California crosses 14,000 deaths, 750,000 cases, but they’re coming in smaller numbers

Even as California’s COVID-19 death toll climbed over 14,000 and its case count crossed 750,000, counties around the state continued to report fewer of each by the passing week.

With 3,569 new cases and 99 new fatalities from the virus Thursday, according to data compiled by this news organization, California crossed two milestones in one day. And yet the seven-day average for each continued to fall, with the 3,600 average daily cases over the past week the fewest since June 20 and the 85 average daily deaths the fewest since July 9.

In the past two weeks, the average number of daily cases has fallen 36%, daily deaths have fallen 32%, and the test-positivity rate has fallen more than two percentage points to 3.6%.

However, the number of tests has dropped off in the past two days, likely due to closures from the holiday weekend and poor air quality. The California Department of Public Health did not provide a reason for the decline in tests — an average of 60,000 the past two days, compared to normally over 100,000 — in time for publication.

The number of hospital patients fell to 3,288, the fewest active hospitalizations since June 14 and below half of its peak. The state had previously hit a low Sunday before adding a net of 46 patients between Monday and Tuesday, but its total fell by 66 patients, a 2% drop, on Wednesday alone.

The decline in hospitalizations began at the end of July and has persisted apace since, falling by nearly 25% in the past two weeks, according to this news organization’s analysis.

In the Bay Area, hospitalizations have fallen about 18% in the past two weeks and about 33% from their peak about six weeks ago. But even at its peak, the Bay Area never came close to other parts of California. Its peak per-capita hospitalization rate — about one in every 10,000 — was less than half that of the high in Los Angeles County and almost one-third of the San Joaquin Valley.

California’s worst percapita outbreak remains in the San Joaquin Valley, with about 14 active hospitalizations for every 100,000 residents and a case rate nearly double the Bay Area and Los Angeles. But it too had drastically decreased its cases and hospitalizations in the past month.

Less separates the three regions now than at their peaks, but there is one stark outlier.