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San Francisco Mayor London Breed said on Wednesday she expected the city to enter the least restrictive red level next week – meaning restaurants, movies and other businesses could open with limits – and leave purple, California’s most restrictive four-tier system for reopening the economy. .
“With the continuous improvement of our COVID-19 health metrics, we could move to state red by next Wednesday, March 3,” Breed said in a Twitter message. “It’s a big step forward, but we have to keep making progress.”
Only nine of California’s 58 counties are in the red category, including Marin and San Mateo in the Bay Area. The red level allows more people to shop inside and allows other businesses to open with a reduced number of customers. Museums can open at 25% of capacity, gymnasiums at 10%, and cinemas and restaurants at 25% or 100 people, whichever is less. Only two counties, Sierra and Alpine, have reached the orange level, allowing even fewer restrictions.
The news came as deaths from COVID-19 surpassed 50,000 statewide on Wednesday, county data showed.
However, new cases of the coronavirus continue to fall statewide and more Californians are becoming eligible for vaccination.
In San Francisco, teachers, grocery store workers and emergency responders who live or work in the city became eligible to be vaccinated for the first time on Wednesday.
But not everyone was able to make an appointment.
That’s because San Francisco, like many health departments and providers across the state, prioritizes second injections for people who received their first doses a few weeks ago. According to the Department of Public Health, around 91,000 San Franciscans are expected to receive their second dose in the next few weeks, and many newly eligible people will have to wait two or three weeks until more vaccines arrive.
Craig MacLellan, a worker at a San Francisco Whole Foods market, was one of thousands who became eligible for the vaccine on Wednesday. At around 9 a.m., he looked at an online appointment system for vaccines. He expected to click on his job category, “food and agriculture workers,” to indicate that he was eligible.
But he said the category was not listed. MacLellan checked in about an hour later, and while food and agriculture workers were now on the list, appointments were full.
MacLellan said since he was young and has no underlying health issues he feels safe at work. But he is worried about some of his colleagues.
“While I’m very excited to be part of a group that can get it, I understand that this is one of the biggest logistical challenges in American history,” MacLellan said. “I imagine that tens of thousands of people are logging on to these websites today.”
Still, some got lucky on Wednesday.
“It’s a huge relief,” said Frank Lara, a fifth-grade teacher at Buena Vista Horace Mann School in San Francisco. He received his first blow on Wednesday afternoon. “It’s obviously stressful trying to get there, and I hope everything is organized. But it is one more step towards the classroom. “
Vaccination of educators has been a huge point of contention for the city’s teachers’ union, which has said it will not allow unvaccinated teachers to return to the classroom until San Francisco reaches the standard. orange, which means there is only “moderate” spread of the virus.
San Francisco delivered up to 6,000 shots a day before the winter storm that hit the Midwest caused supply delays and the shutdown of mass vaccination sites in the city and across California. So far, 80% of the city’s healthcare workers and people 65 and over who are in phase 1A – healthcare workers and people living in long-term care facilities – have been vaccinated, has declared the Mayor of London Breed mentionned on Twitter Wednesday.
“We can do over 10,000 doses a day right now, as soon as we have more,” Breed added.
The status of delayed vaccinations in San Francisco remained uncertain on Wednesday, and city officials did not answer questions.
But three other Bay Area counties that reported delays last week – Santa Clara, Alameda and Contra Costa – said on Wednesday that thousands of doses of the vaccine had now arrived.
The Marin County health department said Wednesday that educators, food service workers and other essential workers could start scheduling immunization appointments immediately. The agency said it was ready to open its supply after vaccinating more than 60% of all residents in the county over the age of 65.
“We have made a lot of progress in vaccinating our healthcare workers and older residents, and it’s time to move forward to protect our essential workers,” said Dr Matt Willis, Head of Marin County Public Health, in a statement.
The Santa Clara County Health Department announced on Wednesday that a large vaccination site at Gilroy High School would open on Sunday. The site, established with the Gilroy Unified School District, will deliver up to 2,000 doses of vaccine per day to county residents who qualify under Phase 1B of the state’s vaccine deployment plan, which includes educators and food workers.
“I hope that many of our residents and staff will register in the near future,” said Dr. Deborah Flores, Principal of Gilroy School. “Please register and get vaccinated as soon as possible.”
The two vaccines currently available in the United States, manufactured by Pfizer and Moderna, are given as two injections, 21 or 28 days apart.
Meanwhile, some elementary schools in Sonoma County may begin to reopen as the number of coronavirus cases has dropped enough and other requirements have been met, said Dr Sundari Mase, Sonoma County health official. , at a press conference on Wednesday.
Schools that wish to reopen can submit a reopening plan, with middle and high schools on hold until the county goes from the purple level to the red level.
As the number of new coronavirus cases, hospital admissions and deaths from COVID-19 continue to decline, medical experts continue to warn of the danger of asymptomatic spread.
Dr. Bob Wachter, Chair of the Department of Medicine at UCSF, mentionned Monday on Twitter that 1.1% of coronavirus tests in his hospital are positive even if the patient does not have any symptoms. This means that about 1 in 100 San Franciscans may be walking around with the virus without knowing it.
“So don’t let your guard down, especially since – if you haven’t been vaccinated yet – you will have a chance in the next 3 months,” Wachter said.
The White House plans to allocate 3-4 million doses of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine by the end of next week if it obtains emergency use clearance from the Food and Drug Administration, Jeff said on Wednesday. Zients, President Biden’s COVID-19 coordinator. The FDA is expected to make a final decision within days.
Michael Williams, Aidin Vaziri, and Catherine Ho are editors of the San Francisco Chronicle. Email: [email protected], [email protected], [email protected]
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