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Arkansas Sees 20 COVID-19 Deaths In Single Day, Total Cases Surpass 40,000

Governor's Office

Arkansas has recorded its highest number of COVID-19 deaths in a single day as the total number of cases in the state surpasses 40,000.

The state saw 734 new cases Tuesday, according to numbers from the Arkansas Department of Health. The total number of coronavirus cases in the state is now 40,181. Of those cases, 6,595 are considered active.

The state recorded 20 deaths from COVID-19, bring the total to 428. The number of Arkansans hospitalized with the virus is now 501 due to an increase of 12.

As far as testing, the state logged 5,428 tests in the past 24 hours. With days left to reach the state’s goal of 200,000 in July, Gov. Asa Hutchinson spoke on the state’s progress with testing during his daily briefing on the pandemic Tuesday.

"We’re at 170,000. We’re going to easily achieve the 180,000 mark, which is 6% of our population and so our testing is in pretty good shape compared to the nation and compared to the goals that we have set. We obviously wanted to get to 200,000. We’ll see if we get there, but we should make the 6% of our population this month," Hutchinson said.

11 counties in the state had 20 or more new cases. Pulaski County had the highest number of new cases with 55. Benton and Mississippi counties had the second and third highest number of new cases with 50 and 48 cases respectively.

Credit Governor's Office
This chart shows the percent positivity of COVID-19 cases by county.

During the briefing, Hutchinson presented a new chart that measured the positivity percentage of total coronavirus cases in each county.

"This is helpful to us as we make decisions on our testing, on our focus on resources. As we measure schools…if they have a positive COVID case in a school after it starts, how do you respond to that. Some of it will be the extend of spread in the community. This…gives us that information," Hutchinson said.

According to the data provided, Lincoln County has the highest percentage of positive cases with 32.5%. Hot Spring, Lee, Washington and Yell counties all have a positivity percentage of over 20%.

While Pulaski county currently has the second highest number of total coronavirus cases in the state at 4,492, its percentage positive rate is 7.4%.

Sarah Kellogg was a Politics and Government reporter for KUAR from November 2018- August 2021.
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