Kentucky's COVID-19 Cases Still High, But Beshear Says Progress Is Being Made

Gov. Andy Beshear said progress is being made in the fight against COVID-19, though he said case numbers are still alarmingly high.

Last week set a record for weekly COVID-19 cases. The three deadliest days all happened that week, too.

In a statement released Wednesday, Beshear announced 3,481 new cases.

This week, Beshear said the state is seeing signs of relief. Wednesday marks the sixth straight day with a declining positivity rate. In the statement, Beshear said this decline is a result of the restrictions on certain public venues he put in place roughly a month ago.

“We continue to see some promising trends in our COVID-19 numbers,” Beshear said. “They are still far too high, but given that we were experiencing exponential growth before we took those difficult steps, this is evidence that we may not just be slowing down that growth, we may even be plateauing our cases. You have to slow down the train before you stop it, and you have to stop it before you turn it around.”

Another 16 deaths were reported. Nearly 1,800 Kentuckians are in the hospital with COVID-19, 412 are in the ICU and 211 are on ventilators. The positivity rate is at 9.23%.