California Coronavirus Update: Governor Gavin Newsom Warns COVID Could Impact Labor Day, Halloween And The Holidays

Tom Tapp
·3 min read

California Gov. Gavin Newsom held a coronavirus press conference Monday and highlighted some good news. He also issued a warning about the state’s future with respect to COVID-19.

Newsom announced a total of 5,719 new coronavirus cases in the state for a total of 514,901 confirmed cases since the pandemic began. That’s a much lower daily number than some of the record-setting totals seen last week.

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“The overall trend…is showing a decrease from where we were over a week ago,” said Newsom. “But one week does not make the kind of trend that gives us confidence to generate headlines. We are looking forward to that and need to see another few weeks of this kind of data to come in to feel more confident about where we are as a state.”

The rate of positive tests over the last 14 days is 7.0 percent. That’s down from 7.4 about two weeks ago.

On Monday, there were 6,383 coronavirus patients in hospitals. That’s down from more than 8,800 on July 21. Likewise ICU beds; the number now occupied by COVID-19 patients has fallen below 2,000.

“The good news is we do feel confident about our critical care capacity,” pointed out the governor.

Newsom announced 32 new deaths, resulting in a total of 9,388 people lost to the pandemic. “Thirty-two is a lower number than in the past…[but] we’re likely to see those numbers remain stubbornly high over the next few days and weeks.”

“These are just a few days” worth of results, warned the governor.

“We’ve seen some stabilization in most parts of the state,” said Newsom. “At the same time, we can quickly find ourselves back to where we were just a few weeks ago, a month ago, with significant increases if we do not maintain our vigilance.”

“This virus is not going away,” he warned. “It’s not just going to take Labor Day off. It’s not going to take Halloween off. Or the holidays off.”

“Until we have quality therapeutics, until we have a vaccine, we are going to be living with this virus,” predicted Newsom.

“We anticipate the second wave in the fall,” he said. “And that second wave also challenged by…flu season on top of COVID-19.”

Watch Newsom’s new conference below.

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