Utah coronavirus updates: The latest COVID-19 news and case counts

Utah has seen 623,703 confirmed cases of COVID-19 with 3,754 total deaths as of Thursday, according to the Utah Department of Health. That’s an increase of 1,289 cases since Wednesday. School-aged kids account for 152 of today’s newly announced cases. Five new deaths were reported.

Here are the latest numbers.

• Total number of COVID-19 cases: 623,703
• Total reported people tested: 4,174,214
• Vaccines administered: 4,483,794
• Total COVID-19 hospitalizations: 27,185
• Current COVID-19 hospitalizations: 458
• Total COVID-19 deaths: 3,754
• Single-day high for reported cases: 4,672 (Dec. 31)
• Single-day high for reported deaths: 30 (Dec. 17 and Jan. 21)

Recently

• The world’s death toll from COVID-19 has topped 5 million.
• Utah now has just as many patients hospitalized with the virus as during the peak of the pandemic — and the state’s case count may be headed back up,
• Utah is beefing up COVID-19 testing so residents no longer have to wait in line for hours to be swabbed for the virus and is also piloting a new process intended to make it easier to get the results required for travel to many places,
• The Utah Department of Health is now recommending high-risk individuals get a booster shot of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine.
• While one Utah Republican, Rep. Chris Stewart, harshly criticized the CDC’s latest mask recommendations, GOP Sen. Mitt Romney says being pro-life means getting COVID-19 vaccine.
• Even with the shots, Utahns can still catch the coronavirus. “All of us are going to get it at some point,” a Westminster College professor said.
• The University of Utah is offering free, weekly asymptomatic testing for COVID-19 to family and household members of its students, faculty and staff.

Worldwide

Globally, the novel coronavirus pandemic has now infected 276,436,619 and killed5,374,744people as of Thursday, according to the World Health Organization.

Read more of our coronavirus coverage.