Coronavirus updates: What can reopen, what can’t as California hits 100,000 cases
Although states are gradually beginning to reopen their economies, economic devastation has continued due to the coronavirus pandemic and ensuing shutdowns across a broad range of industries.
Another 2.12 million workers across the U.S. filed initial unemployment claims last week, according to the U.S. Department of Labor’s weekly report, for a 10-week total of more than 40 million out of work.
California had more than 212,000 initial claims for the week ending May 23, according to the Department of Labor, which was down by more than 32,000 compared with the previous week. The U.S. total is seasonally adjusted, while state figures are not.
Thursday marks 10 weeks since Gov. Gavin Newsom issued his stay-at-home order March 19, making California the first state to effectively restrict its economy to essential businesses only in response to the ongoing COVID-19 crisis. In recent weeks, most states have implemented economic reopenings at varying speeds and to various extents.
Newsom’s administration has instituted a gradual reopening plan. As of the beginning of this week, in-store retail shopping and places of worship were permitted to reopen statewide, with significant changes required to allow for social distancing and sanitation to ward off spread of the virus. For 47 of the state’s 58 counties, restaurants’ dining rooms have been allowed to reopen, as well as barbershops and salons as of a Tuesday announcement.
According to data by Johns Hopkins University, the United States on Wednesday surpassed 100,000 total fatalities from COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus. The university’s data map also showed California surpassing 100,000 lab-confirmed cases the same day, nearly simultaneously.
California has suffered 3,973 total fatalities among at least 101,697 total cases, the state Department of Public Health said in a Thursday update. After the lowest days daily death figures since March, of 21 reported Sunday and 19 on Monday, fatalities shot up by 70 between Tuesday and Wednesday, and 89 between Wednesday and Thursday.
More than half of the total deaths, at 2,195, and nearly half of the total infections have come in Los Angeles County.
Yolo County ends shelter-in-place order
Yolo County on Thursday issued a new local health order that ends the county’s shelter-in-place order that has been in place since March, but keeps face coverings mandatory while in public.
Little will change, in practice, as people in Yolo County will still be bound by the statewide stay-at-home order, which has most of the same provisions the county order had, except for the local mask requirement.
“Yolo County hopes to remove public confusion over having multiple Shelter In Place orders (i.e. local and state) while still providing: guidance for local businesses to reopen as safely as possible; standards for residents who participate in newly released activities; and measures to help decrease the chances of COVID-19 surges and prioritize the health and safety of all its communities,” the county said in a news release.
Independent data model predicts death tolls by September
One COVID-19 forecasting model that has been followed by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention now gives prediction ranges for each state as well as 34 counties across the U.S.
The model, created by independent data scientist Youyang Gu, was updated recently to include Sacramento County. There are also graphs for Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino, San Diego and Santa Clara counties.
On top of 56 deaths reported as of Wednesday’s update from Sacramento County’s public health department, Gu’s model projects 28 more by Sept. 1 for a total of 84. The graph also shows a range for its estimates: on the low end, 68 total deaths by the start of September; on the high end, 129.
The model assumes and approximates several things. For one, it gives the county an approximate reopening date of May 23 and assumes the reopening process will remain gradual.
Additionally, the model estimates that the true number of infected people in Sacramento County is significantly higher than the total number of positive tests, accounting for untested and asymptomatic cases. While the county reported just over 1,300 lab-confirmed cases of COVID-19 as of Wednesday, Gu’s model estimates the true number of cases was within a range of about 4,700 to 9,800 as of that time. The model estimates a range of between 5,900 and 20,000 total true infections by Sept. 1.
Gu’s model for California as a whole shows an even more gaping range. It projects the state at about 12,300 coronavirus fatalities by Sept. 1, assuming gradual reopening, with 124 deaths per day at that time.
There’s massive variance though: on the low end, a total death toll of around 5,200, with only five people dying per day as of that date. But on the high end, 30,000 Californians would be dead with 465 new deaths each day by the start of September.
Forecasting models for the coronavirus remain highly variable and subject to great change. Because the virus is new, adjustments are constantly being made to those models by data scientists as new information about the nature of the virus itself, up-to-date numbers from health agencies and the status and impact of states’ reopening plans change by the day.
What’s reopening in California? What isn’t? What phase are we in?
Newsom and the state’s four-phase reopening plan, and the specifics of what can open and what cannot, can be confusing or verbose at times.
Right now, California as a whole is in Phase 2 of reopening, which includes businesses state health officials have classified as involving a lower risk for virus transmission. This involves things like retail shopping, manufacturing, office spaces and in-restaurant dining, all with required modifications to operations intended to limit spread of the contagious virus (things like requiring the use of masks, or restricting a building’s normal occupancy).
