photo by: Kevin Anderson/Journal-World File Photo

The Lawrence-Douglas County health department's home at the Community Health Facility, 200 Maine St., is pictured in this file photo from July 2010.

More than 300 new COVID cases emerged in Douglas County just before and after New Year’s Eve, but the number of people hospitalized for the virus didn’t increase at all, according to the latest figures.

The number of active COVID cases jumped to 1,538 as of Monday afternoon, the Lawrence-Douglas County health department said in its latest pandemic update. That’s an increase from about 1,200 cases that the health department reported on Wednesday.

But nationally, public health leaders have said the number of active cases is becoming a less important metric as the omicron variant is expected to produce many more infections, even among those who are vaccinated. Early data also shows the omicron variant is producing serious illnesses and hospitalizations at a slower rate than the delta variant of COVID.

On the hospitalization front, the latest numbers show there has been little change in Douglas County. The health department reported that LMH Health has 14 inpatients being treated for COVID as of Monday afternoon. That’s down from 15 inpatients on Dec. 29 and continues to be about half as much as what the hospital was experiencing during the earlier peak of the pandemic.

But other statistics related to the virus detail how the virus is spreading much more rapidly in the county. Among the latest figures are:

• The 14-day moving average for new cases is now at 89 cases per day. That’s a new high for the county. Previously, the high mark was about 82 cases per day in November of 2020. As recently as early December, Douglas County was adding less than 50 cases per day, on average.

• The average percentage of COVID tests coming back positive was 9.1% as of Monday. That’s up from 5.4% on Dec. 29. Local testing sites have been reporting some very high numbers of positive tests. For example, LMH Health confirmed that at one of its testing locations last week, it tested 200 people in a single day, and 25% of them tested positive for the virus. That testing location, however, is limited to testing people who have symptoms or who know they’ve been exposed to the virus.

• The number of Douglas County deaths attributed to COVID grew by three over the holiday weekend. The health department reported a death of a woman who was over 85 years old, a man who was in the 75-84 age range, and a man in the 45-54 age range. There have been 114 Douglas County deaths attributed to COVID since the pandemic began.