The rate at which coronavirus tests are coming back positive has fallen in the last week in Los Angeles County but is expected to rise further in Orange County. But in Orange County, the test positivity rate was 8.3%, the same as it was a day before, said Dr. Regina Chinsio-Kwong, Orange County deputy health officer, on Tuesday. Officials in Orange County expressed continued concern about the trajectory of COVID-19 hospitalizations in California’s third most populous county. Still, the recent number is far below the peak of the winter surge, when 2,259 people were hospitalized in Orange County’s hospitals. In general, the hospitals in southern Orange County can get crowded as there’s a relative scarcity of hospitals in that area, and hospitals near the county border in northern Orange County are sometimes crowded with patients coming in from L.A. County.

Source: Los Angeles Times August 11, 2021 16:07 UTC