The number of coronavirus patients at Orange County hospitals has increased by seven to 175, according to the latest state numbers released Saturday.
Of those patients, 28 were being treated in intensive care, a decrease of one from the previous day’s total.
Local health officials say COVID positivity rates and hospitalizations showed signs of creeping upward again this week. According to the Orange County Health Care Agency, the county’s test positivity rate ticked up from 5% to 5.1%, with the statistic going from 4% to 4.7% in the health equity quartile, which measures the communities hardest hit by the pandemic.
The daily case rate per 100,000 increased from 4.8 to 5.3 on a seven-day average with a seven-day lag, and inched up from 4.9 to 5 in the adjusted daily case rate per 100,000 on a seven-day average with a seven-day lag.
The OCHCA logged 1,602 cases for the week, increasing the cumulative case count to 677,236 since the pandemic began. The OCHCA also logged six more fatalities, boosting the cumulative death toll to 7,561.
Of those hospitalized, 68% are incompletely vaccinated or unvaccinated and 68.4% of the COVID-19 patients in intensive care units are incompletely vaccinated or unvaccinated, the agency said.
The positivity rate for those fully vaccinated with a booster went from 6.8 on Nov. 6 to 7.8 on Nov. 13, according to the latest data available. For those vaccinated with no booster, the rate went from 3.2 to 3.6. For those not vaccinated the rate went from 5.1 to 7.6.