California
Who’s dying now? Here’s how recent COVID deaths compare to the early months of the pandemic in California
Four years after the start of the COVID pandemic, the age and race of its victims in California have dramatically shifted: Now, a Bay Area News Group analysis finds, those who are dying from the virus are much older, and more often White than Latino, a notable switch.
While COVID deaths in California have plunged across all race and age groups, a comparison of deaths from the first six months of the pandemic to the most recent six months of data compiled by the California Department of Public Health shows 70% of those dying nowadays are 75 or older — up from just over half in early 2020.
And while Latinos made up nearly half of all Californians killed by COVID in the first six months of the pandemic, White residents now account for nearly 60% of all deaths.
The changing demographics and plummeting overall death toll exhibit how Californians built up immunity to the virus, experts say, through exposures and vaccines, and which groups are now the most vulnerable to the worst outcomes.
After four years of living with the virus, life is largely back to pre-pandemic normal. But when the virus first shut down our lives in 2020, face masks and working from home were foreign concepts to most. And while the speed of developing the first COVD vaccines was unprecedented in science, it took until early 2021 — the heart of the pandemic’s deadliest wave — for the public to get immunized. While COVID’s risk has certainly diminished, how much has its deadly wake actually changed in that time?
First, the virus is much less deadly. In the most recent six months for which data is available, from Sept. 1, 2023, through Feb. 29, 2024, there were 3,472 deaths attributed to the virus in California. But in the first six months of the pandemic, Feb. 1 through Aug. 31, 2020, more than four times that number of Californians died from COVID — 14,648.
“Wow, we are doing so much better than we were,” said Dr. John Swartzberg, clinical professor emeritus at the UC Berkeley School of Public Health, his first reaction when looking at the data.
The total number of people dying has dropped across the board in nearly every category. More people over 85 died in the first six months of the pandemic, 4,209, than the number of deaths across all age groups in the past six months.
Second, your age is a factor. While older people have always been more vulnerable, they account for an even higher proportion of COVID deaths now.
The proportion of all COVID deaths among those 85 and older has grown from 29% to 42%. But that doesn’t mean the virus is deadlier for our elders: In the first six months of the pandemic, there were three times more deaths from the virus in that 85-and-older age group than there were in the most recent six-month period.
However small the number, there is one statistical peculiarity: The two youngest age groups are the only ones that saw more deaths in the past six months than early in the pandemic.
No deaths were reported among children younger than 14 in the Golden State through Aug. 31, 2020, but three young children have died from COVID, including two children under 5, in the last six months.
While deaths have become more concentrated among older Californians, another factor has changed dramatically: the racial breakdown of the people dying.
Early in the pandemic, “Blacks and Latinos struggled much more … in terms of mortality rates than any other population, primarily compared to Asian and White populations,” Swartzberg noted. “But that has flipped.”
The percentage of Californians who died who are White has nearly doubled, from 30% to 60% of all COVID deaths, from 4,332 deaths through August 2020, to 2,065 deaths in the most recent period. White people make up 37% of the state’s residents.
Moving in the other direction, the proportion of Latino deaths among those who died from COVID has shrunk from 49% of the first six months to just 20% of recent deaths. Latino people make up 39% of the state’s residents.
California’s Latino population is younger and therefore less at risk, Swartzberg said.
And he has some more educated guesses as to why the early pandemic death trends among racial groups have flipped so dramatically: In the first years of the pandemic, many Black and Latino communities were not getting vaccinated as quickly as their White counterparts, a combination of lack of access and insufficient outreach, but that has changed as the pandemic has evolved.
A November 2023 poll by KFF, a nonprofit health care research foundation, found a slightly higher percentage of Black and Hispanic adults reported getting an updated vaccine, compared to 19% of White adults. And the gap grew when adding those who planned on getting the new vaccine but hadn’t yet, 59% of Black and Hispanic adults and just 42% of White adults. The poll also found White adults were less likely to take precautions against catching and spreading the virus during this past holiday season.
Dr. Peter Chin-Hong, a UCSF professor of medicine who specializes in infectious diseases, also points to political influence on vaccine uptake as “one of the most compelling trends.”
The KFF poll found Democrats were twice as likely as Republicans to say they had already gotten the updated vaccine, while 55% of Republicans said they would “definitely not get” the new vaccine compared to 12% of Democrats and 40% of independents.
“In the beginning, none of this was political … we were all in this together,” said Chin-Hong. “The differential in mortality was based on structural racism and lack of access, underlying medical problems. But then it became a very polarizing issue, like everything regarding COVID.”
California voters will decide in November whether to require photo identification to cast a ballot, making California the latest battleground in a long-running effort by conservatives to push voter ID laws that have been bolstered in recent years by Donald Trump’s repeated and unfounded accusations of widespread voter fraud.
Nearly 1 million Californians signed on to support the ballot measure championed by Carl DeMaio, a Republican state representative from San Diego.
“Voters will be able to restore election integrity in our state, citizenship verification, auditing voter rolls – and yes, requiring ID to vote,” DeMaio said in a video statement posted to X.
Democrats have historically opposed voter ID laws, viewing them as unnecessary obstacles to casting a ballot that are likely to disproportionately affect voters who are low-income and people of color.
If the ballot measure passes, California voters would be required to present a photo identification when voting at a polling place, or submit a four-digit pin when sending a mail-in ballot.
Efforts to impose voter ID in solidly blue California have failed in the past. A poll released last month by the Institute of Governmental Studies at the University of California, Berkeley, however, found voters deadlocked on the issue, with 44% supporting it, 45% opposing and the rest undecided.
California is one of 14 states, along with the District of Columbia, that do not require voters to show ID when casting ballots, according to NBC News.
