Coronavirus updates: California COVID crisis deepens; Granite Bay party scrutinized
Two months in and now in a new calendar year, California remains in an intense coronavirus surge, with hospitals across a majority of the state either already overwhelmed or bracing for that in the near future.
Health experts still expect that the next few weeks could see already-record levels of virus deaths and hospitalizations soar even higher due to the recent holiday double whammy of Christmas and New Year’s Eve.
The state on Monday surpassed 2.4 million lab-confirmed cases and added nearly 100 new COVID-19 deaths for 26,635 across the entire pandemic, according to the California Department of Public Health. In the past two weeks, California has added more than 500,000 cases and nearly 4,000 deaths, averages of about 38,000 infections and 283 fatalities per day. The latter mark is twice as high as the peak of the summer surge.
Neither figure yet factors in the likely impact of the two recent holidays. In fact, reporting delays and backlogs related to them may still be keeping the reported numbers significantly lower than their true totals, though the state did add a record-setting 585 deaths on New Year’s Day that included a large backlog from Los Angeles County.
More than 21,000 virus patients were hospitalized with COVID-19 as of a Monday morning data update, including nearly 4,600 in intensive care units, according to CDPH.
The state’s aggregate ICU capacity has been 0% for well over a week, driven by the dire situations in Southern California and the San Joaquin Valley, which combine for about 27 million residents.
Some of the hardest-hit hospitals in Southern California have taken drastic measures, clearing out gift shops or conference rooms to treat patients, the Los Angeles Times and other local and national news outlets have reported in recent weeks.
And to top it all off, the state disclosed last week that a new variant of COVID-19, originally identified in the United Kingdom and believed to be more transmissible than other variants, has been confirmed in California. The first case in the state came in a San Diego County resident with no reported travel history.
Gov. Gavin Newsom first broke the news during a virtual conversation with Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation’s leading infectious disease expert.
In a news conference Monday afternoon, Newsom said there have now been at least six total cases of the new variant confirmed statewide, all in Southern California: four in San Diego County and two in San Bernardino County. The four San Diego cases include one person who is hospitalized.
Health experts have attributed the ongoing surge, which started to take root around early November, to a combination of holiday gatherings going back to Halloween combined with societal pandemic fatigue.
“What you’re seeing right now is a complete function of people not being able to stay apart, not being patient,” Bradley Pollock, associate dean for Public Health Sciences at the UC Davis School of Medicine, recently told The Sacramento Bee. “This is just human nature, we’re social creatures.“
Where is California in its vaccination timeline?
Newsom announced during Monday’s news conference that a little over 454,000 Californians have had their first shot of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine administered.
Both vaccines are two-shot regimens that are taken a few weeks apart — three weeks for Pfizer’s, four for Moderna’s.
The governor said 1.3 million doses of vaccine have arrived in the state. That’s a discrepancy of a half-million from the federal government’s figure. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says as of Monday that California has received 1.8 million doses.
Newsom said about 600,000 doses were en route but not yet in California. The CDC’s tracker showed a similar number for vaccines administered in the state — 451,000 — as the one given by Newsom.
The U.S. as a whole is well behind schedule in terms of the vaccine. After the Trump administration’s “Operation Warp Speed” set a goal of having 20 million shots in arms by the end of 2020, the CDC reports only 15 million doses distributed and 4.5 million “initiating” doses administered by the fourth day of 2021.
That, coupled with intensifying surges in states like California plus multiple states identifying cases of the U.K. variant, has led to some scientific debate on whether it makes more sense to hold back half of the received vaccines in reserve for second doses, or to give as many shots as possible as quickly as possible.
Newsom prefers the latter.
“It’s gone too slowly,” he said Monday. “For many of us, all of us, I think, want to see 100% of what’s received immediately administered in people’s arms.”
The earliest doses of vaccine are being given to hospital workers who deal directly with COVID-19 patients, as well as staff and residents of long-term care facilities like skilled nursing homes.
The next subphases, “1b” and “1c,” are still being finalized.
Sacramento stays in stay-at-home order
The state formally announced over the weekend that the 13-county Greater Sacramento area must remain in the state’s strict, regional stay-at-home order until further notice, as health officials noted a few days earlier would likely be the case.
That decision came as the state’s mathematical projections showed the region’s available ICU capacity expected to remain below 15% four weeks from now.
For much of the past three weeks, Greater Sacramento has hovered near but mostly slightly above that mark. However, the region’s availability plummeted from 14% on Friday to just under 7% in a Saturday update from CDPH, before rebounding up to 10% Sunday and 12% on Monday.
Like San Joaquin Valley and Southern California, Greater Sacramento will have to stay in the order until the projections do show ICU space above 15% four weeks into the future.
The Bay Area, in which ICU availability had dropped to 7.9% as of Monday, remains in its required three-week window within the order through this Friday.
The main additional restrictions in the stay-at-home order compared to the strictest tier, purple, in California’s reopening framework are that outdoor restaurant dining and personal care services like barbershops must remain closed.
Only the sparsely populated 11-county region designated “Northern California” has avoided the stay-at-home order. Northern California maintained 30% ICU availability as of Monday’s update.
New Year’s Eve parties violate health orders, state guidelines
A large and lavish New Year’s Eve party at a mansion in Granite Bay brought at least about 100 people together in a flagrant violation of state-issued health orders, according to photos and videos circulating on social media.
The party apparently took place at a home previously owned by actor Eddie Murphy in the gated Los Lagos community. Videos posted publicly to YouTube, Snapchat and other mediums showed crowded rooms, attendees dancing in close proximity and few if any wearing masks.
