Coronavirus updates: California death rate slowing; outbreak at faith-healing school
As California continues with gradual, county-based economic reopening, the state’s coronavirus infection and hospitalization figures have remained steady at relatively low rates for the past few weeks, while deaths continue to decline.
The state is still averaging roughly 3,200 new lab-confirmed COVID-19 cases per day, and as of a Wednesday data update there were 2,239 patients hospitalized with the disease including 622 in intensive care units, according to the California Department of Public Health. Of all diagnostic COVID-19 tests processed in the past two weeks, only 2.6% have returned positive.
All four of those numbers are about one-third of what they were in the peak of California’s surge in coronavirus activity around the end of July. Decline was sharp over the course of August but has since slowed; most of the statewide numbers appear to have been stabilizing, or “plateauing,” as Gov. Gavin Newsom has recently said, since late September.
Deaths lagging a few weeks behind the other data indicators is to be expected due to the timeline for virus progression, and data show fatalities are still dropping without a plateau as of mid-October.
CDPH added just eight new deaths Monday and nine on Tuesday in daily data updates. It was the first time since late March that the state reported single-digit death tolls on back-to-back days.
Wednesday’s reported death toll of 58 was much higher, but still below California’s daily average daily fatality toll for the past two weeks, which has dropped to 61. That’s as low as the rolling 14-day average has been since July 5; it peaked at 142 in mid-August.
The state on Tuesday released its weekly update to counties’ COVID-19 risk tiers, which dictate what businesses and activities can reopen and how tight distancing and capacity modifications must be.
Ten of the state’s 58 counties got the go-ahead to move to a less restrictive tier, including six that moved from the strictest purple tier into the red.
Of the 41 counties that either didn’t move or were already in the least strict yellow tier and can’t promote any further, 39 did not meet the criteria for a better tier in this week’s update. Because counties need to meet the requirements for two straight weeks before promoting, that means only the two that did so this week — Butte and Napa counties in Northern California — are on track to potentially do so next week.
CDPH says a handful (Modoc, Riverside, Shasta and Trinity counties) are at risk of demotion. The rest of California’s counties are expected to stay put in their current tiers, barring a change to the statewide system.
State leaders and health officials are continuing to preach caution, adherence to social distancing and avoidance of gatherings as a pair of critical dates approach. Health and Human Services Secretary Dr. Mark Ghaly on Tuesday said California is strongly discouraging trick-or-treating this Halloween. And Election Day, less than three weeks away on Nov. 3, will bring its own unique set of challenges for in-person voters.
Over the course of the pandemic, more than 855,000 Californians have tested positive for COVID-19, and at least 16,639 have died from it, according to CDPH.
K-12 campuses can open in Sacramento County. When will they?
Tuesday marked two weeks since Sacramento County exited the purple tier and entered the red tier. Within the state reopening framework, that means districts can begin reopening campuses for in-person learning.
But there’s still contention, in some cases between district officials and teachers unions, with the latter urging county and district leaders to keep campuses closed until at least January due to the pandemic, giving more time for schools to safely prepare.
Sacramento City Unified, Natomas Unified and Twin Rivers teachers unions wrote a letter to those districts’ superintendents and to Sacramento County Superintendent of Schools Dave Gordon saying that allowing some schools to reopen before others “deepens inequality” in local K-12 education.
“Even if Sacramento County overall can maintain red tier status, our collective position is it is unsafe and inequitable to resume instruction via a hybrid or fully-in-person instructional model until these standards can be achieved in every zip code in the three school districts,” the unions wrote. “Our position from the beginning has been simple: California cannot physically open schools for in-person instruction unless it is safe.”
Educators, parents and school experts agree that at Sacramento City Unified in particular, vulnerable students are falling behind as COVID-19 and the transition to distance learning disproportionately impact low-income families. In some neighborhoods within the district, for instance, as many as one in four households don’t have high-speed internet subscriptions.
Another large school district in the county, Folsom Cordova Unified, last week approved a hybrid model that will have elementary students returning to campuses less than a month from now, on Nov. 9. Grades six through eight will return Nov. 30, and high school students will return Jan. 4. Students will split time between distance and on-campus learning, showing up to school in person between two and four days a week depending on grade level.
At Folsom Cordova, some teachers as well as school board President Chris Clark, who was the lone vote against the reopening, maintain that November is too soon to be reopening school campuses.
“My concern is getting the kids in when it’s safe,” Clark said during last week’s public board meeting streamed online. “I think about the holidays coming up and children who want to spend the holidays with their families – their grandmothers and grandfathers.”
Major outbreak at Shasta County faith-healing school
A large outbreak of coronavirus cases has been linked to Bethel School of Supernatural Ministry in Shasta County, which offers instruction in faith healing and raising the dead.
The school last week asked its entire student population of more than 1,600 people to quarantine, saying in a statement that 137 students and staff members recently tested positive for COVID-19.
