Sonoma County coronavirus patient dies at Sutter Hospital in Santa Rosa

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A Sonoma County resident died Friday after contracting the coronavirus and being hospitalized for serious illness, marking the first known death in the county from the fast-moving disease that has led California Gov. Gavin Newsom to ask all Californians to stay home.

Interim Public health Officer Dr. Sundari Mase said she received the news of a death “with great sadness,” the same day the number of confirmed cases of coronavirus among Sonoma County residents doubled to 22. A source with Sutter Santa Rosa confirmed the person died Friday afternoon.

The increase in confirmed cases foretells a rapid escalation of the virus’s spread in the community, just one month after the first person with coronavirus was hospitalized in this county in late February.

“We need to be prepared for a worsening situation here over the next week,” said Mase, noting that “every case infects another three, so the more cases we have the more cases we get, so this is exactly what we expected.”

Mase declined to say anything about the person who died, including the person’s age or information about how long the person had been sick. The patient’s family has been notified, she said.

Mase said she will not provide any details about the demographics of people contracting COVID-19 until the number of local cases reaches roughly 50, a decision she made based on a sense that a larger group of patients would make it harder to identify anyone.

The rise in positive coronavirus test results indicates that the virus is spreading within the community, said Susan Gorin, chairwoman of the Sonoma County Board of Supervisors, noting that this didn’t come as a surprise to her. She emphasized her belief that the county had sufficient testing capacity for the expected rise in caseload: “We will be on top of this in terms of test kits that we need.”

“I am deeply sorry for the family of the person who died from coronavirus,” Gorin said. “None of us would wish that on a family member.”

Gorin said she had not spoken to the victim’s family, noting that supervisors were observing standards of confidentiality: “We don’t know who the victims are, or who the patients are, or what facilities they’re being housed at.”

One of the county’s top priorities is getting more space and medical beds outside of hospitals in the event the number of people needing to be hospitalized with coronavirus exceeds the capacity of its three main hospitals, said Chris Godley, director of the county’s emergency services department.

They are working to find at least two properties where they can establish makeshift hospitals staffed by a combination of volunteers with the Medical Reserve Corps, retired doctors, nursing students and others. Godley said he believed they could have the sites running within two weeks, if needed. These extra sites would in part be for people with minor conditions to open up space within hospitals, he said. He said they are examining “several dozen” sites with the goal of choosing two.

Godley said he had no information about when the county might need such added facilities because the limited data from testing doesn’t show the full scope of the virus’s prevalence here, but that he believes the county is “ahead of the curve on this one, quite literally.”