With COVID-19 cases on the decline, Los Angeles and Orange counties are getting closer and closer to being able to significantly reopen their economies.
Both densely populated counties are now on the verge of potentially moving to the red level, a more permissive category in the state’s reopening roadmap that would allow for broader internal business operations – including in restaurants and gyms – as well as resuming face-to-face classes. 7th to 12th grade students.
The earliest that any county can move forward is two weeks from now, and they will only do so if selected coronavirus transmission measures reach certain state-established benchmarks.
But officials in both counties said they believed there was progress on the horizon.
“I am very optimistic that, in two weeks from now, we will be able to enter the red level,” said Dr. Clayton Chau, director of the OC Health Care Agency and county health officer, during a press conference Tuesday market.
Los Angeles County Department of Public Health officials told The Times on Tuesday that they are equally hopeful.
But officials are also calling for caution, saying conditions could still deteriorate if residents and businesses are not careful. The fall and winter coronavirus wave hit southern California and, to date, the region’s reopening has been slower than other areas in the state.
Here’s what we know:
Basics of reopening
In California’s coronavirus reopening plan, each county is assigned to one of four color-coded levels – ranging from the strictest, purple, to the red, then orange, and finally yellow, the most permissive.
Level assignments are based on three criteria: average daily case rates, adjusted based on the number of tests performed; the rate of positivity of the test; and a health equity metric designed to ensure that the rate of positivity in poorer communities is not significantly worse than the overall number in the county.
Counties must meet the criteria for the next level for two weeks to advance to it.
In each layer, there are a set of restrictions that counties must follow. In the purple layer, for example, many companies and public facilities need to suspend or severely limit internal operations.
Where are LA, OC
LA County, long the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak in California, now meets two of the three criteria needed to progress to the red level. The rate of cases is what is preventing the region.
To move forward, LA County needs that number to be no more than 7.0 new cases per day per 100,000 people. As of Tuesday, it was 7.2, according to the latest state data. Last week, it was 12.3; in the previous week, there were 20.
The case rate for Orange County was most recently calculated at 7.6. Last week it was 11.9, down from 20.7 the previous week.
Orange County has already reached the red level before, but returned to purple in mid-November, when state officials drastically reduced the reopening in much of the state, as coronavirus infections began to increase.
LA County, on the other hand, never left the purple layer. The color-coded system was unveiled in late August.
“As there is still widespread transmission occurring in our county, we hope to see no increase in the number of daily cases in the coming weeks, which will disrupt our recovery journey and cause more hospitalizations,” said county director of public health, Barbara Ferrer, in a statement. “With the increased circulation of variants, we need to ask our residents, workers and companies to continue to follow safety measures … including wearing a mask and physically distancing themselves from others who are not at home to prevent it from spreading. . ”
What turning red means
Red tier counties may allow indoor restaurants and cinemas to reopen with a capacity of 25% or up to 100 people, whichever is less. Indoor gyms and dance and yoga studios can open at 10% capacity. Museums, zoos and aquariums can open indoor activities at 25% capacity, and non-essential stores and libraries can open at 50% capacity, above 25% capacity.
The red layer, however, still keeps several places closed – including amusement parks and convention centers; bars, breweries and distilleries where meals are not provided; indoor pools; indoor entertainment areas, such as bowling alleys, escape rooms and laser tag facilities; and internal card rooms. Watching professional sports outdoors in person is still prohibited in the red layer.
Counties can unblock these activities, although to a large extent still in a modified form, when they move into the orange and yellow layers.
All level rules serve as a basis for local health agencies, which can adopt even stricter regulations if they feel it is necessary, although they cannot be more lenient.
Reopens elsewhere in California
As of Wednesday, seven new counties have moved to the red level.
The advance of Santa Clara, San Francisco, San Luis Obispo, El Dorado, Napa, Lassen and Modoc increases the number of counties that have moved from the purple layer to 18 and increases the number of Californians living outside areas with the greatest fence restrictions from 1.6 million to 5 million, or about 13% of the state’s population.
The counties of Del Norte, Humboldt, Trinity, Shasta, Plumas, Yolo, Marin, San Mateo and Mariposa were already in the red layer. Two counties – Sierra and Alpine – have taken it a step further towards the orange level.
No county is currently in the less rigorous yellow category.
Based on state data released on Tuesday, 12 counties could potentially move forward next week, including nine currently in the purple layer: Alameda, Butte, Calaveras, Imperial, Mono, Placer, Santa Cruz, Solano and Tuolumne.
The City News Service contributed to this report.