Orange County COVID data keeps sliding downward

Orange County’s COVID-19 positivity rates and hospitalizations declined since last week, according to data released Thursday by the Orange County Health Care Agency.

The county, which provides updates on Thursdays, reported that COVID hospitalizations went from 117 Oct. 13 to 116 on Wednesday, but the number of intensive care unit patients fell from 21 to 11.

The county has 26% of its ICU beds available. Officials grow concerned that percentage drops below 20%.

Of those hospitalized 68.5% are incompletely or unvaccinated and 69.2% are similarly situated in ICU.

The county logged 1,427 cases, increasing the cumulative case count to 672,033.

The county’s test positivity rate went from 6.6% last week to 5.9%, with the statistic going from 7.3% to 5% in the health equity quartile, which measures the communities hardest hit by the pandemic. The daily case rate per 100,000 dropped from 6.6 to 5.4 on seven-day average with a seven-day lag, and from 7 to 5.6 in the adjusted daily case rate per 100,000 on a seven-day average with a seven-day lag.

The county logged seven more COVID-related fatalities, boosting the cumulative death toll to 7,495. Five of the fatalities occurred this month, increasing the death toll for October to 12. Two of the fatalities occurred in September, increasing its death toll to 65.

The positivity rate for those fully vaccinated with a booster went from 6.9 on Oct. 9 to 5.1 on Oct. 16, according to the latest data available. For those vaccinated with no booster the rate went from 3.5 to 2.2. For those not vaccinated the rate went from 6.8 to 8.3.

The number of residents fully vaccinated went from 2,354,756 to 2,355,864. The number of residents who have received at least one dose is 211,816. The number of booster shots administered increased from 1,380,438 to 1,380,989.

The number of children up to 4 years old, who have received at least one dose is 14,760 with 7,216 fully vaccinated. Just 3.9% of the county’s population in the age group is fully vaccinated.

For 5- to 11-year-old children, 96,846 are fully vaccinated, about 36.6% of the age group. In the 12-to-17 age group, 69.8% are fully vaccinated.