The number of people hospitalized with COVID-19 in Louisiana continued its downward trend today, as did the number of people on ventilators.
According to Thursday's update from the Louisiana Department of Health (LDH), there are 1,727 people in hospitals with the disease caused by the coronavirus and 274 people on ventilators. That's 20 and 13 fewer than yesterday, respectively.
The number of people hospitalized started to fairly consistently drop on April 14 — rising just twice this week, by 46 and then by 4 on Monday and Tuesday. The count is down by 407 overall since April 13.
The number of people on ventilators has been dropping pretty consistently since April 5. It's only risen three times since then, and never by more than nine. Overall, it's decreased by 297 since April 4.
But people are still dying. Another 67 people were reported dead today, according to the LDH. COVID-19 has killed at least 1,540 people in Louisiana to date. In Orleans Parish, 387 people are dead of COVID-19. In Jefferson Parish, 306, and in East Baton Rouge Parish, 100.
The disease continues to hit older populations the hardest. One thousand of those dead were 70 years old or older — and that's far an away the biggest impact on any age group. People who were ages 60 to 69 account for 292 deaths and people who were ages 50 to 59 make up 147 of those dead. Fifty-nine were ages 40 to 49, 34 were 30 to 29, seven were 18 to 29, and one was younger than 18.
Data on race, ethnicity and underlying conditions of the people who died is scheduled to be updated Monday.
The number of known cases of COVID-19 across Louisiana reached 25,739 Thursday. That's an increase of 481 over yesterday — or 1.9 percent.
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