San Luis Obispo County is reporting the deaths of eight more people who tested positive for COVID-19.
Health officials say the patients were between the ages of 60 and 100-years-old.
San Luis Obispo County has had 82 deaths attributed to COVID-19.
The county also added a record 576 new cases of COVID-19 on Wednesday, bringing the county's total to 10,178 confirmed cases as of December 30.
San Luis Obispo County Public Health officials are attributing the high number of new cases, in part, to a backlog of cases in the state's database. On Tuesday, county health officials said a change in the way the state assigns suspected cases to a county was causing a delay in reporting at the local level.
Between Friday and Tuesday, SLO County reported just 131 new COVID-19 cases, while the state's COVID-19 website showed 883 new cases in the county over the same time period.
County health officials said they were reviewing those cases and expected the county's total number of confirmed cases to surpass 10,000 this week.
Currently, 58 people are hospitalized with COVID-19 in San Luis Obispo County, including 11 patients who are in the ICU. Another 2,187 people are recovering at home and health officials say 7,837 people have recovered.
According to the State of California's online COVID-19 dashboard, there are currently 19 ICU beds available in San Luis Obispo County.
Breakdown of cases by location:
- Paso Robles - 2,264
- San Luis Obispo - 2,152
- Atascadero - 897
- Arroyo Grande - 733
- California Men's Colony (inmates) - 726
- Nipomo - 695
- Grover Beach - 414
- Oceano - 353
- Templeton - 308
- San Miguel - 286
- Cal Poly (campus residents) - 256
- Los Osos - 208
- Morro Bay - 201
- Pismo Beach - 155
- Atascadero State Hospital (patients) - 124
- Shandon - 89
- Santa Margarita - 84
- Cambria - 72
- Creston - 43
- Cayucos - 43
- Avila Beach - 16
- San Simeon - 8
The location of 37 additional cases is under investigation, and another 14 are listed as "other," which includes communities with fewer than five cases. The Public Health Department is not identifying those locations.
Community COVID-19 testing sites are currently open to the public in San Luis Obispo, Paso Robles, Morro Bay, Grover Beach, and Nipomo.
Appointments are required at all locations. Click here to schedule an appointment.
For more information on the county's COVID-19 response, visit readyslo.org.