Utah's months-long trend of declining COVID-19 cases continues, but just barely

New confirmed cases of COVID-19 have been ticking upward across the U.S. over the past few weeks, and Utah's months-long downward trend appears to be slowing as well.

Utah reported 2,763 new cases of coronavirus in the week ending Sunday compared to 2,779 the week before, with cases holding steady after weeks of steady declines.

Still, the state's case rates rate well compared to other states.

Utah ranked 38th among the states where coronavirus was spreading the fastest on a per-person basis, a USA TODAY Network analysis of Johns Hopkins University data shows.

In the latest week the United States added 490,277 reported cases of coronavirus, an increase of 10.3% from the week before. Across the country, 35 states had more cases in the latest week than they did in the week before.

Many states did not report cases on Easter. That will make some state-to-state comparisons inaccurate, and also some in-state week-to-week comparisons inaccurate.

Within Utah, the worst weekly outbreaks on a per-person basis were in Summit, Wasatch and Davis counties. Adding the most new cases overall were Salt Lake County, with 957 cases; Utah County, with 450 cases; and Davis County, with 382. Weekly case counts rose in four counties from the previous week. The worst increases from the prior week's pace were in Davis, Tooele and San Juan counties.

>> See how your community has fared with recent coronavirus cases

The state lags behind most of the country when it comes to vaccinations.

Utah ranked 40th among states in share of people receiving at least one shot, with 31.8% of its residents at least partially vaccinated. The national rate is 35.9%, a USA TODAY analysis of CDC data shows.

In the week ending Sunday, Utah reported administering another 196,112 vaccine doses, compared to 190,472 the week before that. In all, Utah reported it has administered 1,662,712 doses.

Across Utah, cases fell in three counties, with the best declines in Utah, Summit and Salt Lake counties.

In Utah, 27 people were reported dead of COVID-19 in the week ending Sunday. In the week before that, 18 people were reported dead.

A total of 390,104 people in Utah have tested positive for the coronavirus since the pandemic began, and 2,159 people have died from the disease, Johns Hopkins University data shows. In the United States 31,197,873 people have tested positive and 562,066 people have died.

Note: For Utah, Johns Hopkins University reports data mostly by health department, such as the combined Weber-Morgan agency. Weber and Morgan counties may be marked as having no cases. The county-level data for Utah is considerably worse than it is for any other state, and county comparisons may be wildly misleading.

>> Track coronavirus cases across the United States

The USA TODAY Network is publishing localized versions of this story on its news sites across the country, generated with data from Johns Hopkins University and the Centers for Disease Control. If you have questions about the data or the story, contact Mike Stucka at mstucka@gannett.com.