San Francisco Mayor London Breed said on Wednesday that she expects the city to enter the less restrictive red level next week – meaning restaurants, cinemas and other businesses can open with limits – and get out of the purple, the most restrictive of California’s four-tier system to reopen the economy.
“With the continuous improvement of our COVID-19 health indicators, we can move to the red state level next Wednesday, March 3,” said Breed in a post on Twitter. “This is a big step forward, but we still need to maintain our progress.”
Only nine of California’s 58 counties are in the red layer, including Marin and San Mateo in the bay area. The red layer allows more people to shop indoors and allows other companies to open with a small number of customers. Museums can open with 25% capacity, gyms with 10% and cinemas and restaurants with 25% or 100 people, whichever is less. Only two counties, Sierra and Alpine, reached the orange level, allowing even less restrictions.
The news came when COVID-19 deaths exceeded 50,000 across the state on Wednesday, county data show.
However, new cases of coronavirus continue to fall across the state, and more Californians are becoming eligible to be vaccinated.
In San Francisco, teachers, grocery stores and emergency responders who live or work in the city became eligible to be vaccinated for the first time on Wednesday.
But not everyone managed to make an appointment.
That’s because San Francisco, like many health departments and providers across the state, is prioritizing the second injection for people who took the first few doses a few weeks ago. About 91,000 San Francisco residents are expected to receive their second doses in the coming weeks, according to the Department of Public Health, and many newly eligible people will have to wait two or three weeks until more vaccines arrive.
Craig MacLellan, a San Francisco Whole Foods market worker, was one of thousands who qualified for the vaccine on Wednesday. Around 9 am, he consulted an online vaccine booking system. He hoped to click on his job category, “agricultural and food workers”, to indicate that he was eligible.
But he said the category was not listed. MacLellan checked in about an hour later, and although food and agriculture workers were now listed, the appointments were fully booked.
MacLellan said that because he is young and has no underlying health problems, he feels safe at work. But he is concerned about some of his co-workers.
“Although I am very excited to be part of a group that is capable of doing this, I understand that this is one of the biggest logistical challenges in American history,” said MacLellan. “I imagine there are tens of thousands of people logging into these sites today.”
Even so, some were lucky on Wednesday.
“It’s a great relief,” said Frank Lara, a fifth-grade teacher at the Buena Vista Horace Mann school in San Francisco. He received his first chance on Wednesday afternoon. “It is obviously stressful to try to get there, and I hope everything is organized. But it is a step closer to being in the classroom. “
Vaccination of educators has been a major 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 orange level, meaning there is only one spread. “Moderate” of the virus.
San Francisco administered up to 6,000 shots a day before the winter storm that hit the Midwest caused delays in supply and the closure of mass vaccination sites in the city and throughout California. So far, 80% of the city’s health professionals and people aged 65 and over who are in Phase 1A – health professionals and people living in long-term care facilities – have been vaccinated, Mayor London Breed said on Twitter on Wednesday.
“We can do more than 10,000 doses a day now, once we have more supplies,” added Breed.
The status of the vaccination delay in San Francisco remained uncertain on Wednesday, and city officials did not respond to 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 vaccine had arrived.
The Marin County Health Department said on Wednesday that educators, food service workers and other essential professionals could start scheduling appointments for vaccinations immediately. The agency said it was ready to open its supply after vaccinating more than 60% of all county residents over 65.
“We have made a lot of progress in vaccinating our healthcare professionals and older residents, and it is time to move on to protect our essential workers,” said Dr. Matt Willis, public health officer for Marin County, in a statement.
The Santa Clara County Health Department announced on Wednesday that a major vaccination post at Gilroy High School will open on Sunday. The site, established with the Gilroy Unified School District, will offer up to 2,000 doses of vaccine per day to county residents who qualify in Phase 1B of the state’s vaccine implantation plan, which includes educators and food workers.
“I am hopeful that many of our residents and employees will apply in the near future,” said Dr. Deborah Flores, superintendent of the Gilroy school. “Please apply and get vaccinated as soon as possible.”
Both vaccines currently available in the United States, made by Pfizer and Moderna, are administered in two injections, 21 days or 28 days apart.
In the meantime, some Sonoma County elementary schools may begin to reopen as the coronavirus case count has dropped enough and other requirements have been met, Dr. Sundari Mase, Sonoma County health officer, told a news conference on Wednesday -market.
Schools that wish to reopen can submit a reopening plan, with elementary and high schools waiting until the county changes from purple to red.
Although the number of new coronavirus cases, hospital admissions and deaths from COVID-19 continues to decline, medical experts still warn of the danger of asymptomatic spread.
Dr. Bob Wachter, chairman of the UCSF Department of Medicine, said Monday on Twitter that 1.1% of coronavirus tests in his hospital are positive, although the patient had no symptoms. This means that about 1 in 100 San Francisco residents may be infected with the virus without knowing it.
“So don’t let your guard down, mainly because – if you haven’t been vaccinated – you’ll have a chance in the next 3 months,” said Wachter.
The White House plans to allocate 3 million to 4 million doses of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine by the end of next week if it obtains emergency use authorization from the Food and Drug Administration, said President Biden’s COVID-19 coordinator, Jeff Zients , on Wednesday. The FDA is expected to make a final decision within a few days.
Michael Williams, Aidin Vaziri and Catherine Ho are editors of the San Francisco Chronicle. Email: [email protected], [email protected], [email protected]