Phase 3 of reopening includes businesses and venues seen as having a higher risk for the virus spread, such as gyms and fitness centers where equipment is typically shared. Phase 4 would represent the end of the stay-at-home order, which would see the return of crowd events like concerts, sporting events with fans in attendance, commencement ceremonies and other large gatherings.
Earlier in May, as the state as a whole was easing into Phase 2 reopening, Newsom announced greater leeway for individual counties to govern their reopening in a “regional variance” model.
Shortly after California was cleared to reopen retail businesses on a curbside pickup-only basis, the governor’s office announced that counties that met a certain set of criteria indicating low infection and fatality figures — as well as high rates of testing and the capacity to contact trace known cases — would be allowed to accelerate further into Phase 2, reopening things like sit-down restaurants, retail stores for more than just pickup and both indoor and outdoor shopping malls.
A handful of counties, including Placer, El Dorado and Nevada, were among the first given the OK from the state after filing “self-attestation” documents for their reopening plans in the first round. In mid-May, Newsom loosened counties’ reopening criteria to drop the death requirement. As of Thursday morning, 47 of the state’s 58 counties were cleared for accelerated Phase 2.
On Monday the state announced in-store retail shopping and places of worship could open in all 58 counties; and on Tuesday, Newsom said professional haircuts and shaves were permitted in the 47 approved counties, though nail salons will still stay closed.
Barbershops and hair salons had for weeks been classified as Phase 3 businesses, but appear to have been recategorized: the state’s COVID-19 website now shows a list of Phase 2 workplaces that include “limited personal services,” which previous iterations of lists have defined as professional haircuts. The announcement caught some local businesses by surprise: they were suddenly allowed to cut hair, but most needed a little more time to prepare.
To summarize what can and cannot open as of now, these businesses and institutions are permitted by the state to open across all of California, with a number of guidelines in place, though individual counties may institute their own restrictions:
- Retail businesses
- Manufacturing
- Offices where telework cannot be performed
- Outdoor museums
- K-12 schools
- Places of worship
These businesses may open only in the 47 counties approved for faster reopening, according to the state’s COVID-19 webpage:
- Barbershops and hair salons
- Dine-in restaurants
The following businesses may not open anywhere in California as of Thursday morning. This list is not exhaustive:
- Bars and nightclubs
- Nail salons and tattoo parlors
- Gyms and fitness centers
- Indoor museums
- Entertainment venues including movie theaters, card rooms and professional sports arenas
- Theme parks
- Leisure and tourism businesses, as well as hotels or lodging for nonessential travel
- Higher education
Lawsuit claims homeless sweeps continue despite Sacramento order
Homeless activists on Wednesday filed a lawsuit alleging that Sacramento police and county sheriff’s deputies have been clearing encampments during the coronavirus pandemic, despite federal and local guidelines prohibiting sweeps.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on March 22 released guidelines including the following directive: “Unless individual housing units are available, do not clear encampments during community spread of COVID-19. Clearing encampments can cause people to disperse throughout the community and break connections with service providers. This increases the potential for infectious disease spread.”
Police continued to direct homeless people to move from several downtown locations, as The Sacramento Bee reported at the time.
On May 22, the county issued an updated public health order saying the CDC guidance should be “strictly followed.”
Wednesday’s lawsuit, filed in Sacramento County Superior Court, alleges that “sweeps” to clear encampments have continued and seeks a court order to stop law enforcement from doing so.
The lawsuit was filed by the Sacramento Homeless Union, Sacramento Solidarity of Unhoused Persons and eight homeless people against defendants that include the city, Sacramento County, Sacramento Mayor Darrell Steinberg, Sacramento Police Chief Daniel Hahn, Sacramento County Sheriff Scott Jones, the county Department of Health Services and others.
The union collected signed statements from nearly 100 homeless people describing sweeps, the lawsuit says.
Sacramento County Sheriff’s Office spokeswoman Tess Deterding said the office is not proactively clearing encampments but that deputies are “continuing to serve business owners and property owners in keeping encampments off their private property” in response to complaints.
The city declined comment on the lawsuit Wednesday because the city had not yet been served with it, a city spokesman said.
As of Tuesday night, 480 homeless people were staying in trailers and motel rooms the county acquired for coronavirus response, while 86 units were empty, according to county spokeswoman Janna Haynes. County officials have also moved 30 families into permanent housing and provided more than 31,000 meals to encampments, she said.
Anthony Prince, an attorney for the Sacramento Homeless Union who filed the lawsuit, criticized the county for leaving motel rooms empty, which he called “disgraceful” during a Wednesday news conference outside the courthouse.
