Fall surge: California cases rise as U. S. tops 10 million
The predicted fall surge in coronavirus infections is sweeping across the United States, topping 10 million total cases on Monday with almost a million Californians getting sick since the pandemic began. Infections also appear to be rising even in the comparatively composed Bay Area.
More than 237,000 of the 10 million infected Americans have died from COVID19 since the pandemic began. In California, the infection rate over the past two weeks went up 7.4% compared with the previous 14 days.
“This has to be concerning,” said Dr. George Rutherford, a UCSF epidemiologist. “California is starting to look like the rest of the country when things took off in midSeptember.”
In recent weeks and months, the Bay Area and
California have fared better than the rest of the country, which experienced a huge uptick in coronavirus cases leading up to the presidential election. With President Trump all but ignoring the crisis, the disease has been spreading almost unchecked throughout the country, according to health officials.
Since Nov. 1, almost 95,000 new cases have been recorded every day in the United States. That’s almost 20,000 more than the highest singleday total recorded during the summer surge. Daily infections have increased more than 60% in the past two weeks, said researchers at Johns Hopkins University.
Deaths nationwide have increased 18% over the past two weeks.
New coronavirus cases have also increased in California, albeit at a slower rate than the country as a whole. The state’s sevenday average for new cases has increased to 5,889, from 4,471 a week ago. That’s a 4.1% increase over the previous week, according to California health department officials.
In California, cases are rising fastest in Southern California, but all nine Bay Area counties had more cases in the past seven days than in the prior seven days.
Gov. Gavin Newsom said during a news conference Monday that there has also been a 28.6% increase in hospitalizations and a 27.3% increase in intensive care admissions in the state over the past two weeks.
He said the real measure, though, is the positivity rate, which is the proportion of people tested who actually have the virus. It was 3.7% over the past 14 days compared with 2.5% on Oct. 19.
“In the past threeplus weeks we've seen not just the number of infected people go up, but the positivity rate go up,” Newsom said, adding that the state still has plenty of available beds, ventilators and staff available to handle the influx. “Obviously, its sobering, these numbers.”
The Bay Area has averaged more than 700 cases per day since Thursday. That’s compared with 529 per day for the past two months. Santa Clara
County appears to have caught the brunt of the surge, recording 358 new COVID19 cases on Sunday, second to its record of 385 cases reported on July 15.
The case load in Santa Clara, the Bay Area county hit hardest early in the pandemic, is a warning sign for Northern California. The county’s number of COVID19 cases is up 8.8% over the past 14 days. There have been 42 deaths, a 10.8% increase over the previous 14 days. Hospitalizations in the county rose nearly 10% on Sunday alone.
“This surge in COVID19 cases is not what we want to see going into the fall and winter holiday season,” said Dr. Sara Cody, director of public health for Santa Clara County. “These trends serve as a stark reminder that COVID19 is all around us. Each and every one of us needs to redouble our efforts to keep our community safe.”
Rutherford said the sudden increase in the Bay Area may be an outgrowth of the national surge, with business travelers and vacationers spreading it around. Or it could just be what will happen whenever rules are relaxed.
“I could say the weather’s getting colder, but today’s the first day it’s been really cold,” said Rutherford, referring to the fact that winter temperatures tend to drive people indoors where the virus can spread more readily. “It may be partially this is some of the cost of reopening.”
In all, there have been 982,405 cases in California, including 18,005 deaths, since the pandemic began. In the Bay Area, there have been 125,192 cases, including at least 241 recorded on Monday. More than 1,842 Californians have died since the virus was first detected.
Newsom attributed the sharp increase in coronavirus cases to people letting their guard down, being haphazard about wearing masks and lightening up on the social distancing.
“You’ve got to be careful,” Newsom said. “You've got to protect yourself and your loved ones.”
The governor suggested that several rural counties, including Shasta, Mono, Alpine and Kings counties, could be moved to more stringent tier under California’s system, which allows counties with lower coronavirus rates to reopen sectors of their economy more quickly.
Increased vigilance is necessary, Newsom said, because “a vaccine will come, but it will not come soon enough.” He said widespread public inoculations are unlikely until “well into the next year.”