PIERRE, S.D. – New cases of COVID-19 were down Thursday, but the state death toll continues to rise.
State Health Officials reported another 30 COVID-19 related deaths Thursday, sending the total number of deaths to 1,177. There have been 231 deaths reported in December. The new deaths were 17 men and 13 women.
New cases totaled 704 Thursday with active cases up slightly to 16,234.
Hospitalizations decreased by 10 to 491.
New cases across West River counties totaled 185. Pennington County added 95 new cases, Lawrence County had 15 and Meade County tallied 16 new cases.
In Pennington, there are 1,865 active cases of COVID-19. Lawrence County has 407 and Meade County has 395.
Other new cases across West River Thursday included 8 each in Custer, Tripp and Todd, 6 in Oglala Lakota, 5 each in Butte and Haakon, 4 in Dewey, 3 in Jackson, 2 each in Corson, Lyman and Gregory and one each in Harding, Fall River, Perkins, Stanley, Bennett and Mellette counties.
There were 1,728 new persons tested reported on Thursday. Thursday’s new person tested positivity rate is 40%.
