“LA County is reaching the terrible milestone of more than 11,000 deaths due to Covid-19,” said Los Angeles County DPH Director Dr. Barbara Ferrer, said in a statement while urging all residents to stay home and follow public health orders. “As a community, we must commit to stopping the spread of Covid-19 in its tracks so that we can save as many lives as possible.”
The pandemic devastated much of the state. On Tuesday, the state reported 368 new deaths from the coronavirus, pushing the number of lives lost in the state to 27,000 since the start of the pandemic. About 2.45 million are infected.
The increase in cases has put California at the center of the fight against the coronavirus.
The number of people hospitalized with the virus in the state reached a bad record with more than 22,000 people being treated on Tuesday, the state reported. About 21% of patients are in intensive care units.
In Southern California and the San Joaquin Valley, ICUs have reached capacity. Hoping to ease tensions so that patients can continue to care, the state has ordered hospitals with 10% or less ICU capacity in those regions to postpone non-essential and non-life-threatening surgeries.
“If we continue to see a disturbing increase in the admission of COVID-19 patients to hospitals across the country, some facilities may not provide the critical and necessary care that Californians need, or the COVID-19 patients or another. medical condition, “said dr. Tomás J. Aragón, director of the California Department of Public Health and Public Health Officer.
Despite the intensity of the fight against the virus, only 27% of the vaccines distributed made it into the arms of Californians.
“Everyone is scrambling to get as many vaccinations as possible, while every staff member is needed to help with the boom,” Ferrer said.
In Mendocino County, Northern California, a broken freezer that stored the Moderna vaccine forced officials at Adventist Health Ukiah Valley Medical Center to administer all 830 doses within two hours.
“The reality is that we were faced with a difficult situation, and that we would not let any vaccine go to waste,” Hospital Judge Howson Howe told CNN.
But vaccines are only part of the solution to the coronavirus crisis in California, Ferrer said.
“While vaccines are a powerful tool, we do not have to wait for vaccines to stop new COVID-19 cases, hospitalizations and deaths. We can do it now,” Ferrer said in a statement. “It takes every business and every resident to purposefully follow public health regulations and safety measures. Please stay home and leave only for essential work or essential services.”
CNN’s Sarah Moon, Stella Chan and Cheri Mossburg contributed to this report.