The Iowa Department of Public Health reported another 389 cases of COVID-19 had been confirmed during the 24-hour period ending at 10 a.m. on Sunday. The new cases increase the number of Iowans who have tested positive for the virus to 42,016.
The 389 new cases came from 6,005 tests, IDPH reported, giving the state a positivity rate of 9.5 percent for that 24-hour time period. The positivity rate is the percentage of people tested who were confirmed as having COVID-19.
Sunday was the first day since July 6 that no new COVID-19 deaths were reported as of 10 a.m. So far, 826 Iowans have died from the virus.
According to IDPH, 13 residents of Johnson County and 38 residents of Linn County tested positive for COVID-19 between 10 a.m. on Saturday and 10 a.m. on Sunday. The positivity rate for Johnson County was 7.7 percent, and Linn County had a positivity rate of 9.8 percent.
The World Health Organization recommends that a community not move forward with reopening until it has had 14 consecutive days with a daily positivity rate of 5 percent or lower. The CDC’s published guidance recommends a state have “downward trajectory (or near-zero percent positivity rates) of positive tests as a percentage of total tests over a 14-day period (flat or increasing volume of tests)” before taking steps in its reopening process.
Iowa did not have any days during the past 14 days with a positivity rate of 5 percent or lower, according to the testing data published at 10 a.m. each day by IDPH. Both Johnson County and Linn County had two days with positivity rates of 5 percent or lower.
The 14-day daily average positivity rate for Iowa as of Sunday at 10 a.m. was 10.3 percent. In Johnson County it was 8.5 percent, and in Linn County it was 7.8 percent.
