Texas is reporting a record increase in positive COVID-19 test rates although hospital admissions are slowing, and state officials launched an investigation to determine why, according to a Bloomberg report.
Four things to know:
1. Gov. Greg Abbott said the state has convened a "data team" to examine the Texas health department's calculations and take a deeper dive into the state's COVID-19 reporting. He suggested the positivity rate may be higher due to increased test volumes.
2. On Aug. 11, the COVID-19 positivity rate was 24.5 percent but had dropped to 16.08 percent one day later.
3. At the end of July, the state had a backlog of more than 1 million unaudited tests, which can skew the positivity rate higher as those tests are added into the overall total, according to the Bloomberg report.
4. Houston expects to kick off surge testing operations in the next week or two with the goal of testing another 50,000 people over 10 days, which will further increase testing volume. On Aug. 12, Texas Medical Center reported the new case volume dropped 22 percent week-over-week and the transmission rate was below 1.
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