Coronavirus update: Positivity rate in Fresno County at 18%; how fast can we vaccinate?

The coronavirus pandemic is pushing 100 million cases, globally.

Of those, more than a quarter have been reported in the United States, according to the Center for Systems Science and Engineering at Johns Hopkins University. As of Monday morning, the United States had 25,128,825 positive COVID-19 cases and 419,263 related deaths.

California leads the nation in cases. Statewide, there have been more than 3 million positive cases, with 37,121 death, according to the data from Johns Hopkins.

On Sunday, Fresno County topped 85,000 cases and now ranks eighth in the state for most positive cases, just above Sacramento, but well below Los Angeles County, which has reported more than 1 million cases.

Fresno County has now reported 85,274 positive cases and 1,043 deaths. The county is averaging more than 90 new cases each day per 100,000 people with a positivity rate of 18.3% for the week. That is down from more than 19% earlier this month, but still much higher than the 7% needed to move out of the state’s purple tier.

Stay-at-home order lifted

At that, California state health officials on Monday lifted shelter-in-place orders that were placed on Fresno and the San Joaquin Valley in December.

The news first came out late Sunday when the California Restaurant Association says it was informed of the impending announcement.

The regional order was aimed at stemming the spread of the novel coronavirus and the resulting increase in the number of cases and a dramatic increase in COVID-19 patients in hospitals. On Saturday Fresno County was reporting 559 COVID-19 hospitalizations and nine available ICU beds.

Vaccine continues its slow rollout across the state

This comes as the rollout of vaccines continues across the state.

At the current rate of vaccination (about 122,000 doses per day), it will take nearly the rest of the year to vaccinate just half of California’s residents against COVID-19. About 80% of the population, or about 32 million people must have resistance to COVID-19 to achieve herd immunity, experts say.

That resistance can be obtained either through vaccination or prior infection.

On Monday, Fresno County will begin vaccinating agricultural workers.

The county’s department of public health hopes to vaccinate 3,000 indoor and outdoor food and AG workers over the next week. Employees at Pappas Family Farm will get the first round of vaccinations, which the county hopes will streamline procedures as it prepares for the mass vaccinations in other sectors of the workforce.

Statistics for other Valley counties

Here are statistics for the rest of the central San Joaquin Valley from the California Department of Public Health.

Tulare County has now reported 42,661 positive cases and 531 related deaths, including 30 deaths over the last week.

Merced County has seen 24,787 positive cases and 324 deaths. Twnety-eight deaths were reported in the last seven days.

Kings County has 19,904 positive cases and 160 deaths. Of those, 27 were reported last week.

Madera County has reported 13,858 cases and 151 deaths since the pandemic began. Last week it reported 21 new deaths.

Mariposa County has had 323 positive cases and just four deaths. The county hasn’t reported a new death since early December.

This story was originally published January 25, 2021 at 9:51 AM.