A very welcome increase in the availability of intensive care at Bay Area hospitals and slower coronavirus transmission rates paint an optimistic outlook for the coming weeks, but there was no indication on Sunday when the region might emerge from the order of stay at home who are very frustrated with normal life.
State health officials said on Sunday that the four-week projections in the bay area did not meet the criteria for lifting restrictions, and that an update would be available on Monday.
Hopes rose when, after staying in the single digits for weeks, the availability of the Bay Area ICU jumped to 23.4%, according to data released on Saturday, reflecting the situation on Friday. This was an unusually significant jump of 6.5% the day before and seemed to signal that the worst of the increase could have happened in the past. The sentiment was reinforced by a statement sent on Sunday to The Chronicle of Ali Bay, a spokesman for the state Department of Public Health.
“We see promising signs that California is slowly emerging from the most intense stage of this pandemic,” said the statement.
The rate of positive tests in California in the last 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, an increase of less than 1% over Friday’s total, the data show.
But in San Francisco, Sunday brought a break from the good news that led the Mayor of London Breed to predict on Friday that the city could soon “start reopening under California guidelines” due to a drop in transmission rates . The day after registering the lowest number of new coronavirus infections in two months, 111, San Francisco reported an increase on Sunday, 283 new cases. New infections have dropped to less than 200 a day since Monday, but Sunday was more in line with last week’s rise in daily infections.
San Francisco also recorded one of the highest death totals of the month, 15, after a week of days with a single digit or zero.
City officials did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the latest statistics, but single-day trends have often proved misleading during the course of the pandemic.
Dr. John Swartzberg, an infectious disease specialist at UC Berkeley, said he is “provisionally confident” that the current increase, which began in late November, has peaked.
“This is what the data looks like and, frankly, it is what the data looks like nationally,” except for some other states, he said. Still, he added, there is no obvious end in sight. “What we see with the last two waves here in the United States and California is that we have a wave and a crest, but we never went back to where we were before. It’s like climbing stairs. “
Under the California system, the regional home stay application must be suspended when a region’s ICU availability is projected to be 15% or more in the next four weeks. The projections specifically consider the ICU’s capacity at the end of the four-week period.
For example, the state’s department of public health would analyze Monday’s data to make projections for February 22. Projections are based on the ICU’s current regional 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 have been administered across the state, out of 4.1 million doses distributed, while the country is recovering from a slower-than-expected initial implantation.
The image of vaccination nationally caused Xavier Becerra, the former California attorney general chosen by President Biden to be the United States health secretary, to express his frustration on Sunday about long lines, delays in supply and confusion about where and when to get the vaccines.
“The plane is sinking and we are going to pull it up,” he told CNN. “This is not America. … This is not how we treat those we consider vulnerable and who need the vaccine most ”.
Becerra said he could not project when all Americans who want a chance will get it. Biden pledged to distribute 100 million vaccines in his first 100 days in office.
In Placer County last week, a person died hours after receiving the vaccination, after testing positive for the coronavirus in late December, said the Placer County sheriff’s office on Saturday. The county’s public health department did not administer the vaccine, officials said. Sheriff’s office officials said on Sunday that they had no further information.
Lauren Hernandez and Jill Tucker, editors of the San Francisco Chronicle, contributed to this report.
Tatiana Sanchez is a writer for the San Francisco Chronicle. Email: [email protected] Twitter: @TatianaYSanchez