Pasadena Sees First COVID-19 Death in Nearly a Month

Pasadena health officials on Thursday reported the first COVID-19 fatality in nearly a month as nine new infections were detected.

The latest casualty died earlier this week, said city spokeswoman Lisa Derderian. She was a woman over 80 years old. The city’s last fatality was reported on Aug. 5.

“Many other family members of the decedent also got COVID-19 and we are trying to identify the source of the exposure and to see how this family became so adversely affected,” Derderian said.

Pasadena has seen a total of 2,411 novel coronavirus infections and 117 fatalities, according to city data. The city’s overall positivity rate was 9.3 percent. The average number of daily new infections detected over the previous seven days stood at 11.4.

Huntington Hospital reported treating 30 COVID-19 patients on Thursday. Nine tests were pending.

At the county level, 1,193 new infections and 61 additional deaths were reported Thursday by the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health.

The county had recorded a total of 244,999 COVID-19 cases and 5,932 deaths since the start of the pandemic.

The overall positivity rate in the county remained at 10 percent, with more than 2.3 million tests administered, L.A. County public health officials said in a written statement.

“There are 1,062 confirmed cases currently hospitalized and 30 percent of these people are confirmed cases in the ICU,” according to the statement.

As the county moves closer to reopening, county health officials reminded employers that it is vital and required to immediately report COVID-19 outbreaks in the workplace.

Employers or employees can report worksite outbreaks anonymously, as well as health protocol violations by businesses, by contacting the Environmental Health Customer Call Center at (888) 700-9995 on weekdays between 8 a.m.and 5 p.m., officials said.

“I want to thank all the workplaces who are following the county protocols for reopening that are in the Health Officer Order, as well as the workplaces that have diligently reported outbreaks and taken the necessary infection control steps to protect their workers,” said L.A. County Director of Public Health Barbara Ferrer.

“As Labor Day approaches, let’s all remember why we celebrate this holiday — and to take extra measures to protect the health and safety of all of our workers so we won’t see a repeat of the spike we saw in July after Independence Day,” she said. “Unless we all take actions that continue to minimize the risk of transmitting this virus to one another, we raise the risk that this horrible disease will surge again in the months ahead, and we all must do everything we can to avoid that.”

The California Department of Public Health announced 5,125 new infections and 164 additional deaths. A total of 717,177 COVID-19 cases have been identified in the state, and the death toll on Thursday stood at 13,327.

The state’s seven-day average positivity rate was 4.5 percent, and the 14-day rate fell to 5 percent, the agency said in a written statement.

As of Thursday, Angeles County accounted for 34 percent of the state’s infections and 45 percent of all reported fatalities in California.