A 57-year-old man who was being held at Otay Mesa Detention Center, a federal immigration detention center in San Diego, died Wednesday morning from complications of the coronavirus, according to Dr. Eric McDonald, medical director for San Diego County’s Health and Human Services Agency’s Epidemiology and Immunization Services Branch.
The man appears to be the first detainee in the custody of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to die of complications of COVID-19. He had been hospitalized since late April, McDonald said during the county’s daily coronavirus briefing.
ICE has not confirmed the death to the USA TODAY Network. The detention center has the largest COVID-19 outbreak among any ICE facility in the country, with 132 confirmed cases — or about 19% of the 705 total cases — as of Wednesday afternoon, according to ICE.
