COVID-19 Latest: CA Signs Deal For New Case Reporting System

CALIFORNIA — The Golden State experienced something of a technological catastrophe in August after thousands of COVID-19 test results were backlogged. Health officials announced Tuesday that they had contracted OptumInsight, Inc. to launch a new coronavirus data reporting system.

The new system will begin its launch in October to collect, track and report cases, as well as supplement California's current disease registry system, CalREDIE, according to the state's Department of Public Health.

“Throughout this pandemic, our public health decisions are guided by science and data and we recognize the need for innovative and modern tools to get in front of COVID-19,” said Sandra Shewry, CDPH Acting Director, in a Tuesday news release.

The new software system is built to manage a large volume of data, which is necessary now more than ever due to an unprecedented amount of diagnostic test results that need to be processed and tracked during the COVID-19 pandemic.

This is a task the state was ill prepared for last month after the state stopped receiving data from Quest Diagnostics from July 31 to Aug. 4, due to the combination of a server crashing and the state's negligence to renew a certificate that was needed to receive data from the commercial testing lab, according to multiple reports.

The gap in data reporting resulted in a false belief that cases had dropped sharply in the state, which Gov. Gavin Newsom inadvertently shared as a 21 percent drop in daily cases Aug. 3, the Los Angeles Times reported.

The situation was so dire that some health officials were hand counting cases and the governor was left to warn Californians that the numbers he was presenting at his daily news conferences were not definitive due to the backlog.

California Chief Information Officer and CDT Director Amy Tong, assured in the Tuesday announcement that the new tool would be efficient.

“This system will reduce labor-intensive collection processes and minimize delays in reporting data so that public health experts across the state have swift access to the tools and data they need to prevent COVID-19 transmission and respond to new cases and outbreaks,” Tong said.

The state signed a $15.3 million renewable six-month contract with OptumInsight Inc., an international company that provides data and software for healthcare and government agencies.

The company was contracted to to develop a data tool using funding from the federal Epidemiology and Laboratory Capacity for Prevention and Control of Emerging Infections Diseases grant.

As of Tuesday, there were 704,085 confirmed coronavirus cases in California. Health officials also announced Tuesday at an afternoon news conference: A 29 percent decrease in ICU patients and a 24 percent decrease in hospitalizations, as well as a 14 percent decrease in cases over a seven day period, continuing the downward trend.