O'FALLON, Mo. (AP) — The death toll from COVID-19 in Missouri has topped 10,000, according to the state health department’s coronavirus dashboard Thursday. Twice as many as in Kansas. The Kansas Department of Health reported 35 new COVID-19 deaths Wednesday for a total of 5357.
The dashboard in Missouri showed 20 new deaths Thursday, bringing the total to 10,002 since the onset of the pandemic in early 2020. Nationally, more than 615,000 Americans have died from the virus.
Deaths have been rising again in recent weeks due to the delta variant, and it has been especially troubling in southwestern Missouri. The Springfield-Greene County Health Department said Wednesday that 82 people died in Greene County alone between July 1 and Aug. 10.
New cases and hospitalizations also are at their worst levels since the winter.
The state dashboard on Thursday also showed 2,675 new cases and a seven-day average of 2,013 confirmed cases. Hospitalizations rose by 68 to 2,268. Intensive care unit space in Missouri hospitals is at 17% — and 14% in the St. Louis area.
New cases, deaths and hospitalizations have been rising in Missouri since June as the delta variant has taken hold in a state with an initial vaccination rate that lags nearly 10 percentage points below the nation as a whole.
Medical professionals say the difference between now and the winter is that younger people are more vulnerable.
During a news conference Wednesday in Springfield, CoxHealth CEO Steve Edwards said a 23-year-old woman died Tuesday at the hospital in Springfield. He said his hospitals are seeing four to six deaths each day. Forty-eight of the 173 people hospitalized at CoxHealth were younger than 50.
“I believe our staff will carry these losses for the rest of their lives,” Edwards said.