COVID-19 cases in Highland County have gone down considerably, according to the New York Times COVID Tracker. The tracker said Tuesday that the county was seeing 10 new cases per day, which is about 37 cases per 100,000 in population.

The last time The Times-Gazette reported on COVID-19 data, which was on Sept. 12, The New York Times COVID Tracker said the county was seeing 16 new cases per day, about 37 cases per 100,000 in population.

The tracker gave some of the latest trends for the county. It said that the community level of COVID-19 in the county is “medium” based on cases and hospitalizations, according to the most recent Center for Disease Control (CDC) update on Sept. 15.

It said the number of hospitalized COVID-19 patients has fallen in the county, but deaths have stayed about the same. It also said that the test positivity rate for the county is “very high, suggesting that cases are being significantly undercounted.”

The update also said that since the beginning of the pandemic, the county has seen a total of 12,389 reported cases, and at least one in four residents have been infected.

The New York Times COVID-19 Tracker gave a COVID-19 update on Sept. 15 for the U.S. as well. It said daily announced cases have gone to fewer than 70,000 in the United States, which the tracker said was the lowest since early May.

The tracker said cases are “flat or falling” in about every state, with the declines “significant” in many areas. It also said more than a dozen states and territories have seen case drops of 40 percent or more since the beginning of the month.

Considering hospitalizations, the tracker said they have seen “sustained improvement.” It said fewer than 35,000 people are in American hospitals at the moment with the virus each day, which is a drop of 11 percent over the last two weeks.

“Data on new virus deaths is volatile at the moment because of the lingering effects of Labor Day weekend, when many states did not report,” the tracker said. “Still, deaths today are far lower than they were a year ago, when the Delta variant was causing nearly 2,000 deaths per day.”

In other news, Highland County’s COVID-19 case rate stood at 366.1 cases per 100,000 in population over the previous two weeks, according to the Ohio Department of Health Coronavirus Dashboard, which was last updated Thursday. The case rate was above the state average of 320.5 cases per 100,000 in population over the same period, and ranks the county 37th among the state’s 88 counties in terms of the highest case rates.

In terms of vaccinations, Highland County is currently at 40.68 percent of the county’s residents that have started their vaccines, according to the ODH COVID-19 Vaccination Dashboard, which was last updated on Thursday. The state average for “vaccine started” is 63.81 percent.

In terms of completed vaccines, the state average is 59.13 percent, while the Highland County average is 37.69 percent.

The dashboard also said there have been 7,776 “first booster” doses and 1,565 “second booster” doses administered in the county on or after Aug. 12, to people that were already fully vaccinated.

Reach Jacob Clary at 937-402-2570.