LA, San Francisco move to California’s loosest COVID tier. Sacramento, Placer stay in red
California health officials promoted four counties into looser levels of COVID-19 restrictions Tuesday morning due to vast improvement in infection numbers, including two of the state’s major urban hubs.
Los Angeles and San Francisco along with Trinity County advanced from the orange tier into yellow. Inyo County also advanced from red to orange.
Marin County, which had entered this week eligible to join the yellow tier, instead saw its case rate spike too high and will remain in orange. Yuba County, the only other county that had been in position for a promotion, also fell short and will stay in the red tier for at least two more weeks.
With the major move for Los Angeles County, home to 10 million people, seven counties accounting for more than one-quarter of California’s population are now in the loosest tier, allowing for the laxest restrictions on businesses, events and gatherings.
Thirty-nine counties are one step below in the orange tier. A dozen, including Sacramento and Placer counties, remain in the red tier. None are in the strict purple tier.
The purple tier kept indoor businesses such as restaurant dining rooms, gyms and movie theaters closed entirely. In the red tier, those businesses are allowed open with tight capacity limits. The orange tier loosens capacity limits, and also allows a few indoor entertainment businesses, such as bowling alleys, to reopen. The yellow tier reduces capacity restrictions further.
The four tiers also govern crowd sizes — with and without proof of vaccination — allowed at both indoor and outdoor venue events, such as sporting events and live performances.
Gov. Gavin Newsom and the state health office have set June 15 as the targeted end date for tier restrictions, provided there are no major setbacks to vaccinations or hospitalizations. The economy would essentially fully reopen, though mask mandates would remain in place.
Sacramento County along with neighbor Placer failed yet again to record a week of progress toward the orange tier and remain stuck in red, but their case rates did show improvement.
The case rate threshold for the orange tier is a daily rate below six cases per 100,000 residents. Placer came in Tuesday at 6.5 per 100,000 and Sacramento at 7.7, down from 8.0 and 8.4 in last week’s update, respectively.
But with tier promotions requiring two consecutive weeks of meeting the looser tier’s criteria, Sacramento and Placer can move to orange no earlier than May 18. Sacramento County health officer Dr. Olivia Kasirye in her latest estimate last week said the county might not make the orange tier until late May, just a couple of weeks before the tiers go away entirely.
Kasirye and Placer County health director Dr. Rob Oldham said last week that if their COVID-19 rates trail statewide levels somewhat by mid-June, they are unlikely to keep local restrictions tighter than the state’s because it would be too difficult to enforce.
They also are hopeful that more vaccination progress in the next few weeks will help drive down the numbers.
Two red-tier counties (Del Norte and Madera) tallied a week toward reaching the orange tier and could advance in next week’s tier assignments; and five in the orange tier (Mono, Modoc, Monterey, San Mateo and Sonoma) could promote to yellow.
COVID-19 in California by the numbers
California continues to boast the lowest infection numbers in the U.S., according to data from Johns Hopkins University.
CDPH on Monday and Tuesday reported weekly test positivity at 1.1%, yet another record low since testing for COVID-19 began. Johns Hopkins reports California even lower at 0.9%, the lowest in the nation, with many states still above 5% and some higher than 10%. Experts view test positivity as a benchmark for true spread of the virus while controlling for differences in testing capacity.
About 1,600 virus patients were in hospitals statewide, including 395 in intensive care units, as of Tuesday’s state data update. Those are down from about 2,150 hospitalized and more than 560 in ICUs at the start of April. At California’s worst peak of the winter surge, nearly 22,000 were hospitalized and 4,900 in intensive care.
Fatalities are also continuing to trend down statewide. CDPH reports the average for COVID-19 deaths was about 28 a day as of early April, with more recent totals still pending. At one point in mid-January, more than 650 Californians were dying of the virus per day, state data show.
To date, California has reported more than 3.64 million lab-confirmed cases and 60,765 deaths from the disease. CDPH reported only two new deaths Tuesday.
Nearly two-thirds of California adults have had a vaccine dose
Close to 13 million Californians are now fully vaccinated with either one shot of the Johnson & Johnson single-dose vaccine or two shots of either Pfizer or Moderna. More than 6.1 million others are partially vaccinated with a first dose of Pfizer or Moderna, according to CDPH.
That means more than 19.1 million people in California are at least partially vaccinated. That’s about 48% of the state’s overall population and 61% of its adult population. None of the three vaccines are authorized yet for use in children under age 16, with Pfizer’s vaccine the only one authorized in ages 16 and 17.
The Food and Drug Administration is expected to clear the Pfizer vaccine for use in children ages 12 through 15 by early next week, the New York Times and other outlets reported Monday. There are roughly 2 million residents in that age group in California.
Hospitalizations climbing in some parts of Sacramento area
The six-county capital region of Sacramento, El Dorado, Placer, Yolo, Sutter and Yuba counties has reported more than 165,000 lab-confirmed cases and at least 2,415 virus deaths over the course of the pandemic.
Sacramento County has reported 103,498 cases and 1,666 resident deaths from COVID-19, last updated Tuesday.
The countywide hospitalized total has been climbing, reported Monday at 103 and 99 on Tuesday, up from 84 one month earlier. The ICU total, though, has declined during that time, from 24 to 17.
Placer County health officials have confirmed a total of 22,323 infections and 289 deaths through Monday.
State data on Tuesday showed 38 virus patients in Placer hospitals including eight in ICUs, nearly the same as one month earlier, when there were 36 hospitalized with seven in intensive care.
Yolo County has reported 13,726 total cases and 205 deaths.
Yolo had five virus patients hospitalized as of Tuesday’s state data update, matching its highest total since late March, with none in intensive care. Yolo hospitals have not had a COVID-19 patient in an ICU since April 22.
El Dorado County has reported 10,040 positive test results and 110 deaths.
State data on Tuesday showed El Dorado with three hospitalized patients, including two in intensive care. A month earlier, El Dorado had no hospitalized COVID-19 patients.
In Sutter County, at least 9,383 residents have tested positive for the virus and 105 have died. Yuba County, which shares a health office with Sutter, has reported 6,203 infections and 40 dead.
Adventist-Rideout in Marysville — Yuba-Sutter bi-county region’s lone hospital — had 17 hospitalized virus patients as of Monday’s update, its most since early March, and dipped to 14 on Tuesday. The hospitalized total is up from 11 early last week while the ICU total has dropped from three to one.
This story was originally published May 4, 2021 at 7:41 AM with the headline "LA, San Francisco move to California’s loosest COVID tier. Sacramento, Placer stay in red."
