COVID death toll rises this week in Fresno, Valley. How many lives have been lost?
More than two dozen fatalities from COVID-19 have been reported so far this week by county health officials across the central San Joaquin Valley – more deaths in a week than any point since April with Friday and Saturday yet to come.
The Tulare County Department of Public Health posted 10 deaths on Wednesday and two more on Thursday to account for nearly half of the 26 fatalities acknowledged in the region so far this week.
No deaths were reported in Fresno, Kings, Madera, Mariposa, Merced and Tulare counties on Sunday or Monday. In addition to the 12 this week in Tulare County, updates for other Valley counties included:
- Fresno County: two deaths on Wednesday, 1,761 to date since March 2020.
- Kings County: one death on Tuesday, three on Thursday, 262 to date.
- Madera County: one death on Tuesday, 250 to date.
- Mariposa County: no deaths this week, 10 to date.
- Merced County: three deaths on Tuesday, two on Wednesday and two on Thursday, 506 to date.
Across the six-county region, 67 deaths have been reported in August through Thursday. With several days remaining before September arrives, that is the most fatalities blamed on the coronavirus since 73 deaths in May. Over 18 months of the pandemic, 3,656 lives have been lost to COVID-19 in the central San Joaquin Valley.
The increase in deaths in the Valley comes amid a continuing surge of new coronavirus infections over the past two months. The region has seen an average of almost 1,000 new cases each day this week through Thursday, including more than 400 per day on average in Fresno County.
The death rate from COVID-19 in this surge has generally not been risen as fast as cases and hospitalizations in the region. January 2021 was the deadliest month of the pandemic in the Valley, with 426 fatalities attributed to coronavirus disease in Fresno County and 821 Valleywide.
