Coronavirus updates: California senior living facility reports second large outbreak
A skilled nursing facility in Northern California is facing its second coronavirus outbreak in three months, local health officials said this week.
Alderson Convalescent Hospital in Woodland reports 26 residents and five employees with active COVID-19 cases as of a Wednesday update to its website. The state-licensed facility has 140 beds.
Alderson “mitigated” its first outbreak in early July, Yolo County officials said in a Wednesday afternoon news release, which had given lower counts of 14 residents and four staff members testing positive this month.
In the summer outbreak, 17 residents and 10 staff members contracted the highly contagious respiratory disease. Three infected residents died.
There have been no deaths among the 18 new cases that Yolo officials confirmed, the county said Wednesday. Residents and staff will be tested weekly for the duration of the active outbreak.
Yolo, a county of roughly 220,000 people adjacent to Sacramento County, has reported just over 3,000 lab-confirmed COVID-19 cases and 56 deaths from the virus since the start of the pandemic. Nearly half the death toll, 27 of those fatalities, were at long-term senior living facilities — even though these facilities account for just 6% of the county’s infections at 179 total residents and staff. Seventeen of the deaths were connected to a spring outbreak at Stollwood Convalescent Hospital. Stollwood, another skilled nursing facility in Woodland, 85closed permanently at the end of September.
Yolo County’s COVID-19 numbers in long-term care facilities, sometimes referred to as congregate care settings, compared to the rest of its general population have trended slightly higher than statewide rates for months, proportionately. But Yolo’s situation is a tragic example that senior care homes have been, and continue to be, devastated by COVID-19 in California.
California’s licensed skilled nursing and assisted living facilities, the latter of which provide a lower level of medical care than nursing homes, as of Wednesday had combined for at least 5,500 resident deaths among about 31,400 cases, according to the California Department of Public Health and Department of Social Services. That’s about 33% of California’s overall COVID-19 death toll of 16,757, despite making up only 3.7% of the state’s 858,000 confirmed cases.
At most points throughout the pandemic, long-term senior living facilities have accounted for between 30% and 40% of California’s overall virus death toll, a haunting reminder of the danger COVID-19 poses to the state’s oldest, most vulnerable residents.
Fewer than 2,400 of the 31,400 senior living cases were considered active as of Wednesday, according to CDPH and Social Services. But the recent spike in cases at Alderson serves as another reminder: multiple outbreaks, spaced out by weeks or months, can happen at a single facility.
California’s COVID-19 numbers still mostly trending down
Though there have been outbreaks and case spikes in some regions within the state, California as a whole has fared much better in the past few weeks of the pandemic than it did over the summer.
Rates of new COVID-19 infections, concurrent hospitalizations, intensive care unit totals and the percentage of lab tests returning positive all remain about one-third of what each metric reached in late July.
Case increase has been on a plateau for close to a month, with daily new infections averaging between about 3,200 and 3,400 since Sept. 17, according to CDPH data.
The state averaged 61 deaths a day in the two weeks leading up to Wednesday, after that rolling 14-day average had been as high as 142 in mid-August.
August was California’s deadliest month of the pandemic, according to CDPH, with about 3,800 succumbing to COVID-19. Fewer than 2,900 reportedly died in September, state data show.
$4.7 million in COVID-19 rental assistance for Sacramento
Low-income renters in Sacramento can receive up to $4,000 in assistance, paid directly to landlords. The rental assistance comes from $4.7 million in federal funding allocated by the Sacramento City Council.
Those who apply must be renters in the city or in unincorporated parts of Sacramento County, with gross household incomes at or below 50% of the area’s median income.
More information about the process, and the latest median income figures, can be found here.
Latest in Sacramento area: Over 35,000 total infections, 597 dead
Sacramento, El Dorado, Placer, Yolo, Sutter and Yuba counties have combined for over 35,000 lab-confirmed COVID-19 cases and at least 597 fatalities over the course of the pandemic.
Sacramento County surpassed 24,000 total cases Wednesday morning, according to county health officials. The county added 119 new cases Tuesday, 91 Wednesday and then just 42 Thursday for an all-time total of 24,102, with 464 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 75 patients in Sacramento County hospitals with confirmed cases of COVID-19, including 15 in intensive care units, according to state data updated Thursday morning.
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 3,010 infections and 56 deaths, last updated Wednesday afternoon. The county added 12 new cases Monday, 19 on Tuesday and 24 on Wednesday.
County officials noted Wednesday the recently confirmed outbreak at Alderson, which accounts for 18 newly added cases.
Yolo had only one hospitalized case, in an ICU, according to state data updated Thursday morning, down from three in hospital beds Wednesday.
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 1,263 cases, reporting 20 total from the weekend through Monday and just two more on each of Tuesday and Wednesday.
El Dorado had no hospitalized patients as of Thursday’s state data update. One patient was in the ICU a day earlier.
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 Wednesday afternoon. Sutter reported no daily new cases for just the second time since early June. Three people are hospitalized in Sutter with none in the ICU, the county says.
Yuba County officials have reported 1,243 infections and 10 deaths from the disease through Wednesday. Five Yuba patients are hospitalized, down by one from Tuesday, 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.
World numbers: Death toll approaches 1.1 million
Close to 38.6 million people have tested positive for COVID-9 worldwide, and over 1,093,000 of them have died, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.
The United States leads the world in each total, at over 7.9 million cases and nearly 217,000 coronavirus fatalities as of Wednesday morning.
India’s infection total is rapidly rising, up to 7.3 million. Brazil is next at 5.1 million, followed by Russia at over 1.3 million. No other country has reported more than 1 million COVID-19 cases, though Spain, Colombia and Argentina have each had more than 900,000.
Brazil is second to the U.S. by death toll, at nearly 152,000. Next are India at 111,000, Mexico at 85,000, the United Kingdom at 43,000 and Italy at 36,000. Peru, Spain and France each have reported just over 33,000 COVID-19 deaths. Iran is approaching 30,000 dead, Colombia recently surpassed 28,000 and Argentina is closing in on 25,000. More than 23,000 have died in Russia.
This story was originally published October 15, 2020 at 8:26 AM.
