After a relative New Year’s lull in confirmed infections, California posted a new single-day record for coronavirus cases Monday, logging more than 74,000, according to a Times tally of local health jurisdictions.
That is 11% higher than the previous record, when 66,726 cases were registered Dec. 28. The state is now averaging about 37,000 cases a day over the last week, down from a high of about 45,000 in mid-December. But the situation is still far worse than the beginning of last month, when 14,000 cases a day were recorded.
California also posted its sixth-highest daily tally of COVID-19 deaths: 379. That helped pull up the average number of COVID-19 deaths over the last week to 353 a day, the highest number yet.
In Los Angeles County on Monday, an additional 79 coronavirus-related deaths were reported and an additional 10,851 infections. The county is now averaging 184 deaths a day over the last week — the equivalent of someone dying of COVID-19 every eight minutes — and about 13,500 cases a day, a count expected to grow because many testing sites were closed for the New Year’s holiday.
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