COVID-19 Cases Increasing Among Persons Experiencing Homelessness

LOS ANGELES, July 30 – The Los Angeles County Department of Public Health (Public Health) has confirmed 5 new deaths and 3,606 new cases of COVID-19. Of the new deaths reported today, one person who died was between the ages of 65 and 79, one person who died was between the ages of 50 and 64, and one person who died was between the ages of 30 and 49 years old. Two deaths were reported by the city of Long Beach.

To date, Public Health identified 1,297,032 positive cases of COVID-19 across all areas of L.A. County and a total of 24,676 deaths. There are 991 people with COVID-19 currently hospitalized and 20% of these people are in the ICU. Testing results are available for over 7,307,000 individuals with 16% of people testing positive. Today’s daily test positivity rate is 6.3%.

In parallel with the overall trend in L.A. County, the number of COVID-19 cases among people experiencing homelessness has increased significantly over the past few weeks. This week (for the period July 19-25), there were 111 new cases reported among people experiencing homelessness, an increase of 21% compared to last week, which had 92 reported cases of COVID-19. To date, 7,588 people experiencing homelessness in Los Angeles County tested positive for COVID-19 and 216 people who were experiencing homelessness passed away from COVID-19. Of the people experiencing homelessness who passed away, 99 were sheltered, 71 were unsheltered, and for 46 people who passed away, their shelter status was unknown.

There are 1,066 providers administering vaccinations to people experiencing homelessness; together they have administered over 45,950 doses of COVID-19 vaccine to people experiencing homelessness across Los Angeles County. Of the vaccinated people experiencing homelessness, 20,188 are fully vaccinated.

The County continues to work closely with partner organizations to vaccinate and protect people experiencing homelessness from COVID-19 infection. Coordination of vaccination work continues across sectors that might have some overlap with PEH, including faith-based organizations, DPH’s mobile teams targeting high morbidity areas, transportation hubs, etc. Approximately 129 events have been scheduled for this week through various partners, including Housing for Health (HFH). These events will take place at a variety of venues including food banks, shelters, public libraries, clinics, and others.

“I send my heartfelt condolences to everyone mourning the loss of a loved one to COVID-19,” said Barbara Ferrer, PhD, MPH, MEd, Director of Public Health. “Given the high rate of community transmission in our county, our vaccination efforts remain critically important to reducing the impact of rising infection on our residents, including people experiencing homelessness who are particularly vulnerable to COVID-19. If you already had COVID-19 and recovered, you should still get vaccinated. There are severe health risks associated with COVID and reinfection is possible, particularly from variants of the virus. And if you haven’t received your second shot of a two-dose vaccine, you aren’t getting maximum protection against COVID-19. All of the emerging data on the Delta variant indicates that the vaccines do not provide significant protection unless you have received both doses, so please go get your second dose this weekend.”

As of July 25th, nearly 11 million doses have been administered to residents 12 years and older, including more than 6 million first doses and nearly 4.9 million second doses. More than 6.1 million L.A. County residents have received one dose, and nearly 5.4 million are fully vaccinated. 90% of County residents 65 years and over have been vaccinated, 71% of residents 16 years and over, and 70% of residents 12 years and over. We have vaccinated 50% of LA County teens between the ages of 12 and 17 years, and out of all 10.3 million LA County residents, including those who are not yet eligible for the vaccine, 60% have received at least one dose, and 52% are fully vaccinated.

For the second week in a row, there was an uptick in first dose recipients after weeks of steadily declining weekly vaccination numbers: between July 19 and 25, we administered 69,558 doses across the entire County network, an increase of about 7,500 from the previous week.