Pandemic Hits 3rd Wave: LA County Residents Urged To Stay Home

LOS ANGELES, CA — Actions need to happen now to help stop the alarming third wave of rising hospitalizations and coronavirus cases hitting Los Angeles County, health officials said Thursday.

LA health officials reported 44 coronavirus-related deaths on Thursday, lifting the cumulative total to 7,782 who have died from the virus in the county. Of those 44 deaths, 17 people were over the age of 80.

LA County also reported another 7,854 cases, lifting the cumulative total to 421,881. There are 2,572 people hospitalized as of Thursday.

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Dr. Muntu Davis responded to the alarming spike, urging people to follow public health guidance to wear a face mask, wash your hands, limit any interaction with people outside your household, and stay home.

"While the county has taken measures within its abilities, this is a health crisis that requires everyone to take and adhere to the personal actions that prevent you from getting or spreading the virus, and those who have, to continue taking those personal actions," Davis said.

Taking personal action now could stop the virus from spreading further, he added.

"I can't emphasize this enough: Everyone must take personal steps to prevent themselves from getting and spreading this virus to others," Davis said. "Actions need to be taken now, and on a daily basis."

As the daily cases reported remain high, so does the risk for infections rising in the community, he said.

"And with the disease of transmission silently occurring during the presymptomatic and asymptomatic stages of COVID-19 infection, accounting for an estimated 50% or more of transmissions, multiple strategies must be implanted to reduce the conditions for disease transmission and lower community transmission, case rates, hospitalizations," Davis said.

The higher the new daily case rates reported, the higher chances are that you may encounter someone unknowingly with COVID-19, he added. It's important to stick with what works right now to protect people you know and people you might not know: stay home, wear a mask, avoid socializing in-person with people outside your household.

"The best protection right now is to stay at home, wash your hands frequently, wear a face covering and maintain physical distance if you have to go outside," Davis said. "We're not asking you to live in fear. We're asking you to take the precautions needed to prevent the continued spread of this virus."

"If more of us take these steps, we stand a very good chance of seeing transmission rates decline," he said.

Dr. Christina Ghaly reported Thursday on the number of hospitalizations for hospitals receiving 911 calls across the county.

"The hospital capacity numbers is really not a static concept," Ghaly said.

On Wednesday about 963 beds were available in LA County hospitals. By Thursday it was 1,119 beds, she said. Intensive care units reported Wednesday about 120 available beds, she said. And Thursday reported 140 ICU beds were open.

“And that’s despite the fact that obviously there’s the increase in hospitalizations that Dr. Davis just spoke to," Ghaly said. "And I think it hopefully reinforces the idea that hospitals can create capacity for additional COVID patients when they need to. However, that’s not an unlimited ability.”

Health officials want people to stay home as much as possible to help flatten the curve and support health care workers battling the virus.

“We very much do want people to abide by all of the public health guidance and stay at home as much as possible so that we can reduce transmission within the communities and start to flatten that curve of what we still see which is a rapidly increasing rate of hospitalizations, which if it does continue, could risk overwhelming the health care system and in particular the ICU capacity among the hospitals of Los Angeles County,” Ghaly said.

- City News Service and Patch Editor Nicole Charky contributed to this report.

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