Los Angeles County Public Health Director Dr. Barbara Ferrer said today that the country’s most populous county is expected to move to the state’s least restrictive red level “by the end of this week”, beating previous projections of “final of the month “that public health officials had previously announced. The move is not entirely unexpected (and has not been fully formalized yet), given the many, many tips from public officials like Dr. Ferrer and Los Angeles City Mayor Eric Garcetti about a wider reopening last week.
Once formalized, the move to the red level means that restaurants will be able to offer indoor meals at 25 percent of the total business capacity (based on the occupancy certificate) up to 100 people in total, whichever is less. Outdoor dining would also remain in place at current levels, along with existing social detachment and COVID-19 protocols for workers and customers.
“If this week’s adjusted case rate remains below [10 cases per 100,000 residents], our understanding is that within 48 hours after the state announces that the vaccine trigger has been fulfilled, LA County would be moved to the red level and would be allowed to reopen additional activities, ”said Dr. Ferrer just this hour in a media. just press conference.
As Eater noted last week, the move comes in the wake of a state-led effort to redistribute some doses of vaccine to affected communities. As soon as two million total doses are redistributed, the state will announce a change in the data limits it uses to move between restriction levels for each county; raising the data limit means that Los Angeles County would fall into the red layer automatically.
Once again, a formal start date for returning to indoor restaurants as part of the red tier has yet to be announced, although it is possible that the news will arrive soon as part of the state’s state audience of California Governor Gavin Newsom Morada. “We will be moving to prepare changes to the public health order to move to the red level” this week, said Dr. Ferrer, so restaurants that want to resume indoor dining should at least start preparing for the move now . This is a developing story.