Wisconsin's coronavirus death toll reaches 1,600; state reports first numbers after weekend system outage - Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

The number of people hospitalized with the virus hit a new record Monday, with 1,172 active patients across the state, including 302 in ICUs.

The number of people hospitalized with the virus hit a new high Monday, with 1,172 active patients across the state, including 302 in intensive care units.

The state Department of Health Services on Monday reported 3,777 new cases and 12 deaths.

How to interpret COVID-19 data:What experts say about positive cases, deaths and hospitalizations.

"We encourage you to view the 7-day average for case counts rather than focusing on the number of new cases on a given day.

Over Saturday, Sunday and Monday, the state reported a total of 38,354 negative tests.

In the first, which DHS has used since the start of the pandemic and is preferred by many epidemiologists, DHS measures positivity as the number of residents who have tested positive for the first time divided by the number of residents who have ever been tested.

So a COVID-19 patient who repeatedly tested positive would be counted twice, as would a health care worker who repeatedly tests negative as part of regular tests.

This results in a lower positivity rate that is more similar to the levels seen in spring, though cases, hospitalizations and deaths all are at higher levels than they were then.

Using only new positive and negative tests, the average positivity rate over the last seven days is 21.2%, an all-time high after weeks climbing upward

Using all tests, including repeats, the average positivity rate is 11.7%

Wisconsin ranks in the top five states in the country for total number of new cases in the last week, behind states with much larger populations: Texas, Illinois, California and Florida

More than 1.8 million people have been tested statewide for the virus