SD County reports 277 new COVID-19 cases, five deaths Thursday

SAN DIEGO (CNS) - San Diego County public health officials reported 277 new COVID-19 cases and five deaths from the illness, raising the region's totals to 37,499 cases and 673 deaths Thursday, Aug. 27.

Three women and two men died between July 28 and Aug. 26, ranging in age from the early 40s to the early 90s.

Of the 5,235 tests reported Thursday, 5% returned positive, raising the 14-day rolling average of positive tests to 3.7%, well below the state's 8% guideline. The seven-day average number of tests performed in the county is 6,946.

Locally, 42 cases have been reported in Bonsall, 72 in Pala, and 424 in Fallbrook. Pala and Fallbrook added one new case since the day before.

Of the total positive cases in the county, 3,040 -- or 8.1% -- have required hospitalization since the pandemic began, and 738 -- or 2% -- were admitted to an intensive care unit.

The case rate for the county remains under the state's 100 cases per 100,000 population, at 80.6 per 100,000, which means that schools are still on track to be able to open as soon as Sept. 1.

County health officials reported three new community outbreaks on Thursday, bringing the number of outbreaks in the past week to 20. Two outbreaks were reported in businesses and the third was in a restaurant.

The number of community outbreaks remains well above the county's goal of fewer than seven in a seven-day span. A community setting outbreak is defined as three or more COVID-19 cases in a setting and in people of different households in the past 14 days.

The county will be placed back on the state's monitoring list should it be flagged for exceeding any one of six metrics for three consecutive days. Those metrics are the case rate, percentage of positive tests, average number of tests a county is able to perform daily, changes in the number of hospitalized patients and percentage of ventilators and intensive care beds available.

County officials announced Wednesday that they would expand free testing for school staff throughout the region.