SACRAMENTO, Calif. (Reuters) – California surpassed New York on Tuesday as the U.S. state with the most coronavirus deaths, a grim reminder of the pandemic’s toll, even as vaccine rollout and a sharp drop in new cases were hoped that life eventually returned to normal.
More than 45,000 people were killed by COVID-19 in California late Tuesday, the most populous of the 50 states and one of the hardest hit in recent months. New York, which was badly hit by the early stages of a pandemic last spring, has lost 44,693 lives, according to a Reuters count. here
“This is a heartbreaking reminder that COVID-19 is a deadly virus, and we mourn every Californian who suffered the tragic loss of a loved one during this pandemic,” said Dr. Mark Ghaly, the Secretary of State for Health. milestone in an email to Reuters.
California, home to approximately 40 million people, emerged as a major US epicenter of the pandemic as an annual spate of infections and hospitalizations engulfed much of the country, pushing many health care systems to their limits.
Looking at the number of deaths per capita, California, with 113 deaths per 100,000 people, ranks 32nd in the nation in COVID-19 deaths. By comparison, New York, with 248 deaths per 100,000, is in second place after New Jersey, which has about 230 deaths from the coronavirus per 100,000 residents.
Nationally, the daily numbers of new cases and hospital admissions of COVID-19 have been steadily declining in recent weeks, while the number of deaths, a lagging indicator, has declined.
The United States as a whole reported 27.25 million infections and 468,559 deaths at the end of Tuesday. Just over 79,000 American patients were hospitalized on Tuesday with COVID-19, the lowest daily number since mid-November.
But in California, as in other states, the improvement masks a rise in illness, hospitalizations and deaths, which remain much higher than during the pandemic’s previous peak last summer.
The number of lost lives reported daily in the state has declined in recent weeks but remains “remarkably” high with an average of 500 deaths per day in the past 14 days, Governor Gavin told Newsom at a news conference.
“Deaths remain devastating,” Newsom said during the opening of a vaccination center at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara County near San Francisco.
Public health experts fear that rallies for Super Bowl celebrations on Sunday, as well as the arrival of new, highly contagious variants of the virus, could lead to another surge in cases before most Americans are vaccinated.
In an effort to accelerate the vaccination campaign anticipated to end the pandemic, President Joe Biden announced on Tuesday that his administration planned to increase the number of vaccine doses being shipped to the states starting Feb. 15.
Some of the expanded supply will be sent to community health centers in an effort to improve access to vaccines for the mostly poor and minority groups serving these centers, the White House said Tuesday.
Tuesday, about 33 million Americans had received at least one dose of the vaccine to fight the coronavirus, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported.
“This vaccine is the weapon that will win this war,” New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said at a news conference on Tuesday. Ten percent of New York State residents have received the vaccine, he said.
Reporting by Sharon Bernstein in Sacramento, California and Lisa Shumaker in Chicago; additional reporting by Anurag Maan and Roshan Abraham in Bengaluru; Edited by Jonathan Oatis, Robert Birsel