Hospitalizations are rising more sharply than ever in the Bay Area and California, climbing to the highest point of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to this news organization’s analysis of state data. That same day, the greater Bay Area recorded its 2,000th death from COVID-19.
On Monday, California admitted more than 450 new patients suffering from COVID-19 — its most of any single day of the pandemic — and the active total swelled to 8,240, the most COVID-positive patients hospitalized at one time and 15% higher than the previous peak this summer, which the state surpassed just two days prior.
California’s active hospitalizations have doubled in the past two weeks, but its rate of new cases has slowed since Thanksgiving. The daily average on Monday was still near its highest point of the pandemic — over 14,000 infections per day in the past week, according to data compiled by this news organization — but has increased just 5% in the past week. Importantly, recent tallies don’t reflect the impact of holiday gatherings because of the virus’s incubation period of up to two weeks and the time for tests to be processed and reported.
In the Bay Area, there are 900 COVID-positive patients being treated in hospitals around the region for the first time of the pandemic, nearly double the total from two weeks ago and about 8% above its summertime peak. That’s just over 11 for every 100,000 residents of the region.
There are 291 patients hospitalized in Santa Clara County — nearly 15 for every 100,000 residents — more than anywhere else in the region and 90% higher than two weeks ago. In Alameda County, hospitalizations have soared by 111% in the past two weeks to 188, still about 12% shy of its summertime peak. San Francisco is also short of the height of its summer surge, but the active count has risen by 140% in the past two weeks.
On Tuesday, Mayor London Breed said the city would “have to take more restrictive action,” possibly as soon as midweek. She cited nearby Santa Clara County and its recently enacted mandatory quarantine as an example.
“And it pains me to say that,” Breed said. “… We’ve been worried for months, but now it’s real. Our dangerous winter has arrived.”
Further south, it’s no better off.
In Los Angeles County, officials reported their highest single-day total of the pandemic, with more than 7,500 new cases on Tuesday alone. The daily average rose sharply Monday to its highest point yet, roughly 4,900 new cases per day over the past week, a nearly fourfold increase since the start of November.
Dr. Barbara Ferrer, the county’s health officer, called it “the worst day thus far” but predicted even worse to come.
“That will be tomorrow, and the next day and the next as cases, hospitalizations and deaths increase,” she said. “Every resident and every business needs to take immediate action if we are to dampen this alarming surge. We are in the middle of an accelerating surge in a pandemic of huge magnitude.”
In some of the largest Southern California counties, the per-capita rate of hospitalizations is double, or in some cases, triple that of the Bay Area. In LA County, there are close to 24 patients hospitalized for every 100,000 residents; in Riverside County, the rate is just over 24; and in San Bernardino, the rate is among the highest in the state, with more than 38 active hospitalizations for every 100,000 residents.
Nationally, the number of patients currently hospitalized with COVID-19 climbed over 98,000 Monday, according to the COVID Tracking Project. That’s about 30 in every 100,000 Americans, more than any other point of the pandemic and 65% higher than the previous peak this summer. In California, the per-capita hospitalization rate — about 23/100K — is less than half that of the hardest-hit states, such as South Dakota, Nevada and Indiana, where the rates are above 50/100K.
Tuesday amounted to California’s deadliest day in six weeks, with 112 new victims of the virus reported around the state.
The majority of the new deaths Tuesday were concentrated in the state’s two most populous counties, with 45 in Los Angeles and 22 in San Diego. But the nine total in the Bay Area on Tuesday were enough to push the region’s cumulative death toll over 2,000, or about one in every 4,000 people here.
Santa Clara County led the region with six deaths, followed by two in Alameda County and one in Santa Cruz County. Alameda County has recorded the largest portion of the fatalities in the region, with 514, followed by 482 in Santa Clara County, the only two Bay Area locales in the top 10 statewide.
In California, the cumulative death toll rose to 19,325, with an average of about 64 per day over the past week, about 53% more than two weeks ago.
The U.S. on Tuesday recorded among its deadliest day of the pandemic, according to the New York Times. More than 2,600 Americans were added to the national death toll, which climbed over 270,000. There were only four days in the spring on which the country recorded more victims of the virus, according to the Times’ data.
At least 13.7 million Americans have been infected with COVID-19, according to the Times, with an average of about 160,000 per day over the past week, slightly below the peak reached prior to Thanksgiving. In total, at least one in every 24 Americans has caught the virus since it was first detected in February, and about one in every 1,200 people in the U.S. has perished from it.
