What is the COVID-19 pandemic’s toll on Fresno, Valley after two years? Here’s the data
The first confirmed COVID-19 patients in the central San Joaquin Valley — a pair of cruise-ship passengers in Madera and Fresno counties — surfaced two years ago, on March 6, 2020.
At the time, few public health officials in the central San Joaquin Valley could have predicted that in the intervening 24 months, nearly a half-million residents in the region — almost one out of four people — would contract the virus, or that what was then a little-understood virus would claim the lives of almost 5,600 people in the Valley.
The rate of new cases of COVID-19 in Fresno, Kings, Madera, Mariposa, Merced and Tulare counties attributed to the highly contagious omicron variant has plummeted in recent weeks from all-time weekly highs in January. But while new infections are fewer, that doesn’t mean they’re gone, and officials caution that yet another variant could spark an upswing in new infections in cases if people let down their guard.
County-by-county totals of confirmed COVID-19 infections, and fatalities attributed to the coronavirus, over the past two years in the Valley through Friday afternoon include:
- Fresno County: 227,154 cases, 2,640 deaths.
- Kings County: 51,130 cases, 430 deaths.
- Madera County: 35,899 cases, 361 deaths.
- Mariposa County: 2,971 cases, 26 deaths.
- Merced County: 71,043 cases, 795 deaths.
- Tulare County: 101,973 cases, 1,302 deaths.
Across the six-county region, at least 490,170 people have contracted the virus at some point over the past two years; of those, at least 5,554 people have died from COVID-19, according to reports from counties’ health departments.
In Fresno County, hospitals were providing inpatient care to 217 confirmed COVID-19 patients as of Thursday. Valleywide, there were 354 coronavirus patients being treated in hospitals.
Both figures are down by about almost two-thirds from the number of people hospitalized just a month ago.
The series of interactive charts below show the effects of COVID-19 on Fresno County and the Valley over the past two years, from cases and vaccination rates to hospitalizations and deaths.
