LA County reports 33 COVID-19-related deaths over 3 days

Superintendents want LA County to change COVID close contact masking policy

A group of 24 Los Angeles County superintendents want the county's masking policy for close contacts with COVID-19 to align with the rest of the state.

LOS ANGELES - Los Angeles County reported another 33 COVID-19- related deaths from a three-day period ending Monday, along with nearly 3,200 new cases in its latest data.

The county, which no longer reports COVID numbers on weekends, reported 13 deaths from Saturday, 11 from Sunday and nine for Monday. The new fatalities lifted the county's overall death toll from throughout the pandemic to 33,565.

Another 3,196 COVID infections were reported Monday -- 1,538 from Saturday, 967 from Sunday and 691 for Monday -- giving the county a cumulative total of 3,450,411. Case numbers for Sunday and Monday tend to be lower than expected due to delays in reporting from the weekend.

The infection numbers reported by the county are also believed to be low in general, due to the prevalence of at-home COVID tests, the results of which are generally not reported to health officials.

An updated number of COVID-positive patients in county hospitals was not immediately available. The most recent figures from the state showed 548 virus-positive patients as of Saturday, with 60 of them being treated in intensive care.

County officials have said about 43% of patients with COVID were actually hospitalized due to virus-related illness, while the rest were admitted for other reasons, with some only learning they were infected when they were tested upon admission.

The average daily rate of people testing positive for the virus was 4.1% as of Monday.