From the daily St. Joseph County Health Department news release, the county's rate of positive cases for coronavirus dropped to 6.9% Tuesday (Jan. 26), the first time in recent time the metrics moved from the red category.

The positivity rate has been as high as 14.3% earlier this month. The positivity rate is the number of positive cases in relation to the total people tested.

There currently are 1,544 active COVID-19 cases in the county, a number still in the red category for county back-to-school metrics but a number that slowly has been dropping since the county reported 2,247 active cases on Jan. 13.

The county also is averaging 96 cases per day based on a seven-day moving average, the second straight day it has been below 100 cases. The average still is in the red category for county metrics.