Joe Deacon / WCBU
The Tri-County Area posted a single-day increase of fewer than 300 COVID-19 cases Tuesday for just the third time in the past four weeks.
Health officials added 266 new coronavirus infections to the region’s tally, bringing the total to 22,548 since the start of the pandemic – and 4,572 in December so far.
Two additional fatalities linked to COVID pushed the region’s death toll to 318 since mid-March. The victims were both from Peoria County, a man in his 60s with underlying health conditions and a woman in her 90s from Sharon Health Care Elms.
The Peoria-area hospitals have 179 patients with COVID-19, including 49 in intensive care units, and 6,819 people who have tested positive for the virus are in home isolation.