Arizona reports 4,012 new COVID-19 cases, 33 more deaths

More than 4,000 new COVID-19 cases reported in Arizona amid holiday surge

PHOENIX (AP) - Arizona health officials are reporting more than 4,000 new confirmed COVID-19 cases for the first time in a week.

The state coronavirus dashboard on Thursday tallied 4,012 new cases and 33 additional deaths.

With those latest stats, Arizona has now seen 1,276,955 cases and 22,383 deaths since the pandemic began.

As for hospitalizations, there were 2,681 people in hospital beds for the virus as of Wednesday. The last time in-patients were in that range was early February when Arizona was coming down from a winter surge.

With many hospitalizations for non COVID-19 reasons, only 5% of inpatient beds statewide were available.

A nurse at Valleywise Health described the toll the virus is taking nearly two years into the pandemic.

"Yes, the vaccine is wonderful and people are getting it and that’s absolutely great - but you know, we’re still seeing the ICUs filled with COVID patients, and we’re still seeing these nursing shortages, staffing issues, just the working conditions themselves are just tough," said ICU nurse Emily Carter. "It's really disheartening to continue to be in this position."

According to Johns Hopkins University data, Arizona’s seven-day rolling average of daily new cases dropped from a peak 3,990.6 on Nov. 22 to 3,085.1 on Tuesday.

The rolling average of daily deaths went from 41.3 to 35 in that same period.