Maine CDC reports more than 200 daily cases of COVID-19

The Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention reported 220 new cases of the coronavirus and no additional deaths on Saturday, which ended a week when government officials proposed their vaccine schedule from April 19 to include all adults.

Government officials also announced Friday that people 50 and older may receive doses starting Tuesday, pending increasing federal shipments of COVID-19 vaccines. Previously, the schedule required people in their 50s to be eligible on April 1st.

Maine’s cumulative COVID-19 cases rose to 48,292 on Saturday. Of those, 37,310 were confirmed by tests and 10,982 are considered probable cases of COVID-19. The average of seven days of new daily cases rose to 205.1 on Saturday.

Seven hundred and twenty-eight people have died from COVID-19 since the Maine pandemic began.

The Biden government has announced plans to deliver enough doses to be eligible for Americans by May 1, leading to Maine and other states speeding up their schedules.

“Maine has been working all this time to get as many people vaccinated as quickly as possible,” government Janet Mills said in a statement Friday. “As we continue to make progress, and with more appointments available and an increase in supply expected in the coming weeks, we believe it is appropriate to accelerate our timeline and get more people eligible sooner.”

Mills warned Mainers that appointments will not be immediately available to all new entrants as the system expands to accommodate more capacity.

Maine health officials and vaccine providers have also reported a worrying trend that vaccine appointments are not being fulfilled after the state expanded its suitability for people in their 60s earlier this month. However, by Saturday morning, the state had already given the first dose of COVID-19 vaccine to more than a quarter of its residents.

As of Saturday, 359,548 Mainers received a first dose of COVID-19 vaccine and 215,408 their final dose. Out of Maine’s 1.3 million population, 26.75 percent received their first dose, according to Maine CDC statistics.

Early booking numbers for hotels, restaurants, campgrounds and other places in Maine are rising, suggesting the state could have a tourism season that matches 2019, a historically strong year.

Tourist visits to Maine fell by 27 percent last year, a total of about 10 million fewer visits than 2019. According to the Maine Office of Tourism, direct spending on tourism fell from $ 6.5 billion to $ 4.8 billion.

But this year, Mills announced that visitors from all states in New England were exempt from test or quarantine restrictions. The exemption will extend to the rest of the country by May 1, with the exception of states that consider public health officials too risky for the spread of COVID-19.

Land for county as of Saturday there were 5,090 cases of coronavirus in Androscoggin, 1,348 in Aroostook, 13,495 in Cumberland, 958 in Franklin, 989 in Hancock, 4,073 in Kennebec, 758 in Knox, 628 in Lincoln, 2,387 in Oxford, 4,337 in Penobscot, 373 in Piscataquis, 937 in Sagadahoc, 1,315 in Somerset, 673 in Waldo, 750 in Washington and 10,181 in York.

By age, 15.9 percent of patients were younger than 20, while 18.1 percent were in their twenties, 14.4 percent in their thirties, 13.2 percent were in their 40s, 15.2 percent were in their 50s, 11.6 percent were in their 60s, 6.3 percent were in their 70s, and 5.3 percent were 80 or older.

Of the 80 patients who had COVID-19 in Maine hospitals Saturday, 20 were in intensive care and 10 in ventilators. The state has 99 beds available for intensive care units, of which a total of 390 and 250 fans out of 319 are available. There were also 446 alternative fans.

According to Johns Hopkins University, there were 122.5 million cases of COVID-19 on Saturday afternoon and more than 2.7 million deaths worldwide. The United States had 29.7 million cases and 541,513 deaths.

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