The California voter ID push has drawn national attention and money from Republicans, with the ballot measure committee raising $8.8m last year, according to Politico. Opponents are only beginning to mount a campaign to keep it from passing.
The California plebiscite comes as the White House is pushing for stricter federal requirements to cast a ballot. Trump demanded last week that Congress do away with the filibuster so Republicans can pass the Save America Act, which would impose a federal requirement to show proof of citizenship to cast a ballot.
Ron DeSantis, Florida’s Republican governor, signed into a law on 1 April a state bill modeled on the stalled federal act.
Opponents of voter ID laws have repeatedly challenged them in federal court.
Last month, US district judge Loretta Biggs upheld North Carolina’s 2018 voter ID law after it faced challenges from civil rights groups who said it would unconstitutionally infringe on Black and Latino voting rights.
In a separate case last year, the ninth US circuit court of appeals struck down key provisions of voter ID laws passed by Arizona in 2022, after finding that several challenged provisions “are unlawful measures of voter suppression”.
ANKARA
A 31-year-old suspect identified as Cole Thomas Allen is in custody following a shooting incident at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner in Washington, DC, with authorities continuing to investigate his background and possible motives, media reports said late Saturday.
Citing official statements and eyewitness accounts, the reports identified Allen as being from California, later confirmed by US President Donald Trump, who called the suspect “a very sick person,” and said he was thought to have acted alone.
Trump, along with the first lady and several top Cabinet members, was escorted out of the Washington Hilton ballroom, where the event was taking place, by Secret Service. Shortly afterward, he said the suspect had been “apprehended” and shared photos of him on the ground shirtless, along with blurry security footage of what appeared to be a figure darting past security agents.
Officials said the suspect was armed with multiple weapons, including a shotgun, a handgun and several knives. Metropolitan Police interim chief Jeff Carroll said he was also a guest at the hotel hosting the dinner.
Also speaking after the incident, Washington Mayor Muriel Bowser said the suspect reportedly “rushed a Secret Service checkpoint” in a lobby before being stopped by agents.
An officer was shot during the incident but survived thanks to a bulletproof vest he was wearing.
“He was shot from very close distance with a very powerful gun, and the vest did the job,” Trump said, adding the officer was “in great shape.”
Witness accounts provided additional details about the suspect’s actions before the shooting.
A volunteer at the event, Helen Mabus, told the New York Post that the suspect appeared to assemble a “long” weapon in a lightly monitored area near a terrace-level entrance.
“He grabbed it out of a bag or something … it was long and didn’t look like a typical gun,” the daily quoted her as saying.
Mabus said the suspect was partially out of view of security while handling the weapon in a “makeshift room” used for storing bar carts.
“He put it together and … ran towards the stairs to go down to the ballroom,” she recounted.
Mabus said the suspect then began firing in multiple directions, estimating she heard at least 10 shots. “It just seemed like he was shooting all over the place,” she said, describing panic among guests.
Authorities said the suspect was later apprehended and transported to a hospital for evaluation.
Jeanine Pirro, US attorney for the District of Columbia, said the suspect would face two charges and is expected to be arraigned in federal court on Monday. Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said additional charges may follow, noting that the investigation was ongoing.
FBI Director Kash Patel, who was also at the dinner, said the bureau had begun examining the suspect’s background and would “analyze all evidence immediately.”
While officials have said no clear motive was immediately clear, CBS News reported that
Allen admitted to security forces after his arrest that he intended to shoot Trump administration officials.
Citing two sources, the broadcaster said Allen did not specify that he was targeting Trump, only saying he was after “administration officials.”
The suspect is reported to have earned a Bachelor of Science in Computer Science from California State University, and a Cole Allen appears among computer science graduates in the May 2025 commencement program of California State University, Dominguez Hills.
According to law enforcement sources cited by CBS News, Allen worked as a teacher with C2 Education in Torrance, a private tutoring service, and was named “Teacher of the Month” in December 2024, according to a Facebook post. It is unclear whether he was still employed there at the time of the incident.
White House Correspondents’ Dinner shooting
The incident occurred during the annual White House Correspondents’ Dinner at the Washington Hilton Hotel, where President Trump, first lady Melania Trump and other high-level figures were present.
Witnesses reported hearing loud “pop, pop, pop” sounds, prompting guests to take cover under tables as security forces responded.
The Trump couple, Vice President JD Vance and Cabinet members were evacuated from the head table, while other guests remained inside the ballroom.
Secret Service agents and law enforcement quickly intervened, securing the scene and taking the suspect into custody as the event was halted.
Margaux Mirkin, the 70-year-old heiress whose father founded Budget Rent a Car, was the apparent victim of a home invasion on Thursday in which she was assaulted and strangled, according to police.
Officers arrived at her Hollywood Hills home in Los Angeles and learned that the attackers had left the woman inside the residence after allegedly smashing her jaw and choking her.
Property records obtained by NBC4 confirmed Mirkin owns the residence.
Although the full extent of the theft remains unclear, police said the suspects stole cash and jewelry from the home. Neighbors said some of the jewelry belonged to the woman’s late husband, who died in a house fire two years ago.
After the incident, Kristen Stavola, executive director of We Are Laurel Canyon, spoke to NBC4.
“She’s pretty shaken up, as anyone would be after being assaulted in your home and watching your valuables get stolen and driven away,” Stavola said.
An individual who did not want to be identified said the street is “dark” and a “dead-end street.”
“Not many people are on it, so of course it’s like the perfect street for a break-in,” the neighbor said.
NBC4 reported that the robbers dropped a bag containing a large amount of jewelry while leaving the home. When a neighbor saw them and shined a flashlight in their direction, they took off.
The police department’s robbery-homicide division is now managing the investigation.
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