On Thursday, April 23rd, California Governor Gavin Newsom announced that the state had faced it’s deadliest day since the coronavirus pandemic started, losing 115 lives in 24 hours.

The numbers represent an 8.5% increase in the death toll from the previous day. Wednesday, the California Public Health Department reported nearly 35,400 cases in the state. About 3,400 are in hospitals, with 1,200 in intensive care units. A total of 1,469 California residents have lost their lives due to COVID-19.

Despite the setbacks that California has faced, Governor Newsom is confident that the virus will be conquered, saying that “we still have more positives in this state every day.” He has stated that “this disease continues to spread and we need to spread the word — we are all in this together.”  Despite Thursday’s death toll, Governor Newsom has stated that both new hospitalizations and the number of intensive care unit patients has dropped, along with the number of people being tracked for potential exposure.