Data Notes for the Week of October 22

Today we released this week’s data snapshot. If you’re new to the data snapshot, we publish a weekly summary of the status for each of our metrics (you can find past issues on our data and metrics page). We have a few notes for this week’s issue:

Dane County’s 14-day average number of cases has increased again and is currently 167 cases per day.  

Cases per day ranged from 71 to 252 with an average of 167 cases per day. Last week’s average number of cases per day was 133.

In this 14-day period there were 2,343 total cases. 247 (11%) of these cases were associated with a cluster and/or a facility investigation. We define a cluster of cases as two or more cases associated with the same location or event around the same time. A facility investigation is initiated when there is evidence of a cluster of cases or a strong possibility for a cluster to emerge from a single facility or setting. To learn more about clusters and facility investigations, see our recent blog post!

* Most clusters also receive a facility investigation, e.g., there were 19 total workplace, not public-facing facility investigations. Overall, there were 42 cases associated with this category.

In September, 28% of cases resided outside of Madison. In October so far, this number has increased to 58%.

For the majority of our local epidemic, the percent of Dane County cases in Madison versus outside of Madison has usually hovered around 50%/50%. However, in recent weeks, the percent of cases outside of Madison has increased. In September, 28% of cases resided outside of Madison. In October so far, this number has increased to 58%. COVID-19 is spreading everywhere in Dane County, which is why it’s so important for everyone to follow all precautions at all times, no matter where you live.

The recommended target for grades 3-5 was not met this week.

The K-12 school metrics are detailed on our website. The Wisconsin Supreme Court issued an injunction that allows K-12 schools in Dane County to fully open for in-person instruction. We are disappointed in this decision and strongly urge all schools to continue voluntary phasing-in of classes for in-person instruction for grades 3-12. We will continue to update data weekly and advise schools on their reopening plans.

The lab timeliness and contact tracing metric dropped to its lowest level in months.

Lab timeliness (how quickly labs are reported to us) and contact tracing (how quickly we can reach out to cases) are combined into one metric because lab timeliness directly affects contact tracing. The struggle to keep up with contact tracing is clearer in this week’s metrics and support why we needed to move to a crisis model of contact tracing.

• During this period, 36% of cases were contacted by public health within 48 hours of being tested, down from 48% last week.
• 64% of positive tests were reported to us within 24 hours (up from 44% last week).
• 43% of cases were interviewed within 24 hours of receiving their test result (down from 65% last week).

The number of patients hospitalized with COVID-19 in Dane County continues to increase, up to 92 hospitalizations on October 21.  

Hospitalizations have continued to rise over the past two weeks, peaking at 92 hospitalizations on October 21. A little under a month ago, on September 29, we were at 37 hospitalizations. We continue to see this upward trend in the South Central region and in all of Wisconsin. We are monitoring hospitalizations very closely because increases in hospitalizations can lead to a strained healthcare system that struggles to meet the needs of all patients. Madison-area hospitals announced recently that they may be postponing non-emergency and non-urgent procedures and surgeries as COVID-19 hospitalizations increase.