The City of St. Louis reported seven deaths from COVID-19 and 16 new cases on Tuesday, May 5.
The city, which remains under the mayor’s stay-at-home order until May 18, has now has reported 78 deaths and 1,362 cases.
Of the 1362 COVID-19 cases reported in the city, 899 (or 66.0%) were black. Of the 78 victims of the pandemic, 50 (64.1%) were black. Only 45.9% of the city’s population is black, according to U.S. Census data.
“African Americans continue to be disproportionately impacted by COVID-19,” said Dr. Fredrick Echols, St. Louis health director.
With 78 reported deaths from the pandemic in 1362 reported cases, 5.7% of the people in the city who tested positive have died.
A communications representative for the St. Louis Metropolitan Pandemic Task Force said its incident commander Dr. Alex Garza always cautions against looking at day-to-day numbers versus longer term trends.
The task force’s modeling said the peak for hospitalizations and ICU patients for the region would take place, Saturday, April 25. Garza said on April 28 that the data suggests hospitalizations in the region are indeed beginning to plateau but not decline.