Shasta County health officials said this week that there have been 274 total cases at the School of Supernatural Ministry, double last week’s total given by the school, the Redding Record Searchlight reported Tuesday. That amounts to about 17% of Shasta County’s entire reported infection total over the course of the entire seven-month pandemic, of nearly 1,600 cases through Tuesday. Even the 137 reported last week by Bethel represented more than 10% of the all-time total at that point.
Bethel Church in a statement last week said it had asked students to arrive early before classes started in early September to quarantine for two weeks, and that students were required to have a negative COVID-19 test result prior to attending school.
But the Record Searchlight reports that Bethel Church held a two-day, in-person church conference that brought 325 people together beginning Sept. 30.
Shasta health officials in a daily report said the county reported 95 new cases Monday — a staggering 6% increase to the county’s all-time case total in a single day. Those 95 new infections included 59 people in their 20s or 30s, as well as 11 teenagers.
County health officer Dr. Karen Ramstrom said during a Shasta County Board of Supervisors meeting last week that because the students live off-campus, there is concern about infection within the community, such as at restaurants.
Shasta County was demoted from the orange tier to the red tier last week, and neighboring Tehama County was downgraded from red to purple.
In each of the past two weeks’ tier updates, state data show Shasta as having the highest per capita infection total of any of the state’s 58 counties. Shasta had 12.8 daily new cases per 100,000 residents in last week’s update, which assessed COVID-19 data for Sept. 20-26, and it worsened to 17.6 this week, which looked at Sept. 27 through Oct. 3.
Demotion to the purple tier, which would close indoor operations at places of worship, gyms, restaurants and other businesses and activities, appears virtually certain for Shasta County next week. It would need to drop daily new cases per 100,000 residents below 7, one week after recording more than 2 1/2 times that many infections.
Latest in Sacramento area: Over 35,000 infected; nearing 600 fatalities
Sacramento, El Dorado, Placer, Yolo, Sutter and Yuba counties have combined for over 35,000 lab-confirmed COVID-19 cases and at least 595 fatalities as of Wednesday morning.
Sacramento County surpassed 24,000 total cases Wednesday morning, according to county health officials. The county added 119 new cases Tuesday and 91 Wednesday for an all-time total of 24,060, with 462 resident deaths from the virus in the past seven months.
The county has now confirmed 104 deaths occurring in September, and 10 through the first 10 days of October, though data is less complete for the current month. At least 179 Sacramento County residents died of COVID-19 in August.
There were 74 patients in Sacramento County hospitals with confirmed cases of COVID-19, including just 14 in intensive care units, according to state data updated Wednesday morning. Each are the lowest totals for the county since June.
The local health office now estimates 22,071 cases are “likely recovered,” meaning there are roughly 1,500 confirmed, active infections among county residents. That figure ranged between 3,000 and 3,600 during the summer peak; it had been below 250 prior to that, in early June.
Sacramento County remains in the red tier.
Yolo County has reported just 2,986 infections and 56 deaths, last updated Tuesday afternoon. The county 12 new cases Monday and 19 on Tuesday.
Yolo had three cases in hospital beds, including two in ICUs, according to state data updated Wednesday morning.
Yolo County also remains in the red tier.
Placer County has reported 3,845 total infections and 51 deaths, adding seven new cases Wednesday after reporting a four-day total of 88 for Saturday through Tuesday.
The county says on its local dashboard that it has nine patients in hospital beds being treated specifically for COVID-19, with one confirmed case in an ICU.
Placer improved to the orange tier on Tuesday.
El Dorado County health officials have reported a total of 1,261 cases, reporting 20 total from the weekend through Monday and just two more on Tuesday.
One patient is hospitalized in El Dorado County, in the ICU, according to state data.
El Dorado, which had been at risk of demotion, improved its metrics to retain orange-tier status this week.
Sutter County has reported 1,785 coronavirus infections and 12 deaths, according to data updated Tuesday evening to add three cases. Three people are hospitalized in Sutter with none in the ICU, the county says.
Yuba County officials have reported 1,239 infections and 10 deaths from the disease. Six Yuba patients are hospitalized, with none in ICUs, the county reports.
Both Sutter and Yuba, which share a bi-county health office, are now in the red tier together.
216,000 dead in US as global death toll nears 1.1 million
More than 38.2 million people have tested positive for COVID-9 worldwide, and over 1,088,000 of them have died, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.
The United States leads the world in each total, at 7.8 million cases and just over 216,000 coronavirus fatalities as of Wednesday morning.
India’s infection total is rapidly rising, up to 7.2 million. Brazil is next at 5.1 million, followed by Russia at just over 1.3 million. No other country has reported more than 1 million COVID-19 cases.
Brazil is second to the U.S. by death toll, at about 151,000. Next are India at 110,000, Mexico at over 84,000, the United Kingdom at 43,000 and Italy at 36,000. Peru, Spain and France each have reported close to 33,000 coronavirus deaths. Iran is approaching 30,000 dead, Colombia recently surpassed 28,000 and Argentina is closing in on 25,000. At least 23,000 have died in Russia.
This story was originally published October 14, 2020 at 8:39 AM.
