The novel coronavirus is spreading faster in Los Angeles County, with the rate of new cases expected to increase in the coming weeks, officials said Wednesday.
The county’s projected COVID-19 transmission rate has crept past 1 to 1.05, new modeling from L.A. County Health Services shows.
A rate of 1 means that an individual with COVID-19 infects an average of one other person. With a rate of more than 1, new cases would be expected to increase.
Estimated transmission jumped past 1 three weeks ago before again dipping below. Officials estimate that 1 in 650 residents are currently infected with the virus. Last week, that estimate was 1 in 950.
Likewise, the daily tally of new cases has been on the rise, though that could be because of a counting backlog. The number dropped in recent days to below 1,000 before jumping back up to 1,349 new infections on Wednesday.
“It is more likely that the number of cases will go up than they will go down,” Dr. Christina Ghaly, health services director, said at a news briefing Wednesday.
Statewide, the number of new cases was 4,383 on Tuesday — the highest since Sept. 25, when 4,122 cases were recorded, according to an analysis of data from the Los Angeles Times’ daily coronavirus tracker. Those trends could also be affected by delays in counting.
A summer-long surge after Memorial Day was followed by a significant decline. Recently, there have been slight upticks in some parts of the state.
Shasta County, which recently regressed to a lower tier on the state’s reopening matrix, recorded 254 cases Tuesday. Similarly, Riverside County recorded 729 cases, and is in danger of moving back a tier.
California’s daily case count is still much lower than during the summer, when tens of thousands of new infections were reported on many days.
Statewide, the seven-day average for positive coronavirus cases is 3.4% — a significant drop from previous months. But in this pandemic, progress has sometimes been fleeting.
As more counties move to a less restrictive tier, allowing more businesses to reopen, people may become more active and cause a resurgence.
“There’s no reason to think there’s not ongoing transmission,” said Dr. George Rutherford, an epidemiologist and infectious disease expert at UC San Francisco.
California has fared well in recent weeks compared with other states that are inching closer to a new coronavirus wave, due in large part to reopenings at college campuses.
The state has recorded its lowest hospitalization count in six months, though a spike is forecast for the next few weeks.
Hospitalizations are considered a lagging indicator, since it takes time for people to become seriously ill after being infected.
Times staff writer Iris Lee contributed to this report.
