As San Diego county is removed from the state’s COVID-19 watch list, Orange County could be next, as the region continues to post improving metrics less than two months after being placed on the list.
The state had paused monitoring counties as a result of ongoing testing database glitches, but recently resumed the list after the issues and backlog were fixed.
San Diego county was removed from the watch list on Tuesday, a few days after the region’s case rate fell below the state threshold of 100 per 100,000 residents.
Orange County was placed on the state watch list on June 29, primarily as a result of increasing cases and hospitalizations.
In the month leading up to the state’s move to place the county on the monitoring list, there were 7,141 new cases reported to the county, which was nearly double the 3,671 cases reported in the month prior.
In the month ending Aug. 18, there were 15,201 new cases reported. That’s down 23% from the month ending July 18.
The county currently has a case rate of 106.4 per 100,000 residents, which is based on new cases over 14 days, with a three-day lag.
The county is also seeing improvements in two other metrics: hospitalizations and the positive testing rate.
The state tracks whether counties have seen a greater than 10% increase in the three-day average of hospitalized patients. Currently, OC’s average is down 4.8%.
Orange County currently has a 6.2% positive test rate, 1.8 basis points lower than the state’s threshold of 8%.
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