More than 7,000 Marylanders have died from coronavirus as of Tuesday morning, state officials reported.
The state has confirmed a total of 7,012 COVID-19 deaths, including 34 newly reported deaths since Monday.
There are also 176 people whose deaths are suspected to be related to the virus.
State health officials and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) officials confirmed two more cases of the South African coronavirus variant in Maryland, Gov. Larry Hogan tweeted on Tuesday.
The two cases were identified in Montgomery County residents, both of whom had traveled abroad recently, Hogan said.
On Saturday, Maryland officials reported the first confirmed case of the South African variant in Maryland, identified in a person in the Baltimore area who had not traveled abroad recently.
The CDC does not believe that this particular coronavirus variant, which was first detected in South Africa, causes more severe illness or increased risk of death than COVID-19. Preliminary evidence from non-peer-reviewed publications found that the Moderna vaccine may not be as effective against the variant.
At least 356,541 Marylanders have tested positive for COVID-19, while 2,851,690 have tested negative as of Tuesday morning, according to the Maryland Department of Health’s COVID-19 Case Map Dashboard.
The state’s coronavirus caseload grew by 905, the first time the state state has reported fewer than 1,000 new deaths since reporting 771 cases on Nov. 3.
Maryland has completed 7,052,264 coronavirus tests to date, with 13,702 test results reported in the past 24 hours.
Over the last seven days, an average of 5.79% of the state’s COVID-19 tests have come back positive.
The seven-day average rate of positive tests yesterday was 5.71% for Marylanders younger than 35 and 5.86% for Marylanders older than 35.
Currently, 1,467 Marylanders are hospitalized with COVID-19, including 1,101 who are in acute care and 366 who are in intensive care.
The number of acute care patients rose by 35 while the number of intensive care patients declined by five, marking a net increase of 30 more people hospitalized with coronavirus compared to Monday.
Maryland has hospitalized a total of 32,291 coronavirus patients since the beginning of the pandemic.
The state has administered the first dose of the coronavirus vaccine to a total of 462,162 Marylanders, including 6,252 who received it in the past 24 hours.
Of the Maryland recipients of the first vaccine dose, 91,571 individuals have received the second vaccine dose, including 3,112 people in the past 24 hours.
As of 10 a.m. Tuesday, there have been 68,295 confirmed cases in Prince George’s County; 59,292 in Montgomery County; 47,608 in Baltimore County; 38,120 in Baltimore City; 33,111 in Anne Arundel County; 15,722 in Frederick County; 14,656 in Howard County; 11,494 in Washington County; 11,450 in Harford County; 8,087 in Charles County; 7,001 in Carroll County; 6,371 in Wicomico County; 6,212 in Allegany County; 4,776 in Cecil County; 4,618 in St. Mary’s County; 3,438 in Calvert County; 3,085 in Worcester County; 2,378 in Queen Anne’s County; 2,261 in Somerset County; 2,106 in Dorchester County; 1,902 in Caroline County; 1,798 in Garrett County; 1,707 in Talbot County; and 1,053 in Kent County, according to the dashboard.
Maryland has confirmed 17,402 cases in people age 9 or younger; 33,543 in people ages 10-19; 64,847 in people ages 20-29; 61,665 in people ages 30-39; 54,457 in people ages 40-49; 53,834 in people ages 50-59; 36,330 in people ages 60-69; 20,676 in people ages 70-79; and 13,787 in people age 80 or older.
The state has identified 187,031 of the confirmed COVID-19 patients as female and 169,510 as male.
Of the Marylanders who have tested positive for COVID-19, 101,160 are Black, 58,342 are Hispanic, 121,919 are white, 7,836 are Asian, 16,743 are another race, and data is not available for the remaining 50,541.
Nationwide, there have been at least 26,324,911 confirmed COVID-19 cases in the United States, including at least 443,774 deaths. The U.S. has conducted more than 306 million coronavirus tests to date as of 10 a.m. Tuesday, according to a real-time dashboard created by Johns Hopkins University’s Center for Systems Science and Engineering.
