From Silicon Valley to Fresno, hospital intensive care units began reaching capacity Tuesday as California continued to set new records for coronavirus cases that officials fear will get worse in the coming days.
The high transmission rates come after weeks of warnings that hospitals could be overwhelmed as serious coronavirus cases spike to unprecedented levels. Officials warn the ICUs that filled up could be just the beginning.
The situation elsewhere in the state was somewhat better but still critical. Capacity remained at about 10% in Southern California, 24% in the Bay Area, 19% in the Sacramento region but less than 6% in the Central Valley.
Meanwhile, the state hit grim new milestones. California surpassed 20,000 deaths and Los Angeles County surpassed 8,000 deaths. California reported 35,400 new coronavirus cases on Tuesday, according to a Times county-by-county tally, and more than 219 deaths — both records for a single day. The latest tally means an average of 135 Californians have died each day over the past week — a number not seen since August — and nearly 25,000 people tested positive for the virus daily, a figure more than twice as bad as the peak of the summer surge.
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