By NANCY WEST, InDepthNH.org

New Hampshire is seeing an increase in hospitalizations due to COVID-19 and an increase in the Community Levels tracked by the CDC, with two counties Carroll and Belknap showing high levels Friday. Two weeks ago, all New Hampshire counties had low Community Levels.

Two counties Grafton and Cheshire showed low Community Levels Friday and the rest show medium levels, according to the CDC.

At high Community Levels, the CDC recommends masks indoors in public and for immunocompromised people to avoid non-essential indoor activities.

Wnen asked about the sudden increase, Jake Leon, spokesman for the Department of Health and Human Services said: “COVID-19 cases are increasing as expected as summer turned to fall and people began to spend more time indoors. The updated Omicron booster provides protection from a potential surge. For optimal protection, people who are eligible for the booster are encouraged to get the updated Omicron booster by the end of October, along with the flu vaccine. Omicron boosters remain widely available and locations can be found on vaccines.gov.”

According to the CDC website: CDC recommends the use of three indicators to measure COVID-19 Community Levels: (1) new COVID-19 hospital admissions per 100,000 population in the last 7 days; (2) percent of staffed inpatient beds occupied by patients with confirmed COVID-19 (7-day average); and (3) new COVID-19 cases per 100,000 population in the last 7 days.

More information about preventing COVID-19 based on Community Levels here: https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/your-health/covid-by-county.html

The state Department of Health and Human Services Thursday reported 12 new deaths because of COVID-19 and 49 people hospitalized in its weekly report.

New Hampshire saw the highest percentage increase of COVID-19 hospitalizations over the last two weeks at 30 percent, according to Becker’s Hospital Review.

New daily COVID-19 hospitalization rates in the U.S. have increased 8 percent over the last two weeks, with 20 states seeing hospitalization rates trend upward and 29 states still seeing hospitalization trend downward, according to data tracked by The New York Times, Becker’s reported. Data is taken from Health and Human Services, was last updated Oct. 21.

Over the last two weeks, New Hampshire saw a 30 percent hospitalization rate increase; Rhode Island an 18 percent rate increase, Vermont a 15 percent increase, Massachusetts an 11 percent and Maine and Connecticut 1 percent each, according to Becker’s Hospital Review.

The following press release was issued Thursday by NH DHHS:

NH DHHS Weekly COVID-19 Update – Week of October 20, 2022

Concord, NH –On Thursday, October 20, 2022, the New Hampshire Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) announced 1,673 new positive COVID-19 test results between Thursday, October 13 and Wednesday, October 19.

For the previous week, DHHS announced 12 additional deaths related to COVID-19. We offer our sympathies to the family and friends.

There are currently 49 hospitalized patients being treated for COVID-19. In New Hampshire, since the start of the pandemic, there have been a total of 355,166 cases of COVID-19 diagnosed.

Current Situation in New Hampshire

New Hampshire 2019 Novel Coronavirus (COVID-19) Summary Report
(updated October 20, 2022, 9:00 AM)

New Hampshire Institutions Associated with a COVID-19 Outbreak (as of 10/20/2022)

The most up-to-date laboratory testing data, positivity rates and vaccination data are available on the COVID-19 dashboards at https://www.covid19.nh.gov/dashboard/overview. For additional hospitalization data, please visit the New Hampshire Hospital Association’s COVID-19 information page at https://nhha.org/index.php/whats-new/1545-coronavirus-disease-2019-covid-19-outbreak.

For more information, please visit the DHHS COVID-19 webpage at https://www.covid19.nh.gov/.