It's been five days since we last shared numbers, and things are getting dicey across the country. Having not gotten the spread under control while the weather was warm, infectious disease experts across the nation are sounding the alarm on the potential spikes and increased hospitalizations and deaths heading into the winter months.
Nashville now only has three of the key metrics in green and two in the red with transmission rates and new cases per 100K slipping to unsatisfactory levels. While still in the yellow, Nashville's ICU beds have dropped to 10% capacity, half of the goal of having 20% availability.
Metro Nashville
As of 9:30 today, the city reported 31,759 confirmed cases, an increase of 276 since yesterday and of more than 800 over the last five days. There are currently 1,739 active cases in Nashville, 29,732 inactive or recovered cases and 184 active hospitalizations. With 288 deaths, the city has a case fatality rate of 0.91%. In Davidson County, 463,356 tests have been administered with a positive rate of 8.5% (up from 6.9% last Wednesday).
Out of 8 metrics on the trend lines, Nashville has 3 in the green, 3 in the yellow and 2 in the red. With a goal for transmission to be less than 1.01, the city's current transmission rate is 1.16 (in the red, but a slight improvement from the 1.17 reported last Wednesday). While the 14-day case rate remains in the green, it bears watching. The goal is a flat or decreasing trend in new cases, but the metric now indicates a 'slight increase in new cases.' Public health and testing capacity remain in the green, as they have throughout.
As of 9:30 am this morning, hospital floor bed capacity remained in the yellow with 17% availability (an improvement over last Wednesday's availability of 14%). ICU beds also remained yellow but at 10% capacity, which is flirting with moving from 'less than satisfactory' to 'unsatisfactory.' The goal for both hospital and ICU bed capacity is 20%.
The New Cases per 100K Residents has moved back into the red. The goal of the seven-day rolling average is to be at 10 or below. Currently, Nashville sits at 25.9 (significantly up from 22.1 last Wednesday and 15.5 the week before). The goal for the 7-Day Positivity Rate is to see a figure at 10% or less. Currently, Nashville remains in the green with a rate of 5.2% as of 9:30 this morning (but worth noting, the rate was 4.6% last Wednesday and 3.6% at the end of the week prior to that). Overall, numbers are trending in the wrong direction.
More detailed data is available on the Metro Dashboard. Click here for details.
Nashville's mask mandate continues alongside loosened restrictions for gatherings and increased capacity numbers in restaurants and bars.
Tennessee State
This afternoon, the Tennessee Department of Health (TDH) confirmed 3,317 new cases of COVID-19 with the state total hitting 232,061. There are currently 1,188 hospitalizations (down 27 from yesterday) and 2,922 deaths (up 13 in 24 hours) for a death rate of 1.27. Nearly 3.4 million tests have been administered statewide (up 42,410 since yesterday). The number of inactive/recovered cases statewide is 204,726.