Some of California’s largest counties – including Los Angeles – may be ready to unlock parts of their savings later this week, if certain state benchmarks are met.
The potentially accelerated opening in places like Los Angeles, Orange and San Bernardino counties is possible thanks to a redesign of the California coronavirus reopening plan that state officials announced last week.
It works like this: 40% of the COVID-19 vaccines available in the state will now be dedicated to residents in the most disadvantaged areas of California – a massive commitment that officials say will help address the stark inequalities in vaccine administration.
Once 2 million doses have been administered in these communities, the state will relax the limit necessary for a county to move out of the more restrictive purple category of the state’s four-layer color-coded reopening roadmap.
Currently, counties must have an adjusted daily rate of coronavirus cases equal to or less than seven new cases per day per 100,000 people to move to the most permissive red level. But after the state reaches its 2 million dose target, which is likely to happen this week, counties with a case rate of up to 10 new cases per day per 100,000 people will become eligible for the red level.
According to state data, nearly 1.88 million total doses of vaccine have been administered by Monday in the target communities – those in the lowest quartile of California’s Healthy Places index.
LA, Orange and San Bernardino counties were among those that recorded adjusted case rates below 10 new cases per day per 100,000 people last week. If they fall below that threshold again when the state updates its classification data on Tuesday, it appears that these counties would be allowed to advance to the next level of reopenings.
“Our understanding is that within 48 hours after the state announces that the vaccine trigger has been fulfilled, LA County – along with other counties with qualifying case rates – would be moved to the red level and would be allowed to reopen to additional activities, ”LA County Public Health director Barbara Ferrer said during a meeting on Monday.
County health officials are already “working with the Board of Supervisors and all of our sectors to plan what will be a sensible and safe reopening, as permitted by the state, but as appropriate for our county,” she continued.
Red-level counties can allow indoor restaurants and cinemas to reopen with a capacity of 25% or up to 100 people, whichever is less. The face-to-face classes could also be resumed for students from the 7th to the 12th grade.
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.
However, it is not certain that the county of LA would reopen immediately to the extent permitted by the red layer. Counties can adopt stricter, but no more lenient, rules than those of the state.
“As we plan to move to the red level, where additional reopening will be allowed, we are examining science to understand which practices can help reduce the transmission of COVID-19 by the community,” said Ferrer.
She pointed to a study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in the United States, which found that the death rate from COVID-19 decreased in counties where states required masks and increased in counties where states allowed meals at on-site restaurants.
“This is something we should take into account when starting more reopenings in our restaurants,” she said.
While changing the red level cap will speed up reopening in some counties, others are ready to make progress this week, regardless. Based on the latest state data, 12 counties may move forward this week, including nine currently in the purple layer: Alameda, Butte, Calaveras, Imperial, Mono, Placer, Santa Cruz, Solano and Tuolumne.
Governor Gavin Newsom said on Monday that the state is seeing “more and more progress each day as we are reopening our economy and reopening our schools safely for face-to-face public instruction”.
“The light is really strong at the end of this tunnel,” he said during a meeting in Tulare County.
A possible broader reopening is among other positive news for LA County. Officials said the region is also scheduled to receive its largest portion of COVID-19 vaccines in a single week – a welcome, if possibly short-lived, booster that will allow tens of thousands of additional Angelenos to receive their first injection.
The swelling in the expected total of about 312,000 doses this week is a substantial shipment of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, which federal drug regulators recently authorized for emergency use.
Authorities are hopeful that the vaccine will give the California – and the nation’s – vaccination campaign a shot in the arm, as it involves only a single dose.
The other two vaccines released for use in the United States, one from Pfizer-BioNTech and the other from Moderna, require two vaccines, given weeks apart.
LA County expects to receive 53,700 doses of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine this week.
Los Angeles city officials said they plan to administer 88,000 injections this week, and most of them – almost 68,000 – will be the first doses.
“Vaccines are our ticket to ending the pandemic, saving lives, rebuilding our communities and bringing hope for a healthier future,” said Mayor Eric Garcetti in a statement. “We still have a long way to go to safely and quickly vaccinate as many Angelenos as possible – and a larger and more stable dose supply this week means that we can bring relief to more seniors, frontline and essential workers, and anyone eligible to receive a vaccine in our city. “
However, this week’s blessing may be a blip, at least in the short term, as the launch of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine has been delayed by production problems.
“All counties have benefited this week from the additional dose allocation from Johnson & Johnson, but we are not sure whether there will be additional doses from Johnson & Johnson in the next two weeks,” said Ferrer. “And that would have a big impact.”
Supply cuts have been a persistent problem for health agencies across the country.
Newsom said California is working to design a system that can deliver 4 million vaccines a week, although shipments have yet to come close to that level.
In LA County, officials say they could already offer more than 600,000 available hours a week, if they had enough doses.
The state is turning to a new vaccination program administered by Blue Shield of California, with the goal of creating “more efficient distribution, speed, equity and transparency”, according to Newsom.
However, this change met resistance from counties that believe the system would not be able to adequately accommodate their unique needs and diverse populations.
For the time being, COVID-19 vaccines are available to people aged 65 and over, residing in long-term care institutions, such as nursing homes or working in education and daycare, food and agriculture, health, law enforcement or services of emergency.
The number of residents who can receive vaccines is expected to deepen considerably, however, as the state will expand eligibility for millions of people with latent health problems and disabilities starting next week.
Last week, providers across the state administered an average of 184,541 doses per day, according to data compiled by The Times.
To date, nearly 10.4 million total doses have gone to arms across the state, including more than 2.5 million in LA County alone.
These numbers, while encouraging, are still far short of what is needed to end the pandemic. As a result, officials say it remains important, even for those who have been vaccinated, to continue taking steps to curb coronavirus transmission – such as wearing masks in public, keeping physical distance from people they do not live with and regularly washing their hands.
Under new guidance released on Monday, the CDC said that Americans can visit other people in small indoor meetings, without masks or social distance, once they have been fully vaccinated.
“We have been through a lot in the past year and with more and more people being vaccinated, every day we start to turn a page,” said CDC director, Dr. Rochelle Walensky, during an interview. “And as more Americans are vaccinated, a growing body of evidence now tells us that there are some activities that fully vaccinated people can resume with low risk to themselves.”
Residents should also feel confident when it comes time to roll up their sleeves, regardless of the vaccine they are getting, according to Dr. Christina Ghaly, director of health services for LA County.
“Although vaccines are slightly different, the ways in which they are the same are much larger and much more important than the ways in which they are different,” she said on Monday. “They are similar in the attribute that matters most: their ability to prevent the most serious disease courses with COVID and their ability to prevent death. I urge you to get a vaccine, whatever it is, as soon as you are eligible. “
Times staff writers Chris Megerian and Melody Gutierrez contributed to this report.