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A very welcome increase in the availability of intensive care at Bay Area hospitals and slower coronavirus transmission rates paint an encouraging outlook for the coming weeks, but there was no indication on Sunday on the time when the area might go out of the home stay order which is blocked a lot from normal life.
State health officials said Sunday that projections for four weeks in the Bay Area did not meet the criteria for lifting the restrictions, and that an update would be expected on Monday.
Hopes had risen when, after persisting in single-digit numbers for weeks, the Bay Area’s intensive care availability jumped to 23.4%, according to data released on Saturday, reflecting Friday’s status. . This was an unusually significant jump from 6.5% a day earlier and seemed to indicate that the worst of the outbreak could be in the past. The sentiment was reinforced by a statement sent to The Chronicle on Sunday from Ali Bay, spokesperson for the State Department of Public Health.
“We are seeing promising signs that California is slowly emerging from the most intense phase of this pandemic,” the statement said.
The rate of positive tests in California in the past 14 days was 9.8% – a decrease of 3.9 percentage points from the previous two weeks, state data showed on Sunday. California reported 24,111 new coronavirus infections on Saturday, which is an increase of less than 1% from Friday’s totals, data showed.
But in San Francisco, Sunday brought a pause in the good news that had prompted Mayor London Breed to predict on Friday that the city may soon “begin to reopen under California guidelines” due to lower transmission rates. . A day after registering its lowest number of new coronavirus infections in two months, 111, San Francisco reported an increase of 283 new cases on Sunday. New infections had fallen below 200 every day since Monday, but Sunday was more in line with the higher daily infections of last week.
San Francisco also recorded one of its highest death totals for the month, 15, after a week of single-digit days or zero deaths.
City officials did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the latest statistics, but one-day trends have often proved misleading during the pandemic.
Dr John Swartzberg, an infectious disease expert at UC Berkeley, said he was “tentatively convinced” that the current outbreak, which began at the end of November, has reached its peak.
“This is what the data looks like and frankly this is what the data looks like at the national level,” with the exception of a few other states, he said. Yet, he added, there is no obvious end in sight. “What we’re seeing with the last two surges here in the US and California is we get a wave and a ridge, but we never go back to where we were before. It’s like going up stairs.
In the California system, the regional stay-at-home order is supposed to be lifted when an area’s critical care availability is expected to be 15% or more in the next four weeks. The projections focus specifically on the capacity of the intensive care unit at the end of the four week period.
For example, the state’s public health department would analyze Monday’s data to make projections for February 22. Projections are based on current regional intensive care capacity, community transmission rates and regional case rates. The state analyzes the data twice a week.
State officials reported on Sunday that about 2.2 million vaccines were administered statewide out of the 4.1 million doses distributed as it rushed to recover from an initial deployment over slow than expected.
The nationwide image of vaccination prompted Xavier Becerra, the former California attorney general to be named US Secretary of Health by President Biden, to express his frustration on Sunday over the long lines, delays and confusion about where and when to get vaccinated.
“The plane’s nose-down and we’re going to wind it up,” he told CNN. “It’s not America. … This is not how we treat those we consider vulnerable and who need the vaccine the most.
Becerra said he couldn’t predict when every American who wants a photo will be able to get one. Biden has pledged to distribute 100 million vaccines during his first 100 days in office.
In Placer County last week, one person died hours after receiving a vaccination, after testing positive for the coronavirus in late December, the Placer County Sheriff’s Office said on Saturday. The county public health department did not administer the vaccine, officials said. Sheriff’s office officials said on Sunday they had no further information.
San Francisco Chronicle editors Lauren Hernandez and Jill Tucker contributed to this report.
Tatiana Sanchez is a writer for the San Francisco Chronicle. Email: [email protected] Twitter: @TatianaYSanchez
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