ATLANTA - Three grim milestones were reached on Wednesday in Georgia's continued battle against the coronavirus.
As of 3 p.m., the Georgia Department of Public Health reports more than 600,000 confirmed cases now in the state. The total is 602,796. That is an average of 5,624 new cases each day for the last two weeks or 78,741 cases in the same time period. Those cases do not 111,044 cases confirmed through antigen testing.
The GDPH also reports confirmed deaths have surpassed 10,000. The total is 10,035. There have also been 1,130 probable deaths in the state since the start of the pandemic.
Hospitalization also broke a record for the second day in a row. The state reports 5,414 patients were currently hospitalized as of Wednesday afternoon. That is about 31.5% of all patients hospitalized as facilities report they are at or near capacity. A total of 43,629 people have had to be hospitalized because of COVID-19 since the start of the pandemic.
The milestone comes a day after state health officials announced the first cases of the COVID-19 variant B.1.1.7 was identified in a patient in Georgia.
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