Michigan Drops Out of Top 10 States for Confirmed COVID-19 Cases
June 29, 2020Lansing — As other states have experienced spikes in COVID-19 in recent days, they’ve nudged Michigan out of the top 10 states for cases of the virus, according to tracking by Johns Hopkins University.
On Sunday, the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services confirmed 252 new cases of the coronavirus, pushing the overall total of confirmations to 63,261. With “probable” cases included, there were 69,946 cases overall.
The number of new deaths linked to the virus here remained low Sunday with only four new deaths reported. The state’s overall death toll stood at 5,911, according to the data. When “probable” COVID-19 deaths were included, the total was 6,157.
Michigan, which ranked third nationally for confirmed cases in early April, ranked 11th early Sunday afternoon. A handful of states in the southern half of the U.S. have moved ahead of Michigan in recent weeks, including Georgia and Arizona.
As of early Sunday afternoon, the other top 10 states were New York, New Jersey, California, Texas, Illinois, Florida, Massachusetts and Pennsylvania. Michigan remained sixth nationally for deaths linked to the virus early Sunday afternoon.
Arizona, which now ranks 10th for COVID-19 cases, had reported 3,858 new cases of the virus in its most recent daily report, according to its department of health website.
During an appearance on “Fox New Sunday,” Dr. Tom Frieden, former director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said some states had reopened their economies too quickly, which he said was “like leaning into a left hook.”
“We’re all sick and tired of staying home. But you know what, the virus is not tired of making us sick,” Frieden said. “And what we’re seeing, particularly in southern states but in most parts of the U.S., is the virus increasing and in some states, increasing explosively.”
Last week, Michigan reported 1,925 new cases of the virus, the highest weekly total in four weeks. Also, the period from Wednesday through Saturday was the first four-day period with more than 300 new cases each day in a month.
However, the numbers were much lower than those in other states and testing for the virus in Michigan increased last week, according to the state’s data. The state reported nearly 107,000 diagnostic tests for the virus took place last week, which was the highest weekly testing total in five weeks.
The percentage of tests with positive results moved slightly upward to 2.6% last week from 2.3% the week before. But the percentage of positive tests was much lower than any week in May.
Michigan confirmed its first cases of COVID-19 on March 10. Gov. Gretchen Whitmer announced her initial stay-at-home order on March 23. The number of new cases confirmed here peaked in April, and Whitmer lifted the stay-at-home on June 1.
As of Friday, 51,099 of those with the coronavirus in Michigan — or 81% of the total cases — were considered “recovered,” which means they were alive 30 days after the onset of symptoms, according to the Department of Health and Human Services.