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SAN FRANCISCO (AP) – Faced with a severe shortage of hospital beds, health officials announced on Saturday that the vast area of Southern California and much of the Central Valley would be placed under a radical new lockdown in an urgent attempt to slow the rapid rise. cases of coronavirus.
The California Department of Public Health said intensive care unit capacity at hospitals in both regions fell below the 15% threshold that triggers the new measures, which include strict closures for businesses and a ban on meeting with anyone outside your own household. The new measures will take effect Sunday evening and will remain in place for at least three weeks, meaning the lockdown will cover the Christmas holidays.
Much of the state is on the brink of the same restrictions. Some counties have chosen to impose them even before the mandate begins, including five San Francisco Bay counties where the measures will also come into effect from Sunday.
With a new lockdown looming, many rushed to supermarkets on Saturday and lined up outside salons to get their hair cut before orders kick in.
Michael Duranceau, a San Francisco resident, rushed to a market to stock up on supplies.
“I just refuel before Sunday – the basics, bread, eggs,” he told KGO-TV, holding a heavy bag of groceries and a baguette.
Governor Gavin Newsom announced the new plan on Thursday. It is the most restrictive order since he imposed the country’s first statewide stay-at-home rule in March. But the situation is darker than in March.
“The risk of contracting COVID in the community is now higher than it has ever been,” said Dr. Eric McDonald, San Diego County Medical Director, on Saturday. He and other officials urged the public to lower, obey the rules and help the state weather the latest and worst wave of cases the state has seen.
California has recorded a staggering 1.3 million cases of COVID-19 since the start of the pandemic, setting a new daily record on Friday when 25,068 confirmed cases were recorded.
The new order divides the state into five regions and uses the capacity of the ICU as the trigger for closures.
The bar steps all of the on-site restaurants and close hair and nail salons, movie theaters and many other businesses, as well as museums and playgrounds. He says people cannot congregate with anyone outside their homes and should always wear masks when they go out.
Under the new ordinance, schools currently open can continue to provide in-person lessons; retailers, including supermarkets and shopping malls, can operate with only 20% customer capacity.
Southern California’s 11-county region, which includes the cities of Los Angeles and San Diego, had only 12.5 percent of its intensive care beds, the California Department of Public Health reported on Saturday. The figure was 8.6% for the San Joaquin Valley region, made up of a dozen counties in the central agricultural valley and rural areas of the Sierra Nevada.
Together, the two regions are home to more than half of California’s population of 40 million.
“We are at a point where the surge in cases and hospitalizations is not slowing down,” said Dr Salvador Sandoval, public health officer for the town of Merced in the Central Valley. “I cannot stress this enough – everyone must take personal action to protect themselves and others.”
The other three regions – Greater Sacramento, Northern California and the San Francisco Bay Area – all accounted for approximately 21% capacity.
But health workers in five of the 11 Bay Area counties did not wait. On Friday, they adopted the order to stay at the state house. The changes begin to take effect Sunday night in the counties of San Francisco, Santa Clara, Marin, Alameda and Contra Costa, as well as in the city of Berkeley.
“We don’t think we can wait for the new state restrictions to take effect. … This is an emergency, ”said Chris Farnitano, Contra Costa health worker.
“Our biggest fear from the start – that we won’t have a bed for you or your mother or your grandmother or grandfather when they get sick – is the reality we will be facing unless we slow down. the spread, ”San Francisco Mayor London Breed told me.
The Bay Area order will last until at least January 4, a week longer than the state’s schedule, and came as the state saw another daily record number of new cases with 22,018. Hospitalizations exceeded 9,000 for the first time and intensive care patients reached a record 2,152.
The new closures were a heartbreaking decision for small businesses that struggled to survive for nearly a year in which they were repeatedly ordered to close and then allowed to reopen, but with complex security precautions .
Michelle Saunders James was in tears on Friday about closing her Oakland nail salon just five weeks after it reopened.
“We wear (face) screens. We take the temperatures. We do whatever we are told to do to make everyone feel safe, including our staff and our team, ”she told KGO-TV. “So I don’t understand why it’s not enough, and I’m terribly sad and scared.
Critics say the vast statewide order unfairly groups too many disparate counties into regions.
“I have the impression that this is absurd. This is how I feel. This is a joke. I mean, first of all, we’re 220 miles from Los Angeles. And we are geographically isolated and we have no problem … with overcrowded intensive care beds, ”said MP Jordan Cunningham, a Republican who represents San Luis Obispo.
He asked why his county should be confused with southern California counties like Los Angeles and Riverside when the San Luis Obispo hospital only has one COVID patient in the ICU. The effect on businesses has already been devastating, he said. “We have small businesses that lose everything, everything they have.”
The explosive rise in COVID-19 infections that began in October is largely blamed on people ignoring security measures and socializing with others.
Berkeley health worker Lisa Hernandez said people shouldn’t meet people they don’t live with in person, “even in small groups, and even outdoors with caution.
“If you have a social bubble, now it’s burst,” Hernandez said. “Don’t let this be the last family vacation.”
In the Central Interior Valley, Fresno County had only 10 of its 150 intensive care beds. Health officials have painted a grim picture with hospitals struggling to stay staffed due to coronavirus infections and exposures. A hospital is holding critical care patients in the emergency room until beds open, Emergency Medical Services Director Daniel Lynch said on Friday.
The county sought state help with staffing for a few weeks. But so far, only one or two more workers have shown up at three local hospitals as the entire state grapples with staff.
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Associated Press writers Olga R. Rodriguez and Juliet Williams in San Francisco, Robert Jablon and Brian Melley in Los Angeles, and Adam Beam in Sacramento contributed.
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