What's happening in NORTHERN California.

[burger]

Baby steps:

Nothing like a sternly worded recommendation to stop a pandemic.

[dabigv13]

They need to be gradual to a degree for compliance sake I think. Next they should be limiting gatherings to less than 10. Hopefully with that and widespread masking we can avert another SIP.

[Goose]

Baby steps:

Nothing like a sternly worded recommendation to stop a pandemic.

Well, better than doing nothing I guess. I would once again wonder why the SCC Health Department doesn't make it an order, even if Newsom won't. Call it a big hint that maybe they should?

[Snorlax94]

They need to be gradual to a degree for compliance sake I think. Next they should be limiting gatherings to less than 10. Hopefully with that and widespread masking we can avert another SIP.

Assuming one of the biggest drivers are gatherings inside private homes of many households (and more than 10 people), how do you limit that?

The only thing I can think of is a curfew -- maybe you need to leave by 8:30pm driving (except for work or essential activities) and 9:30pm for walking in neighborhoods. If indeed 20 and 30-somethings are driving the growth with socializing and house parties, a curfew could dent that. Curfews feel like a good "stick" that might work.

But we need to do something soon: Easter, Memorial Day and Mother's Day all resulted in upticks, and the July 4 holiday weekend is coming.

[M T]

Well, better than doing nothing I guess. I would once again wonder why the SCC Health Department doesn't make it an order, even if Newsom won't. Call it a big hint that maybe they should?

Look for it, maybe.  The SCC Health Officer has indicated a new order will be out probably Tues or Wed. to take effect a few days later. The hint was that some things will be/remain closed that are open elsewhere.  Not sure if anything will close that was previously open, or whether she just meant things still closed here but open elsewhere.

--------
If you didn't see it, the Calif. data base was down (for maintenance) so SCC couldn't report numbers yesterday. So, today's numbers are for a 2 day period.  135 new cases  (so 67.5 per day),  no new deaths, 82 hospitalized (up 10 I think) (49 acute, 26 ICU, 7 elsewhere).  Latest partial day's test is about (just under) 2% positive.  Previous day to that (still partial) is over 3%.

It looks like LTCF outbreak may be slowing down. In the 2 days, there was 1 more patient & 1 more staff with cases at the hot spot. One of the places that had only staff cases now has at least one patient case.  (I didn't recall the number of LTCF cases, so I can't say exactly how many new cases there are.)

I think things are less hot than a few days ago, but it is too early to tell if this just is a lull before another big jump, or maybe we're easing back a bit, or maybe I'm just misreading the partial results.

-----

By the way, for those who don't know what's being done on contact tracing (and so tend to think nothing is being done), I've been watching the Tuolumne County info.  In the last week they essentially tripled the number of total cases (from 8 to 22).   The county was putting up a short bit about the cases, and it was very clear they were on top of these (local woman at a big family gathering resulting in infection of her & others;  4 clusters popped up; then an out-of-area person developed symptoms at a multi-day event & went in for test & care).

I expect that sort of test, trace, isolate is going on in SCC (and throughout the country) but we just don't hear about it.

---

Assuming one of the biggest drivers are gatherings inside private homes of many households (and more than 10 people), how do you limit that?


The only thing I can think of is a curfew -- maybe you need to leave by 8:30pm driving (except for work or essential activities) and 9:30pm for walking in neighborhoods. If indeed 20 and 30-somethings are driving the growth with socializing and house parties, a curfew could dent that. Curfews feel like a good "stick" that might work.



But we need to do something soon: Easter, Memorial Day and Mother's Day all resulted in upticks, and the July 4 holiday weekend is coming.

In most(not all) of the orders I've looked at, "gatherings" include gatherings inside private homes or on private property.   The "bubble" concept (in some counties) muddies the meaning of a "gathering".  ("Oh officer, we're all in the same bubble. ... Well, I know most of them...")

I absolutely agree about July 4.  We're probably too late to get orders to affect that, but maybe SCC might say something.

I've been hearing a lot of big (professional?) fireworks at night.   These private fireworks displays seem like a nucleus for gatherings ("The city isn't having fireworks, but I am.  C'mon over.  Bring the beer.")   I hope the various police & fire departments staff up for July 3-5 and look for gatherings where there are fireworks.   (Rather than cite each individual, cite the property owner.)

[Genuine Realist]

Well, better than doing nothing I guess. I would once again wonder why the SCC Health Department doesn't make it an order, even if Newsom won't. Call it a big hint that maybe they should?

