Coronavirus triggered orange county’s deadliest year in recent times

Dr. Sanghyuk Shin, a UC Irvine epidemiologist and public health expert, said the deaths chart is “sobering” and “an important reminder of the truly horrible and devastating disease that COVID-19 is. “Deaths are just the most severe manifestation,” he added. … Dr. Shruti Gohil, an infectious disease and critical care doctor at UC Irvine Medical Center in Orange, said pandemics “are very well known to increase overall [deaths]. … “This finding of high COVID [deaths] is precisely why vaccinations exist for other infectious diseases that we all get and now gratefully we have one for COVID.” … December and January are where most of the deaths from Covid are actually concentrated, said Dr. Andrew Noymer, an infectious disease researcher [associate professor of public health] at UC Irvine.