The state reported 25 additional COVID-19 deaths Thursday as the number of people hospitalized with the disease continued to drop, according to the Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention.

There are 247 people hospitalized with COVID, 63 in critical care and 23 on ventilators, according to data posted Thursday. That’s two fewer hospitalizations than the previous day and 44 fewer than Monday.

Of those who died, 14 were men and 11 were women. 

Nine were in their 70s, seven were in their 80s or older, five were in their 50s, three in their 60s and one in their 20s. Deaths were reported in 11 of Maine’s 16 counties, with six in Penobscot, five in Androscoggin, three each in Kennebec and Oxford, two in Hancock and one each in Cumberland, York, Aroostook, Somerset, Lincoln and Piscataquis.

The state reported an additional 3,784 cases on Thursday as it continues to clear a backlog of thousands of cases. Dr. Nirav Shah, director of the Maine CDC, said Wednesday that it will take several more days for the state to catch up to all the reported positive cases driven by the omicron variant.

And even after the state is caught up, he said daily case counts will no longer be a reliable metric for the disease’s spread in the state.

“I don’t think this will resurrect the value of the daily case count,” he said.

That’s because more people are testing at home and not reporting the results to the state. Also, because omicron is a milder form of the disease, people may be infected and not know it, so they don’t even take a test, Shah said.

“All of these things mean that the case count just doesn’t tell us what’s going on,” he said.

Previously, the CDC said deaths, hospitalizations and wastewater test results will be the best way to track the disease moving forward.

Since the pandemic began in Maine, there have been 206,005 cases reported, with 151,336 confirmed and 54,669 listed as probable. Deaths stand at 1,883.