Tahoe travel ban order dropped by El Dorado County
El Dorado County has lifted its ban on nonessential travel into the Lake Tahoe basin, but is still discouraging visitors due to the coronavirus pandemic and statewide shutdown.
The county in a news release late Thursday said the travel order is being rescinded because of El Dorado’s “sufficient testing and contact tracing capacity” for COVID-19. The local order had been in place since April 3.
Because Gov. Gavin Newsom’s statewide stay-at-home order remains in effect, nonessential trips are still considered off-limits.
The main consequence of rescinding the local order is that a $1,000 administrative fine that travelers faced for violating the order has been eliminated.
As of Thursday afternoon, the Lake Tahoe region had the most reported COVID-19 cases with 30, according to county data. El Dorado County reported three new COVID-19 cases Thursday; two of them in the Lake Tahoe region. The county has a total of 84 confirmed cases.
Latest Sacramento-area numbers: About 1,800 positive cases
The four-county Sacramento region had more than 1,800 confirmed COVID-19 cases and 88 deaths as of Thursday afternoon, with another 71 COVID-19 cases and three deaths reported in nearby Sutter and Yuba counties. One new death was reported Thursday in Yolo County, and Placer County reported a new death last Friday.
As of Thursday morning, Sacramento County health officials reported 1,349 infections — an increase of 30 from the previous day’s update, for the biggest single-day increase in the reported number since April 23 — and 56 deaths. The county’s last reported death came May 18. The large jump in increased cases may reflect a lag in reporting, which is dynamic, the health department dashboard notes.
Yolo County reported two new COVID-19 cases Thursday; the county has reported a total of 207 cases and 23 deaths related to the virus. Of those deaths, 16 have been connected to Stollwood Convalescent Hospital in Woodland. One new death of someone infected at the Woodland facility was reported Thursday. The county reported five new COVID-19 cases on Wednesday, two new cases Tuesday and four new cases on Monday.
Placer County reported two new cases Thursday after disclosing six on Wednesday. There are a total of 196 cases and nine deaths in Placer County. The county’s first death in more than a month was reported last Friday, the same day the county reported eight new COVID-19 cases. Friday’s spike in new cases was the biggest since May 2, according to county data.
El Dorado County reported three new COVID-19 cases Thursday; the county has a total of 84 cases and no deaths related to the virus. The county reported one new COVID-19 case Wednesday, two new cases on Tuesday and four new cases on Monday. The county reported seven new cases on Friday, which were all from household contacts with an earlier positive case.
Sutter County reported no new cases on Thursday, but it had two new confirmed COVID-19 cases on Monday. The county has reported a total of 42 COVID-19 cases and two deaths related to the virus.
Yuba County reported one new confirmed COVID-19 case on Thursday. The county has reported a total of 29 COVID-19 cases and one death related to the virus.
358,000 dead worldwide, 101,000 in US
The United States on Wednesday surpassed the 100,000 mark in total COVID-19 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University.
By Thursday afternoon, the global death toll was over 358,000. Following the United States are the United Kingdom at 37,900 dead, Italy at 33,000, France at 28,500 and Spain at over 27,000. The most rapid growth in death rate is currently happening in Brazil, where over 25,500 have died, according to Johns Hopkins.
Within the U.S., about 29,500 have died from the coronavirus in New York state, followed by over 11,000 in New Jersey and more than 6,600 in Massachusetts. Next are Michigan, Pennsylvania and Illinois, each at just over 5,000 dead. California, Connecticut, Louisiana, Maryland, Florida, Ohio and Indiana report between 2,000 and 4,000 deaths from the virus.
The U.S. has by far the highest reported infection total, with more than 1.7 million of the world’s 5.76 million lab-confirmed cases as of Thursday afternoon, according to Johns Hopkins. Second on the list is Brazil at over 411,000 cases.
What is COVID-19? How is the coronavirus spread?
Coronavirus is spread through contact between people within 6 feet of each other, especially through coughing and sneezing that expels respiratory droplets that land in the mouths or noses of people nearby. The CDC says it’s possible to catch the disease COVID-19 by touching something that has the virus on it, and then touching your own face, “but this is not thought to be the main way the virus spreads.”
Symptoms of the virus that causes COVID-19 include fever, cough and shortness of breath, which may occur two days to two weeks after exposure. Most develop only mild symptoms, but some people develop more severe symptoms, including pneumonia, which can be fatal. The disease is especially dangerous to the elderly and others with weaker immune systems.
This story was originally published May 28, 2020 at 8:27 AM.
