The state Department of Public Health said Friday that more than 47,000 new confirmed cases have been reported, bringing the total to more than 2.29 million.
Hospitals in the state ended the year on the brink of a ‘disaster’, a health official said as the pandemic drove deaths and illnesses to staggering levels, and some medical centers scrambled to provide oxygen for critically ill patients.
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Gavin Newsom’s government office announced Friday that California will begin working with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to evaluate and upgrade outdated oxygen delivery systems at six Los Angeles hospitals.
The collaboration comes as older hospitals maintain oxygen pressure in the aging infrastructure, and some have struggled to locate additional oxygen tanks for discharged patients to take home.
California became the third state to exceed 25,000 COVID-19 deaths since the onset of the pandemic this week.
Southern California’s ICU bed capacity remains at 0%.
“In ICU, we no longer have capacity. We create spaces from nowhere,” said Olena Svetlov, MSN, RN at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center.
The rest of the state is not doing much better. The San Joaquin Valley also has 0% ICU availability. The Bay Area is down to 6% and Sacramento at 11%.
Los Angeles County reported more than 20,000 new cases and more than 200 deaths on Friday.
LA County officials reported death every ten minutes and begged people on social media to stay home and stay safe.
But many ignored these pleas on New Year’s Eve, with a number of public gatherings in Southern California.
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On Friday, the sheriff’s department of the LA province announced their task force “super-spreader” and last night made 90 arrests in five separate locations.
Actor Kirk Cameron once again hosted a maskless gathering on Thursday, with groups of people seen on the beach at Point Mugu for a faith-based event.
It was a similar scene in Valencia, where hundreds in the new year packed a parking lot to ring. Few people who attended the outdoor concert, hosted by Christian activist Sean Feucht, in the Higher Vision Church wore masks or were physically removed.
Car enthusiasts gathered in Pasadena for their annual New Year’s Eve Rose Parade, although the world-famous show has been canceled.
“It’s hard not to make the connection between the holidays and the rise we see shortly thereafter,” Shane Reichardt told the Riverside County Office of Emergency Management Department.
Meanwhile, the number of confirmed U.S. coronavirus cases on Friday exceeded 20 million, according to Johns Hopkins University data.
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This is almost twice as much as the country 2, India, and almost a quarter of the more than 83 million businesses worldwide.
According to data held by Johns Hopkins University, the U.S. still outperformed other countries in COVID-19 cases, reaching 20 million at the start of the new year.
COVID-19 deaths have also increased in the country and now amount to more than 346,000.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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