Look for it, maybe.  The SCC Health Officer has indicated a new order will be out probably Tues or Wed. to take effect a few days later. The hint was that some things will be/remain closed that are open elsewhere.  Not sure if anything will close that was previously open, or whether she just meant things still closed here but open elsewhere.

--------
If you didn't see it, the Calif. data base was down (for maintenance) so SCC couldn't report numbers yesterday. So, today's numbers are for a 2 day period.  135 new cases  (so 67.5 per day),  no new deaths, 82 hospitalized (up 10 I think) (49 acute, 26 ICU, 7 elsewhere).  Latest partial day's test is about (just under) 2% positive.  Previous day to that (still partial) is over 3%.

It looks like LTCF outbreak may be slowing down. In the 2 days, there was 1 more patient & 1 more staff with cases at the hot spot. One of the places that had only staff cases now has at least one patient case.  (I didn't recall the number of LTCF cases, so I can't say exactly how many new cases there are.)

I think things are less hot than a few days ago, but it is too early to tell if this just is a lull before another big jump, or maybe we're easing back a bit, or maybe I'm just misreading the partial results.

-----

By the way, for those who don't know what's being done on contact tracing (and so tend to think nothing is being done), I've been watching the Tuolumne County info.  In the last week they essentially tripled the number of total cases (from 8 to 22).   The county was putting up a short bit about the cases, and it was very clear they were on top of these (local woman at a big family gathering resulting in infection of her & others;  4 clusters popped up; then an out-of-area person developed symptoms at a multi-day event & went in for test & care).

I expect that sort of test, trace, isolate is going on in SCC (and throughout the country) but we just don't hear about it.

---

Assuming one of the biggest drivers are gatherings inside private homes of many households (and more than 10 people), how do you limit that?


The only thing I can think of is a curfew -- maybe you need to leave by 8:30pm driving (except for work or essential activities) and 9:30pm for walking in neighborhoods. If indeed 20 and 30-somethings are driving the growth with socializing and house parties, a curfew could dent that. Curfews feel like a good "stick" that might work.



But we need to do something soon: Easter, Memorial Day and Mother's Day all resulted in upticks, and the July 4 holiday weekend is coming.

Hopefully, the proverbial shot across the bow. 
In most(not all) of the orders I've looked at, "gatherings" include gatherings inside private homes or on private property.   The "bubble" concept (in some counties) muddies the meaning of a "gathering".  ("Oh officer, we're all in the same bubble. ... Well, I know most of them...")

I absolutely agree about July 4.  We're probably too late to get orders to affect that, but maybe SCC might say something.

I've been hearing a lot of big (professional?) fireworks at night.   These private fireworks displays seem like a nucleus for gatherings ("The city isn't having fireworks, but I am.  C'mon over.  Bring the beer.")   I hope the various police & fire departments staff up for July 3-5 and look for gatherings where there are fireworks.   (Rather than cite each individual, cite the property owner.)

---

135 new cases in SCC, which represents a drop over a two day period. But hospitalizations jump by 7, to 82
 Not so good.

[Mick]

An anecdotal case from SCC -- the Mercury News wrote an article about how all the Aqui Tex-Mex restaurants have closed their outdoor seating region-wide after staff members tested positive at an Aqui (which are popular Tex-Mex restaurants, but are also well known as drinking spots).

And there are so many more anecdotal cases supporting bars and parties -- the mother lode being the bar in East Lansing where 85 (!!!!!) patrons so far have contracted Covid! That is the biggest super-spreader I've heard of recently, and it's beyond a super-spreader event, it's a super-spreader location. I'd be curious to have epidemiologists study that bar -- its layout, airflows, etc., so we can learn everything what not to do.
https://www.cnn.com/2020/06/27/us/michig...index.html

Mrs. Mick and I live about 1/2 mile from the Willow Glen Aqui...their margaritas are the strongest drinks you've ever had.  My best guess is that one margarita equals about 2.5 margaritas at, a regular restaurant like the Crow's Nest in Capitola.  We had dinner there on Thursday night on their patio...social distancing yes, masks no.  And then Aqui closed all of their patios, once the Campbell employee was found COVID-19 positive.

And I can't stand East Lansing.  It's a real shame that there was such a bad super-spreader there.  The place is pretty miserable as far as I'm concerned.  Our office there (one of six in Michigan) was very successful, did a lot of state work, but I was also happy to leave that town.

