Illinois COVID Update: IL reports 13,706 new cases, 121 deaths

CHICAGO (WLS) -- Illinois public health officials reported 13,706 new COVID cases and 121 related deaths Tuesday.

There have been 2,851,567 total COVID cases, including 30,276 deaths in the state since the pandemic began.

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The seven-day statewide test positivity rate is 15.0%.

Within the past 24 hours, laboratories have reported testing 125,097 new specimens for a total of 50,216,132 since the pandemic began.

Chicago's Dept. of Public Health commissioner Dr. Allison Arwady said the average number of new cases in the city has fallen over the past week to fewer than 2,000 each day. But Arwady said she doesn't want people to think that the risk isn't still high.

The Chicago Travel Advisory remains in effect for the whole country, Dr. Allison Arwady announced Tuesday.

"There are still more Chicago residents being newly hospitalized right now, each day, with COVID than at any point since May of 2020 - the beginning of the pandemic," Arwady said.

As of Monday night, 5,138 patients in Illinois were reported to be in the hospital with COVID-19. Of those, 907 patients were in the ICU and 542 patients with COVID-19 were on ventilators.

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A total of 20,305,739 vaccine doses have been administered in Illinois as of Monday and 61.78% of the state's population is fully vaccinated. The seven-day rolling average of vaccines administered daily is 41,692.