As the number of patients with COVID-19 in Harris County intensive care units continues to fall, the percentage of those patients that make up the total patient count in the ICU fell below 30% on Aug. 10.

The percentage has been slowly falling since reaching a high point above 50% in early July, according to data from the Southeast Texas Regional Advisory Council. Public health officials in Harris County have said they want to see that number below 15%.

The overall number of patients with COVID-19 was at 953 in the county's general wards, down from 1,002 on Aug. 9 and 1,076 one week ago on Aug. 3. In ICUs, the patient count was at 463, down from 630 one week ago.

In the Texas Medical Center, base ICU capacity remained completely full, while surge capacity fell to 2% full.

A total of 806 new COVID-19 cases were confirmed in Harris County on Aug. 10, along with eight deaths caused by the virus. Of the new cases, 449 were confirmed in the city of Houston and 357 were confirmed in Harris County outside of the city.


The seven-day average of new cases confirmed per day in the county fell for the fifth day and now stands at 1,208 per day. That number marks the lowest the seven-day average has been since July 11, where it hit 1,146 per day before rocketing up above 1,300 for the rest of July and into August.

Officials with the Houston Health Department also provided an update on the continued decline in testing positivity in the city. The 14-day average fell to 14.6% as of Aug. 7, down from 17.6% on July 31. In a Tweet, officials noted the trend was moving in the right direction, but said it needed to drop more before the virus would be considered under control.

The COVID-19 count in Harris County now stands at 86,563, with 36,073 cases considered active, 49,583 cases recovered and 905 cases that have died.