Fresno region passes 20,000 coronavirus cases. Fresno County changes reporting method
The central San Joaquin Valley passed 20,000 positive cases of the coronavirus on Monday, including more than 300 deaths.
Fresno County no longer updates its count daily, switching this week to Tuesday and Friday. So the most recent report from Saturday of 8,282 cases and 88 deaths did not change Monday. The case total is the highest among the six counties in the central San Joaquin Valley region.
Of Fresno County cases, 1,871 have recovered.
The reporting changed so health officials can stay on top of the numbers, which are coming in higher amounts than in the early days of the pandemic, according to Rais Vohra, the Fresno County interim heath officer.
“Our numbers are at a point where they just need more time to make sure the data being published on the dashboard is high quality,” he said.
Newsom orders closures
Two weeks after Gov. Gavin Newsom ordered the closure of restaurants and bars within Fresno County, on Monday he added a new list of businesses that will be re-shuttered in an effort to stop the fast-spreading coronavirus outbreak.
That includes shopping malls, gyms, nail salons and churches doing indoor services.
Newsom announced the latest orders during a news conference Monday, saying the state trend lines became “points of concern.” COVID-19 cases have continued to spike in California, with more than 329,000 infections and more than 7,000 dead.
The number of positive COVID-19 tests compared to the total number of tests has risen to about 7.7 percent during the past seven days.
The new restrictions apply to the growing list of counties that are being monitored by the state. There are now 30 counties on the list, representing 80% of the state population. Five of the six counties in the central San Joaquin Valley — Fresno, Kings, Madera, Merced and Tulare — are monitored. Mariposa County, which has seen just 33 cases of the coronavirus, is not.
Other Valley counties
Merced County passed the 2,000 mark on Monday after adding 198 cases. That’s a total of 2,082 through Monday. No new coronavirus-related deaths were reported Monday, leaving the county’s total at 12.
Tulare County, which does not update on weekends and holidays, added 264 positive cases to the running total of 5,942 on Monday. There was no change to the 152 deaths.
Madera County officials said that due to the new CalCONNECT system and how information is collected, the county will be reporting for the previous day(s). It had been giving daily updates.
Monday, Madera County reported 70 new cases from the weekend bringing the total number of confirmed COVID-19 cases to 963; 484 are active including 12 hospitalized. Madera County reported one new coronavirus-related death bringing its total to nine.
Kings County added 54 cases to reach 3,024 on Monday. The county reported an additional death, which came from a state prison in either Avenal or Corcoran, to reach 40 total. Twenty-two of the deaths have been in skilled nursing facilities.
Mariposa County reported two additional cases (one each on Sunday and Monday) to reach 33 total after not reporting any changes through Friday of last week. One person in that county has died from coronavirus-related illness.
More than 135,000 people nationally have died, according to The COVID Tracking Project and Johns Hopkins University CSSE. More than 3.3 million have tested positive across the country.
This story was originally published July 13, 2020 at 4:19 PM.
