LOS ANGELES — The coronavirus continues to play an outsized role in the mortality rate in Los Angeles County, new data from the Department of Public Health show.
According to an analysis from the county health department, COVID-19 was the second-leading cause of death in the first six months of 2022, illustrating the outsized effect the pandemic has had on mortality rates despite widespread availability of vaccines and the arguably less-severe omicron strain.
By contrast, COVID-19 was the leading cause of death in the nation’s most populous county in the first six months of 2021, a span that includes the deadliest surge of the 21/2-year pandemic. And for the comparable period in 2020, COVID-19 was the second leading cause of death, even though the coronavirus did not begin to spread widely until March.
