COVID-19 cases continued to mount Thursday in Los Angeles County, but the public health director said the rate of infection increases is slowing and the testing-positivity rate is down, indicators that the surge is leveling off.
Long Beach, meanwhile, recorded three additional deaths over two days, for a total of 956 since the pandemic began. A total of 320 new cases were reported Wednesday, and 104 people are now hospitalized with the virus in the five hospitals that serve the city.
The county reported another 3,672 COVID-19 infections and 19 deaths on Thursday.
Public Health Director Barbara Ferrer said the county’s current rate of new cases is 21.1 per 100,000 residents, which is a drop from 24 per 100,000 last week. The case rate in Long Beach has not declined, however: On Thursday, it was 29 per 100,000 people, up from 23.5 one week ago.
The average daily rate of people testing positive for the virus in the county is 4.73%, down a full percentage point from last week. Long Beach’s positivity rate is almost double that, at 8.1%.
“What we’re seeing now is a much smaller increase in our cases over a couple of weeks, which is what we’re hoping for 10 days after implementing an effective public health measure,” Ferrer said.
Ferrer said that on Aug. 1, the county had seen a 22% week-over-week increase in new cases. The increase in the rest of the state was 57%, a sign Los Angeles County—which implemented a mandatory indoor mask-wearing mandate in mid-July—is now seeing slower transmission of the virus.
Ferrer said it was too early to say if the mask requirement is responsible for the county’s improvement, “but I know for sure it contributed.”
Vaccination efforts are also improving in the county, with more than 81,000 first doses administered in the week ending Aug. 1—the third week in a row the number has increased, after a long period of declines.
Among county residents aged 12 and over, 6.22 million have received at least one dose, and 5.45 million are fully vaccinated. Of the county’s overall 10.3 million residents—including more than a million who aren’t eligible for the shots—61% have received at least one dose of vaccine, and 53% are fully vaccinated.
Black residents aged 12 and up continue to have the lowest rate of vaccinations, at 47%, followed by Latino residents at 56%, White residents at 67% and Asians at 78%. Residents aged 12-15 have the lowest overall vaccination rate at 49%. Black residents aged 12-15 have a vaccination rate of just 26%.
As a result, Ferrer said, Black residents are experiencing the highest rate of new COVID infections, at 426 per 100,000 residents during the two-week period that ended July 24. That was a 500% increase from the two-week period ending June 26.
Ferrer again highlighted the danger of the virus to unvaccinated residents, noting that from May 1 to July 17, people who haven’t been vaccinated were nearly four times more likely to be infected with COVID than vaccinated residents. Of the 3,158 people who were hospitalized in the county during that time period, only 8% were fully vaccinated.
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