California Lifts Virus Stay-At-Home Orders, Curfew Statewide

Speaker 1: 00:00 Governor Newsome says a projection of the state's ICU capacity. And the trend of COVID case rates gives officials confidence that California can lift it's regional stay at home order. Speaker 2: 00:11 Our projections statewide is in the aggregate being at 30.3% on the 21st of February. There again, variables that are constantly changing, but these are the projections you can see in Southern California. It would exceed even that state rate, San Joaquin Valley a little bit below Bay area, tiny bit below. Speaker 1: 00:33 That means that the state will resume its County to County evaluation of COVID restrictions. Most of the state, including San Diego will return to the purple tier. And depending on the final decisions announced by County officials, that change probably means the reopening of hair salons and outdoor dining. I spoke with Nathan Fletcher, chair of the San Diego County board of supervisors about what the end of the stay at home order means to us. We heard that the metrics on positivity rates, ICU bed capacity and hospitalization are improving in many areas of the state. Is that true here in San Diego? Speaker 3: 01:11 Well, we have seen improvements, uh, certainly in the daily case count and in the percentage of positivity, uh, we've seen very slight and modest improvements, uh, in, in ICU and hospitalizations, but again, all of the numbers are headed in the right direction. Um, and I think that's a Testament to the work that San Diego ans did, uh, to, to really claw back and fight back against the largest surge we've seen in COVID. So it is encouraging, Speaker 1: 01:35 But the state is still experiencing a high death rate from the virus. How does that factor into this statistics? Speaker 3: 01:41 Well, it's always important. We remembered the significant delay. Uh, people take, uh, an unsafe action and that action may show up in cases seven to 10 days later, uh, that increase in cases will show up in hospitalizations 21 to 24 days after. And then the loss of life will show up after that people could do the right things and you could still see cases go up. There's a frustration. You could see cases begin to go down, but not hospitalizations. And then you could see cases and hospitalizations go down and deaths continue to go up because of the significant lag between each of these steps. So right now our cases and positivity are holding are going in the right direction. Hospitalizations are ever so slightly beginning to trend there. Uh, but it is likely that loss of life will continue to increase, uh, for a, for quite awhile. Speaker 1: 02:27 And is the rate of vaccinations? Is that now one of the metrics included in evaluating the state of the virus in a particular County? Speaker 3: 02:37 Well, it's a metric. We can, we hold ourselves accountable to daily and we have worked tirelessly to stand up multiple superstations with more coming. Uh, you know, the real limiting factor to date is the availability of the vaccines and the steady supply of them. And, you know, we're hopeful, uh, that that will improve and increase, but the quicker we get more people vaccinated, uh, the quicker, there are fewer places for the virus to spread and the quicker we can work our way out of this Speaker 1: 03:04 Now that the blanket stay at home order has been lifted. Will San Diego again, be in the most restrictive purple tier. And can you remind us what that would mean? Speaker 3: 03:15 So we are going to be in the purple tier, uh, starting today. Uh, the most significant parts of that is outdoor dining was allowed, uh, along with personal services, uh, can operate, uh, that's your, your hair salons and barbershops massage tattoo, uh, various components like that. Um, and so we will go back in that purple tier, um, and we'll basically return to where we were prior to the regional stay-at-home order, uh, where every week we will assess our case rates, uh, and, and begin to work to go down to that next tier, which is red, but I want to caution our, our case rates are still quite high. And, and we are a, a long way away from descending into the red tier, uh, which is what we got ourselves, uh, down into, uh, last fall. Speaker 1: 04:00 What kind of latitude does San Diego County have in controlling reopenings under their purple team? Speaker 3: 04:06 Well, San Diego can be more restrictive, uh, than what the state of California allows, but can not be less restrictive. And so what is allowed for us right now is, is to move into the purple tier, uh, our public health, uh, experts, our doctors, scientists think that that is okay, given the general trajectory of where we are, uh, to, uh, to move into that purple tier. But again, we, we really continue to plead the public that our, our case numbers are still very, very high, and there's still tremendous strain on our healthcare system. Uh, and so we really continue to, uh, to, you know, employ the public, to follow the public health measures, wear a mask physically distanced from non-household members, you know, avoid these high risk settings and let's continue the trajectory that we're presently on. Speaker 1: 04:49 There was a concern that San Diego, even most of California perhaps opened up too soon, early last summer, bringing on a new wave of the virus. Is that something you're also thinking about right now? Speaker 3: 05:03 Um, I shared that concern, uh, both, both last year as we headed into the summer and again, in the fall, uh, as we went into the tiered system. And so it, it is, it is always, uh, something that is, is certainly on my mind and something I think greatly about, uh, I think outdoor dining can be done safely and responsibly. Uh, and I think that the personal care services again, if they follow the health protocols, um, you know, can also be done, uh, reasonably safely. And, and hopefully this can alleviate a little bit of pressure, um, on, on, on some of those entities. But, you know, I'm very mindful that COVID remains with us. And even though every day, we're vaccinating more people that is still a very small percentage of the total. And so we haven't yet seen real substantive relief from COVID due to vaccinations. And so we can't lose our focus on, on battling COVID and adhering to the orders and measuring every day where we are, uh, while we also embrace and celebrate the opportunity that the vaccinations arrival presents to us. Speaker 1: 05:59 I want to just ask a closing question. If I may, the state has announced that the eviction moratorium, which was just extended by the federal government to the end of March, will be extended in California until June 30th. Do you think that's a good idea? Speaker 3: 06:15 I do. We, we don't want people to be put out on the street because they're experiencing hardships surrounding COVID. We don't want to further complicate an already very serious crisis of, of the unsheltered, but I think it's vitally important that we also move forward in as a County. We are moving forward, uh, with expansions and extensions of rental assistance, uh, because it's also not fair to, uh, landlords, uh, to have, you know, no one can, can pay the rent, but they still have to pay their bills. And so we will be moving forward with rental assistance programs to continue those on a similar trajectory. Uh, so then individuals who've been impacted by COVID, uh, won't be evicted, but there also is a mechanism by which, uh, they can help, help pay the rent. And I think that two of those really do have to go together. Speaker 1: 07:00 I've been speaking with the chair of the San Diego County board of supervisors, Nathan Fletcher, supervisor Fletcher. Thank you very much. Speaker 3: 07:07 Thank you for having me.