Fresno Co. reports first coronavirus death, officials looking to ramp up testing

FRESNO, Calif. (KFSN) -- Public health officials in Fresno County say they're looking at ways to ramp up COVID-19 testing after the county announced their first death connected to the virus.

"They had underlying conditions and were treated aggressively at one of our local hospitals...it was expected...but it comes as a shock," said Dr. Rais Vohra with the Fresno County Public Health Department.

After the confirmed cases in the county reached 100 on Friday, Dr. Vohra says of those cases, nearly 30 are travel-related, while 24 were community-acquired. Several others remain under investigation.

An ABC Owned Television Station analysis of data from the COVID Tracking Project shows that the state of New York leads in testing with over 20,000 tests for a million residents.

California, however, is second to last, testing over 800 people per million residents.

Vohra says the numbers are staggering, but they're hoping that'll change soon.

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"Some hospitals will be able to do in-house testing soon, and actually try to ramp up capacity at public health. Hopefully, that will address those backlogs."

Vohra says residents are now advised that wearing cloth masks might be a good idea.

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