Of the cases Berkeleyside has been able to learn about, most of the individuals who have died were Black, male, age 80 or older, or some combination of those factors. Most of them had multiple causes of death listed in addition to COVID-19, such as pneumonia, respiratory failure, cardiac or cardiopulmonary arrest and septic shock, among other conditions. On Wednesday, Berkeley updated the number of the city’s total COVID-19 fatalities to 22, with the cumulative number of lab-confirmed coronavirus cases at 2,430. More than half of the city’s total positive COVID-19 tests have been reported since early December. Ever since the city’s first COVID-19 death was reported in April 2020, Berkeleyside has been asking city staff for information about who has succumbed to the disease. The city has repeatedly declined to provide even aggregate data about age, race or gender, citing medical privacy laws.