PIERRE, S.D. – South Dakota realized 41 new deaths according to state health officials in the Thursday COVID-19 update.
The new deaths raise the state’s death toll to 1,430 since the pandemic began.
There have now been 484 deaths in December. Thursday’s total is among the top three in the month.
One of the new deaths was in the 20-29 range. Twenty-two of the new deaths were in the 80 plus range. Nine in the 70 plus, five in the 60-69, three in the 50-59 range and one in the 40-49 range
Despite the increasing number of deaths, active cases dropped again to 7,098 – down 216 from Wednesday.
The number of people hospitalized due to the virus also continued to decrease – down 29 today to 312.
Pennington County reported 74 of West River’s 136 new cases. Pennington County has 10,802 total cases with 985 remaining active.
Lawrence County added 15 new cases Thursday while Meade County recorded 11 new cases. Active cases in Lawrence County total 161 while active cases in Meade are down to 173.
Elsewhere around the Black Hills area, Butte added 5 new cases, Custer and Oglala Lakota added 6 and Fall River County added 4.
