New One-Day COVID-19 Case Record As Hospitalizations Surge 181% In 30 Days

State officials don’t have an opimistic tone for what comes next in Wisconsin’s fight against COVID-19.

“We know this is going to get worse before it gets better,” said Department of Health Services Secretary-designee Andrea Palm in a media briefing Thursday afternoon. “Our numbers are high and they’re growing rapidly.”

Wisconsin recorded 3,747 new cases of COVID-19 in the past 24 hours. As of three days ago the state had never recorded over 3,000 cases in a single day, but has now eclipsed the mark in each of the days since. The state never eclipsed 2,000 cases until September 17th. In the 197 days prior to that, the state had only eclipsed 1,000 cases in a single day 14 times.

What started in September with a surge of cases in the state’s younger residents now is afflicting all age groups. “What we are seeing now in the state of Wisconsin and have been seeing in all age groups is very intense community spreads,” said Palm. Fifty-seven of the state’s 72 counties meet the state’s threshold for “very high” spread.

A total of 20,495 cases were recorded in the past seven days, a new high. The seven-day case high before September, and now October, brought a surge of cases with it was 6,512 for the week of July 26th.

Thursday’s record case total comes from 15,202 processed tests. The seven-day testing total fell to 93,511, up from 66,518 a month ago. A high of 99,920 tests was recorded for the week ending August 6th.

The increase in testing hasn’t resulted in the percentage of people testing positive falling. The seven and 14-day positive case rates now stand at 21.92% and 20.39%, both are record highs. The figure measures the percentage of tests that indicate a new case of COVID-19. The 14-day figure hit a low of 2.69% on June 19th.

Officials have looked for the positive case rate to trend downward to indicate a slowing spread of disease and sufficient testing. Multiple public health benchmarks call for the positive case figure to be sustained under five percent.

“Because of the course of this virus we can expect to see an increase in hospitalizations as long as we see an increase in daily new cases,” said Palm, talking about days and weeks in the future. But hospitalizations are already setting records now.

The Wisconsin Hospital Association reported 1,043 active hospitalizations on Thursday, a record high. The total is up 26 from Wednesday and up 136 from a week ago. Thirty days ago the figure stood at 370.

DHS reports that 138 people were newly hospitalized in the past 24 hours, bringing the outbreak total to 8,892.

“We need to do all we can right now to break that transmission, to stop the spread”, said Palm. “But it will take time before we see the fruits of that labor in reduced hospitalizations and reduced community spread.” Wearing masks and restricting gatherings is part of that. She said there is no doubt that masks slow the spread of the disease. “My mask protects you, your mask protects me,” said Palm. “The evidence is clear.”

The ultimate lagging indicator of the disease’s spread, death, is increasing in absolute numbers.

DHS reported 17 new deaths, bringing the statewide total to 1,553. There have been 554 deaths recorded in Milwaukee County. An average of 11.1 deaths per day have been reported across the state over the past 30 days, the highest average on record. A month ago the rolling average was 6.3.

As evidence of the outstate spread, in just the past month Milwaukee County has gone from having a runaway lead on the worst all-time per-capita spread of the disease to the 10th-worst. And it’s done so while the spread of the disease accelerated in the county.

Brown County has recorded 4,808.9 cases per 100,000 residents (up from 4,694.1). Menominee County is next with 4,427.2 cases per 100,000 residents. Oconto County has recorded 4,304.3 cases per 100,000 residents (up from 4,233.2).

Shawano, Forest, Kewaunee, Calumet, Winnebago and Outagamie counties are the remaining counties leading Milwaukee.

According to DHS data, 3,601.7 out of every 100,000 Milwaukee County residents have tested positive for COVID-19 (up from 3,550.3) since the outbreak began.

The statewide average of cases per 100,000 residents rose to 2,807.9 (up from 2,743.1). Wisconsin has recorded a per-capita rate of 627.9 per 100,000 in the past two weeks according to the DHS activity level report released Wednesday.

