COVID hospitalizations in Fresno, Valley rise at fastest pace of the pandemic to date
More than 415 people in Fresno County were hospitalized with confirmed or suspected cases of COVID-19 this week – a figure that’s about 27% higher than it was a week earlier, and more than five times the number of patients just a month ago.
The figures represent inpatient coronavirus cases at hospitals throughout Fresno County as of Monday, according to the California Department of Public Health. They include 398 patients for whom a COVID-19 diagnosis has been confirmed through laboratory testing, as well as 18 additional patients whose symptoms are consistent with the respiratory disease but for whom test results are pending.
Also included in the totals are 75 patients who are sick enough to require treatment in intensive-care units in the county’s hospitals.
A week earlier, Fresno County hospitals were caring for 314 confirmed patients and 14 suspected coronavirus patients. A month ago, on July 23, there were 57 confirmed patients and 10 patients with suspected cases of COVID-19, including 12 in ICU beds.
Patient loads have also risen dramatically across the broader central San Joaquin Valley – Fresno, Kings, Madera, Mariposa, Merced and Tulare counties. Over the six-county region, 718 people were hospitalized for COVID-19, including 680 confirmed cases and 38 suspected cases. Of 121 patients in ICUs across the Valley, all but one were confirmed cases.
This week is the first time Valley coronavirus cases in hospitals exceeded 700 since earlier February.
Monday’s Valleywide figures were almost 25% higher than a week earlier, and 4.2 times the number of inpatient cases from a month ago, when 84 patients were hospitalized with confirmed or suspected COVID-19 cases.
The number of coronavirus cases being treated in hospitals remains well below peaks from December and January, when the Valley was in the throes of a winter surge of new cases, hospitalizations and deaths.
At the zenith of that surge, hospitals were handing as many as 684 patients in Fresno County and more than 1,100 in the six-county area.
But the accelerated pace at which hospitalizations have increased over the past month have eclipsed those set during that winter peak in Fresno and the Valley.
The mounting burden on hospitals in central California comes as vaccination rates in Valley counties continues to lag the statewide average, at the same time that the highly contagious delta variant of coronavirus spreads in the region, California and the U.S.
This story was originally published August 24, 2021 at 1:59 PM.
