LA County confirms nine new cases of MIS-C in children
LOS ANGELES - Los Angeles County reported 4,860 new cases of COVID-19 and 193 additional deaths, and confirmed nine new cases of multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children.
The number of coronavirus patients in county hospitals was 4,607, with 28% pf those people in intensive care units.
The latest numbers brought the county's totals since the pandemic began to 1,143,422 cases and 17,955 fatalities, according to the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health.
The latest cases of MIS-C bring the total number of children infected in the county to 75, including one death. MIS-C is an inflammatory condition associated with COVID-19 and symptoms include fever that does not go away and inflamed body parts, including the heart, lungs, kidneys, brain, skin, eyes, or
gastrointestinal organs.
All 75 children with MIS-C in L.A. County were hospitalized and 44% were treated in the ICU. Of the 75, 32% were under the age of 5, 39% were between 5 and 11, and 29% were between 12 and 20. Latino children account for 76% of the reported cases, the department said.
The daily number of new infections and the hospitalization rate have been steadily falling for the last month, but officials are warning the public to exercise caution for Sunday's Super Bowl to avoid a repeat of last year's World Series and NBA Finals, when gatherings at bars, restaurants and private homes were blamed for fueling a spike in COVID-19 cases.
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"Despite seeing some decreases, we continue to experience widespread community transmission in our county,'' Public Health Director Barbara Ferrer
said. "The riskiest thing people can do tomorrow for Super Bowl Sunday, given
our high case counts, is gather with others that don't live with them to enjoy the game. Please don't attend or host parties that could turn Super Bowl Sunday into super-spreader Sunday. Instead, enjoy the game at home with those who live with you or connect virtually with friends and family online to prevent another surge in cases.''
Meanwhile, county officials reported slow but steady progress in COVID-19 vaccination efforts on Friday, but said less than 3% of the population has been fully vaccinated, and appointments for first doses will be difficult to come by next week.
At the five county-operated large-scale vaccination sites, a limited number of first doses will be administered on Monday, with the rest of the week's appointments reserved solely for people in need of their second dose of the medication, according to Dr. Paul Simon, chief science officer for the county health department.
Simon said while the issue applies solely the county's five mega-sites, residents may run into issues at other locations, as all providers deal with short supplies of vaccines.
"Unfortunately, the biggest issue we continue to face in our ability to vaccinate is the scarcity of supply and variability in the amount of vaccine we receive from week-to-week,'' Simon said. "This has been an issue across the country and it makes planning challenging.''
According to Simon, the most recent figures indicate that more than 1.05 million vaccine doses have been administered in the county to date, including slightly more than 104,000 second doses. That means 2.6% of the county's population of people aged 16 and older have been fully vaccinated so far. About 11% over the 16-and-over population has received at least one dose.
The slow progress of the vaccination program has led to some residents getting creative in finding ways to manipulate the appointment system to get access to the shots.
Some people who aren't yet eligible to get the vaccine have taken to lingering at vaccination sites on the slight chance there will be leftover doses at the end of the day that must be administered to avoid wasting them. Ferrer said this week there have been issues with people claiming to be caretakers of disabled children and showing up at vaccine sites with a generic, Xeroxed letter identifying them as such.
Simon outlined another way some people have tried to jump the line to get vaccines. According to Simon, people who received emails from the county about scheduling an appointment for a second dose of the vaccine have been
sharing the unique web link included in the emails with friends. Those people
"are then scheduling a first-dose appointment even though they are not
eligible to be vaccinated at this time.''
"It is important for people to understand that these actions are taking away vaccination access from high-risk people who are eligible for the vaccine right now,'' Simon said. "When we identify these appointments, they are being canceled. I want the public to be aware that persons who are not eligible and show up at one of our sites with one of these shared appointments will be turned away.''
He said he didn't have numbers on how many people have tried to jump the line in that fashion, but "it was happening enough so that we were noticing it very clearly.''
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"In some cases it was done very deliberately -- I think you could characterize it as cheating,'' he said. "And in other cases, I think people just, you know, weren't necessarily viewing it that way, they were just looking at every opportunity to get vaccinated.''
Simon said the county was trying to figure out a way to amend the computer system to prevent such appointments from being made.
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