With one day left to go, July had already amounted to California’s worst month of the COVID-19 pandemic in terms of cases and deaths, and by Friday evening, the state had officially passed 500,000 total cases.
But, as the month comes to a close, there were signs that the spread of the virus had begun to slow.
The average number of new cases was at its lowest level in 11 days Thursday, with about 8,852 per day over the past week, while the rolling seven-day average test-positivity rate had fallen to 7% for the first time since July 1. There was a drop off in new cases Thursday, 7,357 from the day before and also the past three Thursdays (average: 9,803), according to data compiled by this news organization.
But there were also 107 new deaths reported around California, the 15th day this month with more than 100 deaths from COVID-19, according to the data. Prior to July, there had been six days that California reported 100 or more deaths since the start of the pandemic.
In total, there were 3,139 deaths recorded in California from July 1-31 – more than a thousand more than any month before it.
The increase in deaths has been spread all over California, though parts of the state have been hit harder than others.
Los Angeles County, home to 25% of the state’s population, continued to account for the largest share of COVID-19 deaths in July, with about 40%, or 1,150 deaths, though the county only saw a 13% increase in the death toll from 1,018 deaths in June. In the five California counties between LA and the US-Mexico border, there were 400 more deaths in July than the previous month (945 vs. 538). And in the Bay Area, the monthly death toll rose from 136 in June to 227 in July — a 66% increase.
Meanwhile, in the San Joaquin Valley, where cases per capita are rising at the fastest rate in the state, the number of deaths from COVID-19 more than tripled to 399 in July, from 118 in June.
Infectious disease experts told this news organization that Californians should be prepared to see at least another month of significant death totals, as that number catches up to the plateau in cases. The deaths this week “represents the spread of the infection around four weeks ago,” said Dr. John Swartzberg, with the UC Berkeley-UCSF Joint Medical Program.
There were also more new cases reported in July (254,606) than the entirety of the pandemic before this month (238,041), though the growth appears to have leveled off as the month’s end nears. There were about 5,000 fewer cases in the past week (61,961) than the previous one (66,651) — a decrease of about 7%.
The rate of positive tests, which hovered between 7.5% and 8% for most of the month, was at its lowest level Thursday since July 1, when it was at 6.9%. The World Health Organization recommends areas record a positivity rate of 5% or lower before loosening lockdown restrictions.
The state also continued to significantly ramp up testing in July, but it is still well short of the Harvard Global Health Institute’s recommended testing levels. Labs around the state processed more than 3.5 million over the course of the month, up 58% from the 2.2 million tests in June. Over the past week, the state has reported an average of about 122,000 tests per day — 100,000 shy of the Harvard scientists’ target of 222,000 for mitigation of the virus through a testing and tracing strategy; to suppress the virus using that tactic, they call for 825,000 tests per day.
The test positivity rate continues to vary widely across the state, creeping toward 20% in the hardest-hit Central Valley counties, while in the Bay Area, many counties remained below statewide levels and some even south of the WHO recommendation. In San Francisco, the positivity rate is now at 4.2%, and is even lower in Santa Clara County — 3.9%. But it ranged as high as 12.2% in Marin and 10.7% in Solano counties, as of Thursday.
Contra Costa County reported the most fatalities in the region Thursday with seven, followed by three in Santa Clara and Marin counties, and one apiece in San Francisco and Alameda. The 34 Bay Area deaths since July 29 make it the deadliest two-day stretch in the area since the pandemic began.
The 107 deaths Thursday pushed California past 9,000 total fatalities since the beginning of the pandemic. Earlier this week, the death toll in the U.S. crossed 150,000, more than any other country in the world.
While the U.S. reported more cases of COVID-19 in July than any previous month— about 1.8 million of its 4.5 million total — New York’s peak in April remains the largest contributor to the nation’s death toll. Now, however, the virus is much more widespread across the country, and deaths are once again on the rise nationally.
The U.S. seven-day average crept back up above 1,000 deaths per day this week for the first time since May, and it was reporting fatalities at a rate 57% higher than two weeks ago, with an average 1,164 Americans dying each day over the past week.
California’s COVID-19 progression, by the numbers*
July 1-31: 3,139 deaths | 262,878 cases
June 1-30: 1,945 deaths | 123,012 cases
May 1-31: 2,088 deaths | 62,877 cases
April 1-30: 1,917 deaths | 42,306 cases
Pre-April: 214 deaths | 9,846 cases
*cases and deaths reflect date they were reported
Source: Bay Area News Group tracking of county health department databases
