According to a new tweet from the country, one person dies every eight minutes at Covid-19 in Los Angeles.
More than 11,000 Los Angeles County residents have died from the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic. More than 5,000 of the deaths have occurred in the past two months, according to data from the LA Department of Public Health.
“People who otherwise led healthy, productive lives are now moving on because of a chance encounter with the COVID-19 virus,” Barbara Ferrer, director of health in LA, said Wednesday, adding that the province is increasing every day see 200 deaths.
Business has increased by 941% since November 1 and so far the rate of new business in January, according to Ferrer, is double what it was in December. Over the past two months, the positivity rate in LA County has risen from 3.8% to 21.8%.
Hospitalizations are ten times higher than on November 1, and Christina Ghaly, director of health services, warns that another surge is expected within the next two weeks. There are currently more than 8,000 people in the hospital, with 20% in intensive care units and 19% on ventilators.
Los Angeles County hospitals are still working in emergencies, but given the overwhelming demand, it could go into crisis care mode. Should this happen, patients could be transferred to other areas and all hospitals would have to stop elective surgery.