Charts and Maps

Confirmed COVID-19 cases and deaths by gender

Confirmed COVID-19 cases and deaths by race

Confirmed COVID-19 cases and deaths by ethnicity

Cases and deaths by county

		Number of confirmed cases	Number of negatives*	Number of probable cases	Number of deaths**	Cases per 100,000 people (counties)	Deaths per 100,000 people (counties)	Case fatality percentage****
Adams	10/15/2020	340	4,622	20	4	1,658.90	19.5	1.20%
Ashland	10/15/2020	210	3,568	10	3	1,323.80	18.9	1.40%
Barron	10/15/2020	701	10,313	27	6	1,527.90	13.1	0.90%
Bayfield	10/15/2020	166	3,626	10	1	1,091.80	6.6	0.60%
Brown	10/15/2020	12,519	80,201	249	82	4,808.90	31.5	0.70%
Buffalo	10/15/2020	191	2,884	4	2	1,413.90	14.8	1.00%
Burnett	10/15/2020	255	3,157	14	6	1,650.80	38.8	2.40%
Calumet	10/15/2020	2,094	11,805	62	10	4,067.90	19.4	0.50%
Chippewa	10/15/2020	959	16,759	29	2	1,493.30	3.1	0.20%
Clark	10/15/2020	599	6,303	54	9	1,724.20	25.9	1.50%
Columbia	10/15/2020	1,266	17,765	59	4	2,216.10	7	0.30%
Crawford	10/15/2020	268	4,773	7	0	1,618.80	0	0.00%
Dane	10/15/2020	12,072	212,443	521	46	2,284.20	8.7	0.40%
Dodge	10/15/2020	2,806	25,390	78	19	3,145.60	21.3	0.70%
Door	10/15/2020	563	7,978	38	4	2,007.10	14.3	0.70%
Douglas	10/15/2020	655	9,264	6	1	1,492.90	2.3	0.20%
Dunn	10/15/2020	797	9,517	35	1	1,779.90	2.2	0.10%
Eau Claire	10/15/2020	2,508	26,463	21	9	2,437.50	8.7	0.40%
Florence	10/15/2020	149	1,045	2	4	3,370.30	90.5	2.70%
Fond du Lac	10/15/2020	3,247	26,644	91	16	3,141.10	15.5	0.50%
Forest	10/15/2020	388	2,186	6	10	4,225.70	108.9	2.60%
Grant	10/15/2020	1,538	14,615	54	23	2,936.60	43.9	1.50%
Green	10/15/2020	760	9,527	20	3	2,061.60	8.1	0.40%
Green Lake	10/15/2020	536	4,667	85	2	2,808.00	10.5	0.40%
Iowa	10/15/2020	335	6,493	26	1	1,407.60	4.2	0.30%
Iron	10/15/2020	158	1,624	14	1	2,703.60	17.1	0.60%
Jackson	10/15/2020	247	6,901	5	1	1,196.50	4.8	0.40%
Jefferson	10/15/2020	2,112	22,059	78	9	2,494.20	10.6	0.40%
Juneau	10/15/2020	566	10,036	4	3	2,103.50	11.1	0.50%
Kenosha	10/15/2020	4,194	41,077	456	69	2,493.00	41	1.60%
Kewaunee	10/15/2020	851	4,713	22	4	4,122.30	19.4	0.50%
La Crosse	10/15/2020	3,657	29,008	154	11	3,090.40	9.3	0.30%
Lafayette	10/15/2020	436	4,099	8	1	2,582.50	5.9	0.20%
Langlade	10/15/2020	588	4,210	5	4	2,973.20	20.2	0.70%
Lincoln	10/15/2020	484	6,092	18	4	1,701.70	14.1	0.80%
Manitowoc	10/15/2020	1,940	16,337	212	7	2,417.30	8.7	0.40%
Marathon	10/15/2020	3,016	22,986	196	31	2,238.40	23	1.00%
Marinette	10/15/2020	1,349	11,219	83	9	3,295.20	22	0.70%
Marquette	10/15/2020	470	3,808	14	2	3,056.30	13	0.40%
Menominee	10/15/2020	194	2,965	0	0	4,427.20	0	0.00%
Milwaukee	10/15/2020	34,017	277,992	2,117	554	3,601.70	58.7	1.60%
Monroe	10/15/2020	853	11,560	18	3	1,854.40	6.5	0.40%
Oconto	10/15/2020	1,634	10,623	80	6	4,304.30	15.8	0.40%
Oneida	10/15/2020	839	10,258	12	5	2,336.20	13.9	0.60%
Outagamie	10/15/2020	7,105	44,684	338	47	3,865.60	25.6	0.70%
Ozaukee	10/15/2020	1,740	20,421	177	21	1,969.20	23.8	1.20%
Pepin	10/15/2020	85	1,657	3	0	1,156.60	0	0.00%
Pierce	10/15/2020	559	8,959	250	7	1,342.60	16.8	1.30%
Polk	10/15/2020	375	10,097	14	2	854.2	4.6	0.50%
Portage	10/15/2020	2,065	15,386	53	15	2,920.00	21.2	0.70%
Price	10/15/2020	267	3,274	7	0	1,933.70	0	0.00%
Racine	10/15/2020	5,951	71,891	609	101	3,048.60	51.7	1.70%
Richland	10/15/2020	350	6,363	13	6	1,976.10	33.9	1.70%
Rock	10/15/2020	3,634	39,475	210	37	2,267.50	23.1	1.00%
Rusk	10/15/2020	109	2,444	8	1	750	6.9	0.90%
Sauk	10/15/2020	1,373	21,662	62	6	2,190.30	9.6	0.40%
Sawyer	10/15/2020	304	5,026	1	1	1,834.80	6	0.30%
Shawano	10/15/2020	1,773	10,942	11	8	4,297.10	19.4	0.50%
Sheboygan	10/15/2020	2,828	26,452	98	20	2,469.50	17.5	0.70%
St. Croix	10/15/2020	1,332	18,901	85	9	1,510.70	10.2	0.70%
Taylor	10/15/2020	324	3,337	6	6	1,574.30	29.2	1.90%
Trempealeau	10/15/2020	821	6,929	19	2	2,799.00	6.8	0.20%
Vernon	10/15/2020	401	7,752	5	3	1,324.00	9.9	0.70%
Vilas	10/15/2020	388	4,989	18	3	1,791.70	13.9	0.80%
Walworth	10/15/2020	2,989	25,896	224	36	2,912.80	35.1	1.20%
Washburn	10/15/2020	168	3,332	9	2	1,059.70	12.6	1.20%
Washington	10/15/2020	3,561	27,634	193	40	2,647.90	29.7	1.10%
Waukesha	10/15/2020	9,723	91,218	861	100	2,439.00	25.1	1.00%
Waupaca	10/15/2020	1,806	11,511	143	28	3,491.10	54.1	1.60%
Waushara	10/15/2020	710	7,580	8	3	2,922.10	12.3	0.40%
Winnebago	10/15/2020	6,831	45,418	278	48	4,033.80	28.3	0.70%
Wood	10/15/2020	1,226	17,039	70	9	1,656.20	12.2	0.70%