PHOENIX — On Friday, May 8, one day after one new death was reported by the Arizona Department of Health Services (May 7), the health department reported 67 deaths. It was the most reported in one day in the state and more than triple that the previous high.
In the midst of Arizona beginning its reopening phases, and just three days before restaurants were allowed to reopen for dine-in services, it had many scratching their heads about whether Arizona data was showing that the state could begin reopening.
Also on May 8, AZDHS added a graph to show deaths by date, which are not the same numbers as the daily new reported deaths total.
AZDHS Director Dr. Cara Christ explained the numbers in a blog post on May 8 on the health department's site.
On May 8, when the department added 67 new reported deaths, Dr. Christ wrote: "As a result of recent guidance by the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) on how states should certify deaths due to COVID-19 using death certificate surveillance, 35 of the 67 new deaths reported today are from death certificate surveillance dating as far back as the week of April 12."
Dr. Christ says ADHS implemented the use of death certificate surveillance using this updated guidance on May 1st.
"While this change will cause the number of new deaths reported on the dashboard to jump more than expected for a few days, the deaths are shown on the dashboard using the date of death," Dr. Christ said. "This puts the deaths on the day of the event and causes the deaths to be distributed throughout the 'epi curve.'"
The graph on deaths by day in Arizona shows that the day prior to 67 new deaths being reported, there were 14 actual deaths on May 7.
The day with the most deaths in Arizona was on April 20, with 22 deaths related to coronavirus, according to AZDHS.
On April 30, there were 20 deaths in Arizona related to COVID-19, according to the dashboard.
Below are the deaths by date each day since followed by the number of new deaths reported by the state each day at 9 a.m. released by AZDHS.
May 1: 13, 9
May 2: 10, 7
May 3: 13, 8
May 4: 12, 9
May 5: 14, 8
May 6: 12, 6
May 7: 14, 1
May 8: 11, 67
May 9: 3, 15
May 10: 5, 4
May 11: 3, 6
AZDHS has not released death by date numbers for May 12, as of this writing.
On May 12 at 9 a.m., AZDHS reported 20 new deaths and on May 13, AZDHS reported 32 new deaths.
As Dr. Christ said on May 8, 35 of the 67 new deaths reported today are from death certificate surveillance dating as far back as the week of April 12.
This could come from a number of factors that include that the cause of death may not have been immediately known at the time of death or a coronavirus test may not have been available at the time.
According to Dr. Christ, the death certificate surveillance that began on May 1 means there won’t be one spike of deaths on a single day, which allows for a more accurate picture of when COVID-19 related deaths truly occurred in Arizona.
Gov. Doug Ducey announced at his Tuesday press conference that his "Stay Home, Stay Healthy, Stay Connected" order would expire on May 15, ending the state's stay-at-home order and would be replaced with "Stay Healthy, Return Smarter, Return Stronger."
The order says vulnerable individuals should remain home, Arizonans should continue to observe physical distancing and in-person visits to nursing homes remain prohibited.
Additionally, Gov. Ducey said pools and gyms could begin reopening on May 13 and professional sports could reopen in the state after May 15 without fans.