SANTA ANA, Calif. (CNS) — Orange County's COVID-19 hospitalizations and positivity rates remained relatively stable, but another 19 COVID-related fatalities have been added to this month's and last month's death toll, according to data released Wednesday by the Orange County Health Care Agency.

The number of COVID-positive patients in county hospitals ticked up from 325 as of Tuesday to 331 Wednesday, with the number of those patients in intensive care declining from 69 to 68, according to the county.

The OCHCA reported 946 new positive COVID tests and 19 additional deaths associated with the virus Wednesday, bringing its cumulative totals to 536,881 cases and 6,524 fatalities.

The county had 26.8% of its ICU beds available and 65.7% of its ventilators as of Wednesday. Local health officials become concerned when the level of ICU beds falls below 20%.

Of those hospitalized, 84% are unvaccinated and 86% in an intensive care unit are not inoculated, according to the OCHCA.

Of the deaths logged Wednesday, five occurred in January and 14 happened this month. The deadliest day so far this year was Jan. 21 when 25 people died from COVID-related symptoms.

The recently logged fatalities hiked up January's death toll to 460, and February's death toll so far to 80.

December's death toll stands at 107, November's at 112, October's at 136, September's at 199 and August's at 186.

In contrast, the death toll before the delta variant fueled a late-summer surge was 31 in July, 20 in June, 26 in May, 47 in April, 202 in March and 620 for February.

January 2021 remains the deadliest month of the pandemic, with a death toll of 1,600, ahead of December 2020, the next-deadliest with 986 people lost to the virus.

Of the deaths logged Wednesday, one was a skilled nursing facility resident, raising the number of dead in that category to 1,276. The death toll for assisted living facility residents overall stands at 669. 

Outbreaks — defined as three or more infected residents — decreased from 13 to nine at assisted living facilities from Feb. 14-18, the most recent data available, and dropped from 15 to 12 for skilled nursing facilities.

The county's jails had 34 infected inmates Wednesday, down from 40 on Tuesday, with the results of 240 tests pending.

The case rate per 100,000 people decreased from 17.3 Tuesday to 16.2 Wednesday. The testing positivity rate dropped from 4.7% to 4.5%, and fell from 3.6% to 3.3% in the health equity quartile, which measures underserved communities hardest hit by the pandemic.

The case rate per 100,000 people decreased from 23.7 on Feb. 5 to 14.3 on Feb. 12 for those fully vaccinated with a booster shot; from 29.7 to 17.2  for those fully vaccinated with no booster; and 50.6 to 29.4 for those not fully vaccinated.