State’s deaths continue to plummet

Fewest fatalities in a week since the end of May; average daily deaths have fallen 57% in 2 weeks

Daily deaths from COVID-19 in California continued to plummet Tuesday as many other statewide metrics held steady, according to data compiled by this news organization.

Counties around California reported 65 new fatalities from the virus, sinking the daily average further to about 56 deaths per day over the past week. The 394 total deaths reported over the past seven days were the fewest in the span of a week since the end of May.

California is also one of just a handful of states where there are fewer new cases now than there were two weeks ago, albeit not by much.

The Golden State has been stuck in a plateau between 3,000 and 3,600 cases per day for about a month. On Tuesday, counties around the state reported another 4,345 cases of COVID-19 — the highest single- day total in three weeks — which increased the daily average slightly to about 3,340 cases per day over the past week.

Some counties that didn’t issue updates over the three-day weekend reported multiple days of results Tuesday. The numbers here reflect when cases and deaths were reported, not when they occurred.

Locally for Lake County, at press time Wednesday, the county’s health department data showed 639 total cases, 46 of which were active and 579 recovered. In addition, the county posted its 14th overall death, according to Health Officer Gary Pace’s latest social media report, the latest person to pass away was not a part of a nursing home outbreak, was over 65 years old, was in the hospital at the time of death and had chronic medical conditions.

The two worst active outbreaks in the state, per capita, are in Shasta and Sonoma counties.

California’s average daily death toll has sunk 33% in two weeks, while in the Bay Area it has remained about flat.

In Shasta County, home to the city of Redding and about 180,000 residents, there were more cases reported Tuesday than all but six other California counties. Of the 1,502 total cases reported over the course of the pandemic, more than onethird have come in the past eight days. Its daily average of about 50 cases per day is nearly double that of San Francisco, despite a sliver of the population.

With about 191 cases for every 100,000 residents in the past week, even the per- capita rate of cases in Shasta County was nearly double the next- closest jurisdiction, Sonoma County, where the daily average of cases reached its highest point in more than a month.

In Sonoma County, the daily average climbed Tuesday to about 80 cases per day, or about 112 per 100,000 in the past week. While every other county in the Bay Area has decreased its case count, cases in Sonoma County has soared 57% in the past two weeks. After the latest update from Dr. Mark Ghaly on Tuesday, Sonoma County remained as the lone jurisdiction in the Bay Area under the most restrictive state health orders.

A lameda and Santa Clara counties advanced into the orange tier, where they joined San Francisco as the only large and densely populated counties in the state to earn the less restrictive reopening classification.

Just two of the 65 fatalities reported Tuesday came in the Bay Area, while t hree sepa rat e counties each reported more than a dozen.

Fresno led all counties with 18 deaths reported Tuesday, followed by 17 in Los Angeles and 14 in San Diego. Santa Clara and Contra Costa counties accounted for the two deaths reported in the Bay Area.

California’s average daily death toll has sunk 33% in two weeks, while in the Bay Area it has remained about flat.

Overall, the Bay Area accounts for about 10% of the 16,654 total virus fatalities in the state, despite making up about 20% of its population. But the region accounts for a larger share of the statewide deaths in the past two weeks: about 17%.

There was little change in the statewide positivity rate, which fell below 3% on Sept. 20 and has held steady at about 2.6% for the past two weeks.

After hospitalizations hit their lowest point since April 1 over the weekend, they increased slightly Monday to 2,226 active patients — still fewer than any day but the first two days of April. (CDPH began tracking hospital data on April 1.)

Nationally, new cases are coming at their highest rate since mid- August as the cumulative total was closing in on 8 million, according to Johns Hopkins University. On Monday, the national average crept over 50,000 cases per day for the first time since mid-August, after it fell as low as 35,000 per day in mid-September.

T he U. S. death toll crossed 215,000, according to Johns Hopkins.

More Americans have been infected with COVID-19 and died from the virus than the citizens of any other country in the world.