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LA County reaches grim threshold with 7,000 deaths from COVID-19

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Los Angeles County reached the grim threshold of 7,000 COVID-19 deaths and surpassed 300,000 cases this week. The county’s public health director suggested that a dramatic uptick in average daily cases over the past month is likely due in part to gatherings of sports fans.

Dr. Barbara Ferrer said the county has seen a concerning increase in daily case reports, rising from an average of about 940 per day at the beginning of October to almost 1,200 per day over the previous week.

She said the spike “is not steep as what we saw in July, but this is a cause for concern.”

“This is a call to everyone—individuals and businesses—to understand the increases we’re discussing today are the results of decisions we collectively made two to three weeks ago,” Ferrer said. “And the actions we’re taking today will influence whether we’re able to continue our recovery journey, or we stall or even take steps backward. We do need to slow the transmission to allow for economic recovery.”

Ferrer again warned that gatherings of people from different households in close proximity are a major cause of disease spread. She has noted in recent weeks that younger residents are the primary drivers of new cases. And on Monday, she suggested that the recent start of college and pro football, the NBA playoffs and the Major League Baseball post-season may be playing a role in the daily case increases over the past month.

“We have all seen the pictures of sports fans rooting for their teams where they’re shouting in the middle of a large crowd, and almost no one is wearing a face covering. This is the perfect setting for transmitting the virus,” Ferrer said.

Asked to expand on the issue, Ferrer said gatherings of sports fans could be “contributing the most” to the recent case increases. Fans are still prevented in the county from attending sporting events in person, but many still flock to restaurants or other establishments to watch games on TV.

The case increases “do correspond with gatherings happening more frequently as people come together with non-household members to watch games,” Ferrer continued. “And it wasn’t just the Lakers or the Clippers. It’s not just basketball. We now have football games that are happening and of course we’ve had the Dodgers in post-season for quite a few weeks already. The downside of this is during a pandemic some of the things we’ve done in the past just don’t make sense.”

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