The COVID-19 pandemic showed no signs of slowing down in Santa Barbara County on Saturday, as public health officials reported an additional 612 positive cases and three new deaths.
The three residents who died were part of the age group of more than 70 years and none of the victims were associated with outbreaks at congregated facilities in the county, according to COVID-19 data board of the Department of Public Health County of Santa Barbara. Two individuals had underlying health conditions and lived in Santa Maria, and one individual came from the Santa Barbara / unincorporated area of Mission Canyon.
So far, 24,149 positive cases have been reported in the county since its first local case in March, the Department of Public Health said.
Since April, 231 COVID-19-related deaths have been reported across the county. Santa Barbara County reported her first COVID-19 death on April 1.
So far in January alone, more than 70 county residents have died from COVID-19.
There were 89 staffed adult ICU beds and 53.9% of COVID-19 patients occupied, according to the county’s online data board.
UCI availability in the Southern California multi-county region remained 0% on Saturday. The adjusted availability of ICUs in Santa Barbara County stood at 1.3%. The California home stay order is activated when ICU availability drops by 15% in a region.
Of the new cases on Saturday, Santa Maria had 192, Santa Bàrbara registered 113, Lompoc registered 51, the Montecito-Summerland-Carpinteria area reported 34, Orcutt made 36, Goleta counted- ne 32 and the unincorporated area of the Goleta and Gaviota Valley recorded 27. There were 24 in the Santa Ynez Valley, 23 in the unincorporated areas of North County and seven in Isla Vista. Seventy-three were pending geographic location.
There were 196 confirmed patients with COVID-19 treated at local hospitals, an increase from 192 the previous day. Of these, 48 residents were in intensive care units, four fewer than the day before.
According to the Department of Public Health, there are 2,811 cases still considered infectious in Santa Barbara County.
A total of 371,873 COVID-19 tests have been administered in Santa Barbara County, according to Saturday’s daily status report. There were more than 3,990 COVID-19 tests reported Saturday in the county.
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– Noozhawk staff writer Brooke Holland can be contacted . (You need JavaScript enabled to view this email address). Follow Noozhawk on Twitter: @noozhawk, @NoozhawkNews i @NoozhawkBiz. Connect with Noozhawk on Facebook.