Two Wisconsin counties haven’t had a COVID-19 case in weeks

MADISON, Wis. (WMTV) - A Wisconsin county that has only recorded a single COVID-19 case all month and another that has not seen one since the Ides of March dropped into the Dept. of Health Services’ lowest category for tracking the virus’ spread.

In DHS’ latest weekly update, Forest Co. and Menominee Co. became the first counties to drop into the Low category for case activity. The former tallied a case on March 13 – and that was the only one this month – while Menominee last saw an official positive test on March 15. The drop from Medium to Low marked a new milestone in tracking the crashing number of positive tests recorded in the state. In January, every Wisconsin county was two categories beyond High, surpassing the Critically High threshold, often several times over.

Number of confirmed and probable COVID-19 cases by date of symptom onset or diagnosis in Forest... — Number of confirmed and probable COVID-19 cases by date of symptom onset or diagnosis in Forest Co. from Feb. 8 to March 29.(Dept. of Health Services)

Number of confirmed and probable COVID-19 cases by date of symptom onset or diagnosis in... — Number of confirmed and probable COVID-19 cases by date of symptom onset or diagnosis in Menominee Co. from Feb. 8 to March 29.(Dept. of Health Services)

As the first Omicron wave ebbed and cases started falling, counties started dropping into the lower categories. Eighteen counties now register in the Medium category, while the other 52 are listed as still having High case activity. In southwestern Wisconsin, only Grant, Juneau and Waushara Counties were counted as Medium. The geographical triangle encompassing Green, Dane and Rock Counties ranked first, second and third for highest case burden in the state, the DHS dashboard indicated.

The state as a whole still rates as High, despite its case burden falling under the category’s minimum threshold. That was because the trajectory of cases remained steady, as opposed to falling.

COVID-19 Disease Activity(Dept. of Health Services)

While case burdens, which are tracked on a two-week basis are dropping, the daily case counts and seven-day rolling-average are trending the other way. The number of new, confirmed cases jumped again Wednesday continuing to reverse a trend of declining in the average number of cases in any weeklong period. DHS statistics show the 518 cases reported on Wednesday were the most since the second day of March. That rise pushed the seven-day rolling-average to 345 cases per day over the past week, itself the highest in more than two weeks. With the latest figures, DHS has tallied 1,392,570 total cases since the pandemic.

The seven-day rolling-average for deaths did dip to eight per day, staying within the range where the average has stood the entire month.