NEW ORLEANS — The number of COVID-19 hospitalizations in Louisiana continued its alarming rise on Wednesday.
According to the Louisiana Department of Health, there were 1,524 people hospitalized with COVID-19 across the state, an increase of 134 patients compared to the day prior.
"The last time we had this many people with COVID hospitalized was at the very end of January, as Louisiana was on the other side of its third surge peak," Christina Stephens, a spokesperson for Gov. John Bel Edwards office said.
COVID-19 hospitalizations have increased more than 580% since July 1, just four weeks ago. On Tuesday, the LDH announced the largest increase in COVID-19 hospitalizations since March 2020. In the Northshore region, the St. Tammany Health System announced Wednesday that hit had set a new record for COVID-19 patients, prompting the hospital to scale up its COVID care units.
The skyrocketing hospitalizations have put a strain on the availability of intensive care unit beds in the state. The LDH reports that there were only four ICU beds available on Tuesday in Louisiana's Acadiana region which includes seven parishes near Lafayette, La.
Stephens added that the vast majority of new cases and people hospitalized with COVID-19 in Louisiana were unvaccinated residents.
The health department reported 4,699 new cases and 14 new deaths from the virus since Tuesday. In total, 10,948 people have died due to the virus since the pandemic began.
Stephens said another "troubling sign" of the latest surge: the percentage of tests returning COVID-19 positive has increased from 8.7% to 13.2% for the week ending on July 21.
The new figures come as state officials increasingly urge the public to get vaccinated as medical staffs again are stretched thin by the state's fourth surge since the pandemic began.
At the same time, Louisiana saw a spike in the number of wasted vaccine doses as interest in the shots plummeted across the state. More than 79,000 vaccine doses were trashed largely because health providers couldn’t find enough arms quickly enough. Wasted doses of the life-saving vaccines numbered fewer than 1,500 only four months ago.
But data provided to The Associated Press by the LDH showed the unused, discarded shots surged to more than 50 times that number by July 23. But the Health Department says the state is now seeing a surge in immunization interest as the highly contagious delta variant drives record numbers of new infections.
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The Associated Press contributed to this report.