (60071) 716; Hebron (60034) 429; Barrington (60010) 345; Union (60180) 296; and Ringwood and Wonder Lake (60072) 193.