COVID hospitalizations are rising in the Fresno area, as doctors warn of Delta variant
The number of people being treated in hospitals for COVID-19 infections has been rising slowly over the past couple of weeks in Fresno County and across the central San Joaquin Valley.
On Tuesday, a total of 72 people were in Fresno County hospitals with confirmed or suspected coronavirus infections. That’s the largest number of patients since mid-May, and included 15 people sick enough to require treatment in intensive-care units.
Across Fresno, Kings, Madera, Merced and Tulare counties, hospitals were treating a total of 124 confirmed or suspected COVID-19 cases – the third day in less than a week there were more than 120 inpatient cases in the Valley, and the second highest date since mid-May.
The rise in hospitalizations, and an increase in the two-week average of daily patients in hospitals for coronavirus infections, coincides with growing concerns expressed by health officials over the effects of the Delta variant of COVID-19. The Delta variant, which was first identified last fall in India, has spread around the world and become the most common strain of COVID-19 in the U.S. and in California.
On Wednesday, county and state health departments reported 88 new confirmed cases of COVID-19 in Fresno County, along with five additional fatalities attributed to the virus. Since Sunday, 383 new cases have been identified in Fresno County. That’s the most cases in a week in the county since late April – with three days remaining in the week.
Since the first local cases in the global pandemic, more than 103,400 infections have been confirmed through testing in Fresno County, including 1,736 patients who have died.
The increase in hospitalizations is not confined to the Valley. The Los Angeles Times reported Wednesday that the number of people in hospitals for COVID infections statewide doubled over the past month and continues to accelerate.
The hospital figures are well below what they were in December and January, when the two-week daily average of confirmed soared to more than 600 patients in Fresno County and to as many as 1,040 Valleywide.
But the increase is enough to make prompt concern for Dr. Rais Vohra, Fresno County’s interim health officer.
“Our hospitals are telling us they’re seeing more COVID now,” Vohra said last week. “They’re seeing people that are partially vaccinated, or sometimes fully vaccinated, coming in with symptoms. Everyone’s feeling a little bit more of the COVID catching people that it wouldn’t ordinarily catch.”
As of late last week, the Delta variant represented about 30 of the new coronavirus cases identified in Fresno County in recent weeks. That’s about four times more than were known on July 1. But Vohra added that the actual number isn’t known because there is a two- to three-week lag in the results provided by the state Department of Public Health for genomic sequencing to determine whether a person with COVID-19 has the Delta variant or some other strain of the virus.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control estimates that the Delta variant now represents more than 83% of all new coronavirus infections in the nation over the past two weeks. That’s up from about 62% for the two-week period ending July 3. In April, the Delta strain accounted for less than 1% of new cases in the U.S.
Vohra and Dr. John Zweifler, a public health physician with the Fresno County Department of Public Health, both stressed the importance of vaccinations to prevent the likelihood of hospitalizations from COVID-19 in general and the Delta variant in particular. The vast majority of people being hospitalized now, they said, are those who have not gotten shots of the coronavirus vaccines that are available.
A higher percentage of people getting tested for coronavirus are also showing positive results for infection, Vohra added. “One explanation is that we have a variant that’s more contagious and is now being found in more and more people as it makes its way across the population,” he said.
On July 1, only 1.5% of coronavirus tests from Fresno County over the previous seven days were coming back positive for the virus, according to state data. The seven-day averages have been rising ever since, climbing to almost 4% as of early this week.
“As we slide up … that has some very grave implications for what we can expect with hospitalizations,” Vohra added.
This story was originally published July 21, 2021 at 10:28 AM.
