Coronavirus

Coronavirus update, Dec. 6: Stanislaus County sees huge spike in infections

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Latest facts on COVID-19 testing in Modesto area

Hours after it was announced Stanislaus County would face another lockdown, health officials late Saturday afternoon reported a staggering 489 more coronavirus cases and three more deaths.

In addition, the state reported a single-day infection rate Friday of 21.05%, which puts the county’s 14-day rolling rate at 13.6%. It was the fourth time since Nov. 24 the county’s single-day rate was above 20%, according to the state dashboard.

The three deaths bring to 439 the number of residents who have died in Stanislaus County hospitals since March, according to the county dashboard.

The 14-day rate is relatively high compared to recent months, but is lower than the surrounding counties of San Joaquin (13.8%), Tuolumne (20.1%), Merced (16.8%) and Mariposa (17.6%).

Hospital patient numbers grew slightly Saturday to 210, up from 205. The number of available adult intensive care unit bets in the county’s five facilities are at seven.

The county Health Services Agency said 23,763 people have tested positive, 236,610 tested negative and 20,830 are presumed recovered.

The state’s stay-at-home order was implemented to the state’s five designated regions where intensive-care unit capacity fell below 15%.

In the San Joaquin Valley, which includes Stanislaus County, the ICU capacity in hospitals was 8.6% as of Sunday morning. The Sacramento area was at 21.4%, Northern California was at 24.1%, the Bay Area was at 21.7% and Southern California was at 12,.5%, according to the California Department of Public Health.

California COVID map 1101
California COVID map 1101

The demographic breakdowns of the positive tests as of Saturday:

  • 54% are female
  • 46% male
  • 8% are 14 years or younger
  • 16% are ages 15 to 24
  • 20% are 25 to 34,
  • 18% are 35 to 44,
  • 15% are 45 to 54
  • 12% are 55 to 64
  • 6% are 65 to 74
  • 3% are 75 to 84,
  • 2% are 85 or older.
  • Though they make up 47 percent of the population, Latinos represented 64 percent of the positive cases.

Geographically:

  • Modesto has 8,512 positive cases
  • Turlock has 3,231
  • Ceres has 2,617
  • Patterson has 1,188
  • Riverbank has 1,072
  • Oakdale has 619
  • Newman has 468
  • Waterford has 293
  • Hughson has 228
  • Supervisorial District 5 has 1,309
  • District 3 has 1,223
  • District 2 has 1,017
  • District 1 has 525
  • District 4 has 153

In other nearby counties:

As of Sunday morning, there were 1,340,424 confirmed cases in California and 19,883 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University. There were 14,590,894 U.S. cases and 281,196 deaths.

Area residents discuss need, impacts of lockdown

Stanislaus County residents talk about the need and devastating impacts of Gavin Newsom’s COVID lockdown after ICU bed availability falls to less than 15%.

How to help Stanislaus businesses survive holidays

Modesto and Stanislaus County restaurants and retailers suggest best ways to help them survive new COVID-19 pandemic stay-at-home lockdown order.

Modesto holiday parade as bright as ever

The annual Celebration of Lights parade took place on Saturday in Modesto. Because of the coronavirus pandemic, the parade was a drive-thru.

What order means for business, other activities

As the San Joaquin Valley steams toward another shutdown due to the COVID-19 surge in Stanislaus County and the region, business and community members are bracing themselves for what comes next.

Murder suspect left prison early due to COVID-19

The Modesto man suspected in a fatal shooting on Monday should have been in prison but he’d been released six months early as a result of the state’s accelerated release program designed to slow the spread of COVID-19 within prisons, according to Sheriff Jeff Dirkse.

What Modesto neighborhood has highest rate of cases?

The Modesto ZIP code 95351 has the highest rate of coronavirus cases in Stanislaus County, showing how the pandemic affects low-income and Latino communities. One family tells a heartbreaking story.

Editorial: Stanislaus must pinpoint outbreaks

People in neighboring Merced County find it helpful to know the exact name and location of recent COVID-19 outbreaks pinpointed at 30 specific businesses, care homes and schools. Stanislaus County does not offer this online help.

From around the state, nation and world

When children and teens are overwhelmed with anxiety, depression or thoughts of self-harm, they often wait days in emergency rooms because there aren’t enough psychiatric beds. The problem has only grown worse during the pandemic, reports from parents and professionals suggest.

Isolation Room 11” in the intensive care unit of Marshall Hospital in Placerville is one of several thousand acute care nodes that have emerged on the front lines of the effort to handle California’s growing COVID-19 crisis.

Coronavirus infections across the U.S. continue to rise as the country moves deeper into a holiday season when eagerly anticipated gatherings of family and friends could push the numbers even higher and overwhelm hospitals.

Follow More of Our Reporting on Coronavirus in California

Brian Clark
The Modesto Bee
Editor Brian Clark has worked at The Modesto Bee since 1990. He’s worked in various departments, including sports, news and on the digital side for a decade before being promoted to editor in 2018. He’s a native of Berkeley and a graduate of San Diego State University. Prior to The Bee, Brian worked at the Turlock Journal and Las Vegas Review-Journal.
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