Merced County active coronavirus cases rise above 300, latest death reported
The number of active coronavirus infections in Merced County reached 308 cases on Monday.
Department of Health also reported a new death over the weekend, bringing the number of total COVID-19 related deaths to nine locally. According to Department of Public Health Division Manager and Public Information Officer Amalia Madrigal-Hernandez, the decedent was a man over the age of 65 with no underlying health conditions.
Since Friday, Merced County has added 97 new coronavirus cases (52 reported Sunday, 45 on Monday), bringing the total number of people infected since the beginning of the pandemic to 661.
A total of 344 people have recovered, and 65 have been hospitalized.
Elsewhere in the Valley:
Stanislaus County deaths due to the coronavirus remained at 35 on Monday morning. Positive tests reported since the beginning of the pandemic are at 1,599 with 1,144 recoveries, according to the county Health Services Agency. Another 22,111 residents have tested negative.
The daily hospitalized count of confirmed patients was 67, up from 59 the day before.
Fresno County reported 240 new cases of COVID-19 infections on Monday afternoon. The report also included one additional death, pushing the county to a total of 67 lives lost to the virus. To date, Fresno County’s cases have reached 3,485, representing about 7.7% of the more than 45,000 people who have been tested for exposure to the coronavirus.
Earlier Monday, 131 additional cases and two more deaths were confirmed in Tulare County, pushing the case count there to 3,177, including 113 deaths. The report was Tulare County’s first update since midday Friday,
In Madera County, health officials reported 20 new cases since Friday, bringing the total there to 334. Madera County also reported that a man in his 80s died Sunday, raising the death toll to five in the county.
Kings County had yet to update its coronavirus statistics as of 5 p.m. Monday. On Sunday evening, its totals stood at 2,104 cases and 16 deaths. Of those, almost 1,130 cases and one death were associated with state prisons in the county.
Hospitalizations in the Valley – Fresno, Kings, Madera, Merced and Tulare counties – reached a high-water mark to date of 189 confirmed COVID-19 patients last Thursday, according to the California Department of Public Health. By Sunday, that had subsided to 179 patients – more than six times as many patients as were hospitalized on April 1, in the early stages of the pandemic.
Of those in hospitals on Sunday, 41 were seriously ill patients being treated in intensive-care units.
This story was originally published June 22, 2020 at 5:02 PM.