California's feared surge of virus cases hasn't happened

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — Near the end of September, with coronavirus cases falling and more schools and businesses reopening, Gov. Gavin Newsom's administration urged restraint, citing a statistical model that predicted a startling 89% increase in virus hospitalizations in the next month.

That hasn't happened. Instead, state data shows hospitalizations have fallen by about 15% since that warning while the weekly average number of new cases continues to decline even as other more populous states like Florida, Ohio and Illinois see increases.

California's good news isn't enough to change what Newsom calls his “slow” and “stubborn” approach to reopening the world's fifth-largest economy. He again cautioned people against “being overly exuberant” about those coronavirus numbers, pointing to a “decline in the rate of decline” of hospitalizations.

While California's 14-day average of hospitalizations is down, the 7-day average is up ever so slightly to 2,241 patients. The number peaked in July at more than 7,100.

“Boy, what more of a reminder do you need than seeing these numbers begin to plateau?” Newsom said Monday during his weekly news conference.

Dr. Mark Ghaly, California's top public health official, said Monday the state's hospitalizations have declined in part because of the state is testing more people, allowing public health officials to trace positive cases and put people into “supportive isolation.”

But Brad Pollock, associate dean of public health sciences at the University of California, Davis, School of Medicine, said this shows models that try to predict how the coronavirus will behave are “not that great.”

“We don't have a model that accurately predicts what's going to happen next," he said.

Hospitalizations are trending...