ELIZABETHTOWN — Red no more.

Bladen County on Thursday dropped two tiers in the coronavirus community spread impact map of its county alert system. Bladen went from being the only red county, meaning the most severe and “critical community spread,” to being among 41 yellow counties with “significant community spread.”

The report is broken into five tiers, assigned by colors from red to orange, yellow, light yellow and green. Those correspond, respectively, to critcal, substantial, significant, moderate, and low. Bladen had been the only red in two consecutive reports.

Thursday, 54 counties remained in the same tier, six improved and 40 went toward red. One is red, there are 12 orange, 41 yellow, 41 light yellow and five green.

In Monday’s reports from its Health Department, Bladen County zoomed all the way to 148 active cases — the most since Feb. 12 when the COVID-19 pandemic had already reached its height here and was beginning to decline. Dr. Terri Duncan’s report included five people hospitalized.

Since the pandemic began, the county has had 3,692 positive tests and 3,491 recoveries. In July, there have been seven deaths, 182 positive tests, and 126 recoveries. Neither the county nor the state adjust numbers for false positives.

The county Health Department is taking walk-ins for vaccination and can help with those who are homebound and need transportation. The Pfizer and Moderna vaccines are available at the 300 Mercer Mill office for those ages 12 and up; hours are Monday through Thursday 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., and Friday 9 a.m. to noon.

Questions can be directed to 910-872-6291.

In the statewide outbreak and cluster reports. Bladenboro Primary remains listed with five cases for children; West Bladen High is logged with one case among staff and six among children. Bladenboro Primary first showed up in aggregate DHHS totals on May 13, and West Bladen on June 29.

The state defines outbreaks as two or more cases at congregate living settings, and clusters as five or more at child care facilities or schools. DHHS posts the detailed listing of outbreaks and clusters on Tuesdays only.

Vaccination series are complete for 35 percent of the total population of the county, the state Department of Health and Human Services says. There are 11,345 people fully vaccinated in Bladen County, and 12,647 partially vaccinated. Statewide, there are 4,873,217 people fully vaccinated and 4,514,871 partially vaccinated. The breakdown statewide of those fully vaccinated is 84 percent for ages 65-and-up, 57 percent for age 18 and up, 54 percent for age 12 and up, and 46 percent for total population.

The DHHS postal ZIP code report lists 1,200 cases in Elizabethtown and White Lake since the pandemic began; 994 in Bladenboro; 445 in Clarkton; 364 in East Arcadia; 202 in White Oak; 202 in Tar Heel; 97 in Council; and 70 in Kelly.

There are 21 fatalities listed for the ZIP in Elizabethtown and White Lake. There have been 15 in Bladenboro; five each in Clarkton and East Arcadia; three in Council; two in White Oak; and one each in Tar Heel and Kelly. The Dublin ZIP code disappeared from the state report on Jan. 29.

Monday’s totals from the state included:

• 13,580 deaths.

• 1,037,373 cases.

• 943 hospitalized.

• 14,276,891 tests.

For most people, the coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms, such as fever and cough. But for others, especially older adults and people with existing health conditions, the highly contagious virus can cause severe symptoms and be fatal.

In adjacent counties to Bladen, there have been 947 deaths and 70,287 cases. Cumberland has 330 deaths and 31,855 cases; Robeson has 279 deaths and 17,598 cases; Columbus has 155 deaths and 6,753 cases; Sampson has 114 deaths and 8,329 cases; and Pender has 69 deaths and 5,752 cases.

Congregate living settings in North Carolina have totaled 5,690 deaths and 74,091 positive cases. Outbreaks have been identified and are active at 43 nursing homes, 17 residential care facilities, 19 correctional institutions and eight other facilities. Of those, three are in Cumberland and one in Columbus.

Bladen and Cumberland each have two clusters.

With 90 percent of the state’s hospitals reporting, DHHS says there is availability of 73 percent of the ventilators, 22 percent of the intensive care unit beds and 26 percent of all hospital beds.

A combined 13 metropolitan counties have the state’s three largest cities and account for 37.9 percent of the deaths (5,154) and 46.4 percent of the cases (481,037).

In the Charlotte area, Mecklenburg County has 988 deaths and 117,724 positive cases, Gaston County has 445 deaths and 27,619 cases, Rowan County has 314 deaths and 17,648 cases, Cabarrus County has 264 deaths and 23,040 cases, and Union County has 228 deaths and 25,570 cases — a total of 2,239 deaths and 211,601 cases.

In and near the Triangle area, Wake County has 743 deaths and 91,626 cases, Durham County has 239 deaths and 26,225 cases, Johnston County has 240 deaths and 22,996 cases, and Orange County has 101 deaths and 8,736 cases — a total of 1,323 deaths and 149,583 cases.

In the interior of the 12-county Piedmont Triad, Guilford County has 726 deaths and 49,432 cases, Forsyth County has 430 deaths and 37,584 cases, Randolph County has 234 deaths and 15,569 cases, and Davidson County has 202 deaths and 17,268 cases — a total of 1,592 deaths and 119,853 cases.

According to the coronavirus tracker of Johns Hopkins University, available on BladenJournal.com, more than 34.4 million confirmed cases and 610,000 deaths are counted in the U.S. The second-highest case total is in India, with more than 31.4 million.

There have been more than 194.3 million cases worldwide, with more than 4.1 million deaths.

Alan Wooten can be reached at 910-247-9132 or awooten@bladenjournal.com. Twitter: @JournalBladen.