DETROIT – The daily COVID-19 cases in Michigan continue to rise, even as more Michiganders are becoming vaccinated.
Testing has been steady around 35,000 diagnostic tests reported per day on average, with the 7-day positive rate above 10% as of Sunday, the highest since December.
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Lori MacFarlane is one of the latest COVID cases. She believes she caught it when she ate out in Macomb County last Wednesday. The owner reported that some staff tested positive Friday and closed the restaurant.
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“It is all touch and go with this new variant and it is hitting very hard very fast,” MacFarlane said. “The breathing. And the body aches. The body aches are torture.”
She said she wore a mask and restaurant staff did too, but as a bartender, she knows that open businesses are walking a tightrope.
“As soon as texted my boss that I had symptoms, she said, ‘The bar’s closed. We will figure it out,’” MacFarlane siad. “She closed it until Friday.”
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Michigan’s 7-day average of new COVID-19 cases is the highest it’s been since mid-December. It is leading the nation in U.K. variant infections.
The daily infection numbers are higher than they were in November when Gov. Gretchen Whitmer mandated the “Pause to Save Lives.”
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Will restrictions be put back into place?
“It’s bound to happen that people are going to get infected, no matter how safe you try to be,” MacFarlane said. “There is so much of it out here right now.”
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