While California Governor Gavin Newsom did not hold a coronavirus press conference on Thursday, there was still plenty of news. The state reported a new bleak record: the number of daily deaths from the virus rose to 157. The previous high, 149, was observed on July 12.
That means the total number of COVID-related deaths in the state has now exceeded 8,000, with 8,027.
The state also saw 12,040 new massive COVID infections in the past 24 hours. That’s just below the record, set on Wednesday, Newsom, which was 12,807 new cases. Newsom said this total was “the highest in the nation.”
The state had 6,825 coronavirus patients in the hospital as of Thursday and 1,978 people infected in the ICU. Fortunately, those numbers were down 4.8 percent and 3.9 percent, respectively.
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Also Wednesday, California had the unwanted distinction of overtaking New York as the state with the most COVID-19 infections. California’s 413,576 confirmed cases of COVID-19 exceeded 408,886 seen in New York State as of Wednesday.
Of course, California is the most populous state in the U.S., with roughly twice as many residents as New York State, so those totals should be taken in the context of the states’ total populations. But it is revealing given that New York was previously the epicenter of the virus in the nation and, at one point, in the world.
According to a calculation by the Sacramento Bee, approximately 1 in 96 state residents has or has had the virus.
On Thursday, California had 425,616 confirmed cases of COVID-19. The number of COVID-19 diagnostic test results in California totaled 6,778,304, an increase of 113,306 tests in the past 24 hours. The positive result rate in the last 14 days is 7.6 percent.
The state’s largest county health director, Los Angeles, said Wednesday: “COVID-19 appears to be on track to claim more lives in Los Angeles county than any disease other than coronary heart disease.” The flu, he said, is not as deadly as COVID-19. In the first six months of 2020, COVID-19 killed twice as many people in the region as it did during the 8-month flu season this year and last.
