LDH explains new COVID-19 report format

The Louisiana Department of Health released its latest batch of COVID-19 case numbers at noon Friday, to some confusion.

LDH listed 201,981 total positive COVID-19 cases reported to the state, an increase of more than 10,000 from the 191,889 cases reported on Thursday.

But the LDH website said the day-to-day case increase was only 3,492.

When the Leader questioned the apparent inconsistency, LDH Public Information Officer Mindy Faciane said the rest of the added numbers didn’t come from new cases, but rather a change in the way the state will be reporting data going forward.

She said Friday’s COVID-19 report was the first time the LDH had included “probable cases,” identified through rapid antigen testing, as part of the overall case total.

So the apparent increase from 191,889 cases on Thursday to 201,981 cases on Friday is actually made up of 3,492 new cases plus more than 7,000 “probable cases” that until Friday had been listed elsewhere on the LDH dashboard.

Unlike the more common molecular tests that detect nucleic acid and can take several days to yield results, antigen testing returns results in approximately 15 minutes. But the quick tests are also less sensitive, according to the Centers for Disease Control, and therefore more likely to yield a false positive or negative.

LDH will continue to list a “total cases” figure including results from both molecular tests and antigen tests, a “confirmed cases” figure from just the molecular tests, and a “probable cases” figure from just the antigen tests.

Even without the addition of antigen test cases, the daily case increase was the state’s largest since early August.

Meanwhile, Lincoln Parish’s confirmed cases went up by 44 from Thursday to Friday, for a total of 1,861. That’s only from molecular testing — the parish has another 199 “probable” cases from rapid antigen testing.

The parish remained steady at 54 deaths from the virus. The state went up to 6,121, an increase of 24 from Thursday.