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CHARLESTON -- An additional four people were confirmed as COVID-19 deaths and new cases of the virus increased by 499 from Thursday to Friday morning, according to the pandemic update Friday from the West Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources.
The state reported 5,811 active cases of the virus as of Friday, which has gone up since March 11 after several weeks of trending downward.
The increase of 499 new cases is up, but more testing is being done, according to Gov. Jim Justice at his routine Friday morning pandemic briefing, separate from the daily update from the DHHR.
"That is significantly up but we've tested a tremendous amount because of our daily percent positivity rate is 3.85 percent and our cumulative rate continues to drop to 5.27," he said.
Active cases in local counties (previous day): Calhoun, 11, (10); Doddridge, 25 (26); Gilmer, 5 (7); Jackson, 52 (46); Pleasants, 8 (8); Ritchie, 8 (8); Roane, 8 (5); Tyler, 29 (30); Wirt, 5 (5); Wood, 179 (180.)
Hospitalizations have also increased to 231, up 20 from Thursday morning, with 81 people in an intensive care unit and 20 on ventilators.
Caution is still needed, the governor said.
"We got to watch this now West Virginia," Justice said. "You know this thing is not over and it has a real ability to whiplash right on us when we think things are all good."
The death count as of Friday was at 2,628. The four deaths reported Friday were in Logan, Cabell, Berkeley and Monongalia counties, the state said. It's a fraction of neighboring states, although that is no solace in that for the families, Justice said.
The state has fully vaccinated 293,756 people. By local county, the number of people fully vaccinated and percentage of population: Calhoun, 967, 13.6; Doddridge, 1,810, 21.4; Gilmer, 1,234, 15.8; Jackson, 3,588, 12.6; Pleasants, 1,414, 19; Ritchie, 1,561, 16.3; Roane, 2,129, 15.6; Tyler, 1,475, 17.2; Wirt, 998, 17.1; Wood, 9,071, 10.9.
Residents 16 and older can register for a vaccination at vaccinate.wv.gov or call 1-833-734-0965 from 8 a.m.-6 p.m. Monday to Friday and 9 a.m.-5 p.m. Saturday.