SANTA ANA, Calif.—Orange County’s COVID-19 hospitalizations finally fell below 300 after two months, as weekly averages posted Sept. 28 showed more encouraging news in a slowdown of the Delta variant-fueled summer surge. The county’s weekly case rate per 100,000 residents improved from 11.3 to 9.7, while the positivity rate fell from 3.7 percent to 3.4 percent. The county’s Health Equity Quartile positivity rate—which measures progress in low-income communities—dropped from 4.2 percent to 3.8 percent. “Those numbers look good,” Andrew Noymer, an epidemiologist and University of California–Irvine professor of population health and disease prevention, told City News Service on Tuesday. The number of hospitalized patients dropped from 300 Monday to 288, with the number of intensive care unit patients declining from 80 to 72, according to the Orange County Health Care Agency (OCHCA). The county has 24.2 percent of its intensive care unit beds available and 66 percent of its ventilators. …