Nov. 22 COVID-19 update: 40 more deaths in Minnesota

2 min readNov 22, 2020

Minnesota’s death toll has reached 3,241 after a further 40 fatal cases from COVID-19 were reported Sunday by the state health department, in addition to more than 7,200 new laboratory-confirmed cases of the disease caused by the novel coronavirus.

November has been a very deadly month for COVID-19 in Minnesota, with 788 deaths reported in the first 22 days of the month. For perspective, there were 423 fatal cases in all of October and 696 in May, which was previously the state’s deadliest month of the pandemic.

Of the 40 newly reported deaths, 22 were residents of long-term care facilities, who have accounted for 68% (2,214) of all COVID-19 deaths in Minnesota. The deaths also include an individual aged 35–39 years old in Wright County.

“It pains me beyond belief to know, with almost certainty, that each day I am going to stand in front of you and tell you that we have another record number of deaths,” Gov. Tim Walz said Thursday.

Through Nov. 19, the number of people with COVID-19 hospitalized in Minnesota is 1,784, which marks an all-time high. Of those hospitalized, 369 patients are in intensive care and 1,415 are receiving non-ICU treatment.

Note: Hospital totals are preliminary and are subject to adjustment in the days ahead.

Testing and positivity rates

The 7,205 positive results in Saturday’s update were from a total of 56,617 completed tests, creating a daily test positivity rate of 12.72%..

Those completed tests were from 36,114 people. People are often tested more than once, so the test positivity rate when dividing positives by people tested is 19.95% today.

The World Health Organization recommended in May that a percent positive rate (total positives divided by total completed tests) of below 5% for at least two weeks is necessary to safely reopen the economy. That 5% threshold is based on total positives divided by total tests.

According to Johns Hopkins University, Minnesota’s percent positive over the past seven days is 13.90%.

Coronavirus in Minnesota by the numbers

Total tests: (up from 3,712,110)
People tested: (up from 2,277,980)
Positive cases: (up from 262,952)
Deaths: 3,241–60 of which are “probable*” (up from 3,201)
Patients no longer requiring isolation: 219,720 (up from 211,513)

Nov. 22 COVID-19 update: 40 more deaths in Minnesota

Through Nov. 19, the number of people with COVID-19 hospitalized in Minnesota is 1,784, which marks an all-time high. Of those hospitalized, 369 patients are in intensive care and 1,415 are receiving non-ICU treatment.

Testing and positivity rates

Coronavirus in Minnesota by the numbers

Written by jamesbron