1,641 cases, 75 deaths in county; state to spend $1.8 billion

Tulare County Health and Human Services reported an increase of 38 COVID-19 cases in the county on Friday.

There have now been 1,641 COVID-19 cases in Tulare County. The department also reported one more death, bringing the total of deaths due to COVID-19 in Tulare County to 75.

The department reported the total number of COVID-19 cases in Porterville has reached 143. Its official tally for Lindsay is 113.

There have been 23 cases in Southwestern Tulare County while there are now three cases in foothill/mountain communities. There are 189 cases in Tulare, 335 cases in Dinuba, 11 cases in Strathmore, 67 cases in Farmersville, 22 cases in Exeter, 11 cases in Goshen, 19 cases in Ivanhoe, 11 cases in Traver, 13 cases in Woodlake, 11 cases in the Reedley area and 11 cases in Orange Cove. There are more than 600 cases in Visalia.

Twenty-eight cases have been reported as travelers, 807 are due to person-to-person contact and 806 are under investigation.

There are 125 cases ages 0-17, 203 ages 1825, 367 ages 26-40, 563 ages 41-64 and 383 ages 65 and older.

The department has reported there are 588 people in Tulare County who have tested positive for COVID-19 and have recovered. There are 1,026 people in Tulare County who are under self-quarantine and being monitored by public health officials.

As of 4:30 p.m. Friday, Sierra View Medical Center reported it had 33 confirmed COVID-19 cases, including 11 COVID-19 inpatients.

Sierra View is now reporting it has had 11 deaths due to COVID-19. The hospital also reported as of Thursday it has had 706 test conducted while 3,650 tests have been conducted at the Tulare County testing lab.

STATE TO SPEND ANOTHER $1.8 BILLION

Governor Gavin Newsom has taken another $1.8 billion from the state budget to pay for additional personal protective equipment and hospital beds.

Newsom said he expects the federal government to reimburse 75 percent of that spending. The new

spending. The new spending brings the state total to $5.7 billion to battle the COVID-19 pandemic since March.

Of the $1.8 billion, $1.3 billion will be used for personal protective equipment. There will be $445 million that will go to Chinese electric vehicle manufacturer BYD, which earlier was awarded a $1 billion contract with to deliver 200 million masks a month.

BYD had trouble fulfilling the contract and has refunded $247 million to the state.

The rest of the $1.8 billion will be used to continue to improve testing efforts, for 3,000 hospital beds and hotel rooms for healthcare workers who treat COVID-19 patients.