Idaho has likely hit its COVID-19 case peak, a top health official announced Tuesday.

But the news isn’t all celebration. Hospitalizations remain higher than during the region’s winter 2020 surge, and the entire state remains under a never-before-declared hospital resource crisis that has lasted for more than a month.

Health officials warned that Idahoans aren’t out of the woods yet.

Elke Shaw-Tulloch

Elke Shaw-Tulloch

“If we truly want to celebrate an end to COVID and success, we need to increase our vaccination rate, we need to embrace wearing masks to protect ourselves and others much more robustly than we have seen it now. We need to limit our social interactions and we need to avoid large gatherings,” said Idaho Public Health Administrator Elke Shaw-Tulloch. “We know it works. We know it has saved lives. And we know it’s how we can get out of our Crisis Standards of Care and get our kids back to our classrooms, where they deserve to be.”

Idaho’s seven-day rolling case average rose to 1,400 on Monday. That’s despite 4,400 pending positive test results that are awaiting local review, according to the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare. The case rise isn’t that big when compared to two weeks ago, when cases hit an average of 1,351 each day. Health officials have also been recently chipping away at a backlog of positive test results, which has skewed down infection reports.

“The data indicates that it is likely that Idaho has reached the peak of its current surge in cases,” said Idaho Department of Health and Welfare Director Dave Jeppesen. He cited flattening case counts and consistently declining test positivity rates.

Idaho hospitals remain under Crisis Standards of Care. The statewide declaration allows hospitals to use a state plan that gives legal and ethical guidance for how to provide treatment when too many people are in need.

But hospitalizations are finally falling, too.

At Idaho’s peak hospitalization rate a couple of weeks ago, 759 COVID-19 patients were being treated in Idaho hospitals, according to Dr. Kathryn Turner, deputy state epidemiologist. She said the daily hospitalization average was 615 last week.

About 89% of staffed intensive care unit beds in the state were full Tuesday, according to federal hospital data. Patients with COVID-19 filled more than half (56%) of ICU beds in the state, down from two-thirds in late September. About 27% of all hospital inpatients in Idaho have COVID-19, the data show.

About 54% of Idahoans age 12 and up have been fully vaccinated, compared to 68% of all Americans eligible for the vaccine. Idaho has one of the lowest vaccination rates in the nation.

Since mid-May, 87% of COVID-19 cases, 90% of hospitalizations, 92% of ICU stays and 86% of deaths due to COVID-19 have been among unvaccinated Idahoans, according to the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare.

Idaho’s test positivity rate has declined for four consecutive weeks, down to 10.6% during the week ending Oct. 9. That’s the latest data available. Last week, Turner said four straight weeks of decline would be a positive sign.

“I think if I see a decline in the percent positivity again this week, I think we’ll lean more towards we’re optimistic. It’s hard to go week to week to determine a trend, but I think four weeks would indicate to us that we may be on the downside,” Turner said last week.