COVID-19 Deaths Continue on STX with 84th Fatality Territorywide

The territory’s COVID-19 death toll climbed to 84 Thursday with the death of a 61-year-old St. Croix woman, the Department of Health reports. This continues a trend where nearly all recent deaths have been on St. Croix.

The 83rd death occurred one week ago, with the death of a 50-year-old St. Croix woman last Thursday. The day before that, a 59-year-old St. Croix man became the 82nd confirmed fatality within the territory.

For much of the pandemic, St. Thomas was hit harder, and it has seen 46 fatalities, while St. Croix is at 34 to date. But recently, most fatalities have been on St. Croix. Since Oct. 1, St. Croix went from 24 to 35 fatalities, while St. Thomas went from 44 to 46. St. John is much smaller in population and has seen three fatalities to date.

A majority of U.S. Virgin Islands COVID-19 deaths have taken place in the past three months, long after several free, safe and effective vaccines against the illness became readily available throughout the territory. The Health Department has not reported whether the most recent person to die was vaccinated, and the department does not release individual case information for privacy reasons.

To date, there has been only one report of a vaccinated Virgin Islander dying of the illness, and Health Department officials have repeatedly said almost none of the Virgin Islanders hospitalized for the illness were unvaccinated. This means most USVI COVID-19 deaths and hospitalizations were preventable.