The number of Nevada counties not flagged for high risk of virus transmission has now grown to seven from a low of five.
One of them, Esmeralda County, is good on all three measures used to determine risk. Counties are considered “at risk” if they fail two of those three measures — failure to test at least 100 people each day for every 100,000 residents, if their case rate is higher than 200 tests per day per 100,000 residents and the positivity rate of those tested exceeds 8 percent.
Counties that fail just one of the three and are therefore not considered high risk are Pershing, Humboldt, Eureka, White Pine, Lincoln and Lander.
Most of those counties report zero new daily deaths but test positivity rates have spiked upward in a number of Nevada’s rural counties.
The 14-day average of new virus cases is 969 and Nevada is averaging 12 deaths a day over the past two weeks.
Experts point out that positivity rates in Nevada’s small rural counties can change dramatically over just a few days or a week.
Carson City is averaging just 27 new cases per day over the past two weeks and, as of Tuesday, reported no new deaths. But the positivity rate has spiked to just a fraction under 18 percent.
Washoe County reported a daily average of 192 cases over the past two weeks but just one death from COVID-19. Washoe’s positivity rate is at 19.8 percent.
In Douglas County there were 16 new cases Tuesday but, like the capital, no new deaths. But the positivity rate in Douglas was 21.4 percent.
In Churchill County, there was an average of 10 new cases over the past 14 days. Churchill also reported no deaths from the virus but a positivity rate of 9 percent. The story was similar in Lyon County where the 14-day average of new daily cases was just 23 and Tuesday saw no new deaths. The positivity rate there was 26.7 percent.
Populous Clark County remains the center of Nevada’s problem with a rolling average of 643 new cases daily and 10 deaths. Test positivity rates there are over 13 percent.
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