By Tim Mastro

DOVER — The Delaware Division of Public Health reported 547 new positive cases of COVID-19 in Friday’s update — the largest single-day total since Feb. 5 when there were 572.

The number of individuals hospitalized with the virus also increased, up to 210 which is the most since Feb. 13. Of those currently hospitalized, 34 cases are considered critical.

Vaccination data for cases and hospitalizations this week was not available on Friday but the DPH did release data for the week of Aug. 16 to Aug. 22. For that time frame, 73% of those hospitalized were not fully vaccinated while 77% of positive cases came in individuals not fully vaccinated.

There have been 1,544 breakthrough cases of COVID-19, according to the DPH, which includes 308 new breakthrough cases in the past week. A breakthrough case is defined as testing positive for COVID-19 after an individual has been fully vaccinated for two weeks or more — although it does not necessarily mean the infection actually occurred after vaccination.

The 1,544 breakthrough cases represents 0.3% of the 492,758 fully vaccinated Delawareans, according to the DPH.

Delaware has recorded an all-time total of 118,544 positive COVID-19 cases with 1,875 COVID-19-related deaths. There were three new COVID-19-related deaths reported on Friday. Two of those individuals were not vaccinated while one was fully vaccinated.

None of the three were residents of long-term care centers. However, four long-term care residents suffered COVID-19-related deaths in the past week as that total number rose to 830. An additional 43 positive cases were recorded among long-term care residents this week for an all-time total of 2,848.

The DPH sequenced 139 test samples at the DPH Lab for variant strains in the past week and 68% were positive for some COVID-19 variant. An additional 20 specimens sequenced at an outside lab also were identified as having variants for a weekly total of 114.

The delta variant made up 97% of the variants this week. There have been a total of 255 cases of the delta variant identified in Delaware but because not every positive test is sequenced for variants, the actual number is likely higher.