ORANGE COUNTY coronavirus cases reported on Thursday were 369; deaths were 29 (Shutterstock/Mongkolchan).

One third of the way toward getting off the state watch list for COVID-19 cases, Orange County was reminded of the ongoing human cost of the pandemic.

According to the Orange County Health Care Agency, 29 deaths were reported on Thursday, bringing the county total to 947. In today’s count, 11 were residents of skilled nursing facilities and the other 18 were OC residents not living at a facility.

Today was the fifth consecutive day off the watch list. Fifteen days in a row can enable the reopening of schools for in-person instruction and some other re-openings.

The daily case count is 369, down from 448 on Wednesday. The death count is up from seven on Wednesday and 15 on Tuesday.

Combined cases to date for Orange County are at 47,459, of which 39,678 are considered recovered. Cases currently hospitalized are at 372, with 112 cases in intensive care units.

The key metric of “test positivity,” which measures how many people tested turn out to be infected with the virus, dropped to 5 percent from 5.2 percent. The threshold, or goal, is less than 8 percent. Also within thresholds are metrics for ICU beds and ventilators available.

Here is a list of Orange County cities with the most cases, along with numbers from two other area cities. Deaths are in parentheses.

• Santa Ana: 9,207 (231).
• Anaheim: 8,150 (217).
• Garden Grove: 2,577 (57).
• Orange: 2,159 (43).
• Huntington Beach: 2,152 (60).

Westminster has 910 cases and 23 deaths; Stanton has 595 cases and 10 deaths.