A Placer County Sheriff’s Office spokesperson confirmed that deputies responded to the mansion for a noise complaint. Those deputies estimated about 100 people in attendance, though social media posts appear to show the true total may have been significantly higher.
In another celebration in Placer County, Destiny Christian Church in Rocklin hosted a wedding for Pastor Greg Fairrington’s daughter on New Year’s Eve. It also flouted the state’s pandemic protocols.
Wedding ceremonies are allowed under even the strict stay-at-home orders, but must be held outdoors and with strict social distancing and masks required. Numerous photos and videos posted publicly to social media appeared to show the Destiny wedding indoors at the church’s main campus, with no social distancing or mask use visible.
Multiple readers notified The Bee about the Destiny Christian wedding days in advance, expressing concern that it could turn into a so-called superspreader event.
Fairrington, in a weekend Facebook video lambasting The Bee’s recent coverage of his church, acknowledged that about 220 people attended the wedding. The pastor has been an outspoken opponent of Newsom and the state’s COVID-19 restrictions.
Placer County, which has a population of about 400,000, has largely taken a hands-off approach to the pandemic. Placer has not had its own local health order in place for months, and law enforcement has opted for an education-based approach rather than enforcing the state order.
The county’s health office last week released a detailed report for COVID-19 activity during most of December. From Dec. 1 to Dec. 28, the county added 6,452 new lab-confirmed cases of the disease — almost half of its 10-month total for the entire pandemic. Placer also suffered 40 of its 125 cumulative COVID-19 deaths in those four weeks.
Based on contact tracing, Placer health officials reported that more than 2,000 of the people with infections confirmed in December reported attending a large gathering. Due to incubation and reporting periods, this total does not include any cases linked to Christmas.
The health office previously noted that 20% of the people with cases confirmed in October and 18% in November reported attending large gatherings.
December’s total works out to 32% — but of all cases, not just those for which an interview was completed. The county that month began using a virtual survey for people with cases who could not be directly reached by phone. It’s unclear how many of these surveys were sent and how many responses were received, and the new system makes direct comparisons with previous months difficult.
The report did enumerate 308 cases for which the type of large gathering was specified. At least 68 of those, or 22%, were explicitly linked to Thanksgiving; another 107, or 35%, were listed as “friend or family gathering (may include Thanksgiving).”
Six-county Sacramento area surpasses 1,200 virus deaths
The six counties that make up the bulk of Greater Sacramento — Sacramento, El Dorado, Placer, Sutter, Yolo and Yuba counties — surpassed 100,000 confirmed cumulative COVID-19 cases early last week. At least 1,235 residents of those six counties have died of the disease.
Sacramento County has reported a total of 69,111 infections since the onset of the pandemic, and at least 898 of those residents have died of COVID-19. County health officials last updated those numbers Monday, reporting 41 new deaths and 3,866 cases — an average of 967 per day — for a four-day window including New Year’s Day.
By date of death occurrence, December last week surpassed August as Sacramento County’s deadliest month of the pandemic. County health officials now report a staggering 223 deaths for Dec. 1 through Dec. 29, 42 more than all of August and still growing.
Virus hospitalizations in Sacramento County have fluctuated recently. The total in hospital beds jumped to a record 524 on Monday, up from 451 on Sunday.
State data showed there were 112 ICU patients countywide as of Monday, up two from Sunday. Available ICU beds were at 81, down one from Sunday.
Placer County health officials have reported a total of 13,755 infections and 125 deaths, also last updated Thursday. The county reported 205 new cases Thursday, with no new fatalities disclosed either day. Placer reported five new deaths on Dec. 28, for the four-day reporting window including Christmas.
State data show Placer’s hospitalized total dropping to 192 on Monday, down from a record 216 Wednesday. The number of ICU patients, though, has risen to an all-time high of 33 with Monday’s update. The state reports 23 ICU beds left available in Placer, up three compared to Sunday.
Yolo County reported a total of 8,402 cases and 117 deaths as of Sunday. Yolo over the weekend reported 305 new cases and eight new deaths for the three-day window including New Year’s Day. County officials noted there would be no update Monday because of problems with the state database.
State data showed Yolo with a record-tying 29 virus patients in hospital beds, including 15 in intensive care. But the state now reports 26 ICU beds available in Yolo County, an increase of nine compared to Sunday.
El Dorado County has reported 5,719 positive test results and 24 deaths, last updated Thursday to add 70 cases and two deaths.
Following just four deaths from March through mid-November, 20 El Dorado residents have died of COVID-19 since Nov. 25, county officials report.
State health officials reported a record-high 35 virus hospitalizations in El Dorado, including 10 in ICUs on Monday. Both totals were the same as on Sunday, but state data showed available ICU beds increased from two to four as hospitals work to bolster surge space.
In Sutter County, at least 6,505 people have been infected and 52 have died, last updated Thursday. The county reported two deaths and 95 cases Thursday, following one death and 70 cases Wednesday.
Neighboring Yuba County has reported 3,898 infections and 19 dead, reporting 40 cases and one new fatality Thursday.
Not all patients are necessarily hospitalized in-county, but the only hospital serving the Yuba-Sutter bi-county region — Adventist-Rideout in Marysville — had 78 COVID-19 patients and 18 in ICUs as of Monday’s state update, the latter dropping two from Sunday’s record-setting 20. One ICU bed remains available.
A hospital spokesperson confirmed to The Bee last week that California National Guard personnel have assisted in Adventist-Rideout’s emergency department “for several weeks” due to hospital staff being stretched thin.
This story was originally published January 4, 2021 at 8:33 AM.
