The number of Iowa hospital patients who’ve tested positive for COVID has increased 12% since Wednesday.
The Iowa Department of Public Health’s website shows nearly 900 hospital patients in the state have tested positive for COVID and 19% of them are in intensive care. Eight out of 10 COVID patients in the ICU are not vaccinated.
Mercy Hospital in Cedar Rapids keeps track of the positivity rate among all its patients on a rolling, seven day average. It’s up to 32% today.
About 56% of Iowans are fully vaccinated. The more contagious omicron variant of the virus is now the dominant variant in Iowa according to Centers for Disease Control.