Orange County COVID-19 Cases, Hospitalization Rates Continue To Climb
SANTA ANA (CBSLA) — COVID-19 cases and hospitalization rates continued to climb in Orange County Tuesday, approaching similar numbers to the spike seen over summer.
Health officials Tuesday reported 790 new coronavirus cases as hospitalization rates zoomed up from 605 on Monday to 648 on Tuesday.
The number of patients in the intensive care unit also rose, moving up from 146 to 158.
The new numbers brought the county's caseload to 79,343 and the death toll remained unchanged at 1,577.
No new fatalities have been reported since Sunday though the county logged 26 coronavirus-related fatalities from Nov. 22 through Saturday.
The change in the three-day average of hospitalized patients went from 17% to 20.2%. The last time hospitalization rates were this high was the end of July, and the last time ICU rates were this high was around Aug. 10.
The county has 23% of its intensive care unit beds and 61% of its ventilators available.
The state's tiered monitoring system metrics were updated again Tuesday. The adjusted daily case rate per 100,000 rose from 18.7 on Monday to 22.2 on Tuesday, with the positivity rate going up from 7.6% to 8.8%.
As of Tuesday, all of the county's metrics fall within the state's most-restrictive purple tier.
"I don't think anyone is proud of their numbers," county CEO Frank Kim said. "Our ICU numbers haven't reached the peak we saw in the summer, but I'm certainly concerned" about the trend.
Orange County Supervisor Lisa Bartlett said, "There's plenty of space for ICU expansion and equipment like ventilators and (personal protective equipment), but there's a potential major shortage of hospital staffing" for ICU beds, which require a higher-degree of care skills and experience.
The county's hospitals, as they did this summer, will have to take on patients from other more stressed hospital systems in the state, Bartlett said.
(© Copyright 2020 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. City News Service contributed to this report.)