Daily vaccinations plunge as state reports 35 more COVID-19 deaths

Illinois health authorities said just 13,433 doses of COVID-19 vaccine were administered in the state Saturday, the fewest in more than six weeks.

There was no immediate explanation from the Illinois Department of Public Health for the low figure Sunday, which comes after health workers gave more than 160,000 doses combined over the previous two days.

According to the IDPH, more than 2.1 million vaccines have now been administered in the state, and even with Saturday's low total, the seven-day rolling average of vaccines given daily is 52,658.

As of Sunday, about 4.5% of DuPage County's population has been fully vaccinated. In suburban Cook County, that figure is slightly above 4%, followed by 3.42% in Will County, 3.07% in Kane, 2.92% in McHenry and 2.91% in Lake.

Experts believe at least 70% of the population must be protected from the coronavirus in order to obtain herd immunity.

The IDPH on Sunday reported 1,585 new confirmed and probable cases of the virus and 35 more COVID-19 deaths. Among the deaths were 10 residents of Cook County, four from DuPage and two from Will.

Overall, there have been 20,269 deaths from the coronavirus in Illinois, authorities said.

As of Saturday night, 1,468 coronavirus patients were hospitalized in Illinois with COVID-19. Of those, 356 patients were in intensive care and 170 were on ventilators.

The preliminary seven-day statewide positivity for cases dipped slightly to 2.7%, after being 2.8% the previous two days.