(Image courtesy of FDA)

Coronavirus cases continue to increase in the Bay Area, with Santa Clara County again reporting the highest numbers. 

But cases in Alameda County now number nearly as many as in Santa Clara County and could surpass those in Santa Clara County in the near future. 

The difference between the two counties has fallen from 617 cases three weeks ago to 103 this week, according to county data. 

In all, Bay Area health officials have reported 10,525 cases and 385 deaths since tracking started. 

Here’s how the counties rank by number of cases as of May 15.

The next step in Santa Clara County’s efforts to curb the spread of the virus is an expansion of testing to people without symptoms, said Dr. Marty Fenstersheib, the county’s COVID-19 testing officer.

“We really, really want to find out the extent of the infections in the community,” he said.

County health officials are urging all workers whose jobs require a lot of contact with the public to get tested as soon as possible and to repeat the tests monthly.

Source: Santa Clara County Public Health Department and other Bay Area county health departments

Keith Burbank is currently a fulltime reporter covering Alameda County and Oakland news for Bay City News. He has also worked on the Data Points project for Local News Matters, finding trends and stories about the region through data. In 2019, he was a California Fellow at the USC Annenberg Center for Health Journalism, producing a series about homeless deaths in Santa Clara County. He worked as a swing shift editor for the newswire for several years as well. Outside of journalism, Keith enjoys computer programming, math, economics and music.