[Goose]

By the way, for those who don't know what's being done on contact tracing (and so tend to think nothing is being done), I've been watching the Tuolumne County info.  In the last week they essentially tripled the number of total cases (from 8 to 22).   The county was putting up a short bit about the cases, and it was very clear they were on top of these (local woman at a big family gathering resulting in infection of her & others;  4 clusters popped up; then an out-of-area person developed symptoms at a multi-day event & went in for test & care).



I expect that sort of test, trace, isolate is going on in SCC (and throughout the country) but we just don't hear about it.

San Mateo County says they track and trace 100% of the cases in the county. If they know where all these cases are coming from, they can contain the disease. The fact we just don't hear about it is disturbing. We don't need all the gory details, but the public needs something to assure them that the County is containing this virus and we won't wake up one day back where we started, community spread and no control.
From my point of view, if each jurisdiction would publish two numbers once a week, we would know whether or not they are containing the virus. Those numbers would be the number of new cases in that period that were already contacts of previously tracked cases, and the number of people they told to quarantine. If the vast majority of the "new" cases each week are contacts of already detected cases, we are containing the disease, because those people were already quarantined when they tested positive. The number of people put into quarantine each week should be at least the same as the number of new cases. Note that the new case themselves  are not put into quarantine. They are put into isolation.  Since the tracing goes both directions, for each positive new case you hope to find the person who infected them. That person also goes into isolation, not quarantine. Since the average number of contacts is usually more than 1, an average of 1 is conservative. Normally, it will be significantly greater than that. The "at least one" is needed to indicate that some tracing is actually going on. For some reason, nobody seems willing to do publish these numbers.

[M T]

You may notice that Santa Clara County's testing results have changed in appearance.  This also corresponds to a change in reporting. (Announcement)

Data Notes: A test represents at least one specimen tested per person per day. Some people will have multiple specimens collected and tested during the same visit but they are only counted once. If a person is tested multiple times on different days then they will show up once for each day they were tested. The positivity rate is the percentage of tests performed that were positive.

Suppose Joe is a healthcare worker who gets tested weekly, and that he's tested negative every time.  Previously, his week-old test got removed from the counts once his newest test came in.   So, the number of negative tests 3 weeks ago would be 3 tests lower than they were originally.   Also, if you look at tests 3 weeks ago, the positive % would be higher than originally reported.  But, if you looked at the cumulative test county, you were seeing individuals.  If 100K tests had been given, that was 100K people.   So you had some sense of the % of people that had tested positive.

Now, he will be in the database of test results multiple times.  So, if "total tests" is 10% of the population of the county, that doesn't mean that 10% of the population has had a test.  The cumulative % positive number (still being reported as 2.72%) is artificially lower.   But the 7-day rolling average will be correct.  The % positive from (say) June 1 will be the same on June 8 and July 8.

They don't say it here, but I think once a positive test is recorded, no more tests are recorded for that person.  If they were, that could drive up the positive % artificially as a patient is tested while still sick.

[Snorlax94]

Hospitalizations in Santa Clara County have more than doubled in the past week to 83 hospitalized and 32 in the ICU.

That's from 40 in the hospital and 25 in the ICU a week ago.

And that's from a low of 25 hospitalized and 9 in ICU on May 31.

Things slowly increased in early June, and stabilized with ~40 hospitalized, but then in the last week the numbers have more than doubled.

(Using the CA open data set that provides historical data)
https://data.ca.gov/dataset/covid-19-hos...anta+Clara

We are still a long ways off from places like Orange County, which has 175 people in the ICU, but still, I feel like the thread should be re-named:
What's happening in NORTHERN California. (YIKES for SCC!)

[oldalum]

But testing in SCC has greatly increased (one day hit 6,000 recently) and percent positive might have peaked at 2.25%.

[Genuine Realist]

Hospitalizations in Santa Clara County have more than doubled in the past week to 83 hospitalized and 32 in the ICU.

That's from 40 in the hospital and 25 in the ICU a week ago.

And that's from a low of 25 hospitalized and 9 in ICU on May 31.

Things slowly increased in early June, and stabilized with ~40 hospitalized, but then in the last week the numbers have more than doubled.

(Using the CA open data set that provides historical data)
https://data.ca.gov/dataset/covid-19-hos...anta+Clara

We are still a long ways off from places like Orange County, which has 175 people in the ICU, but still, I feel like the thread should be re-named:
What's happening in NORTHERN California. (YIKES for SCC!)

We may not be reading the same chart, but I believe the hospitalized number dropped to 78 today. About 100 new cases, which is slightly below recent numbers. but not at all what it was four weeks ago.

[BostonCard]

This article may have already been posted, but if not it suggests reasonable success at test and tracing in the Bay Area.

https://www.sfchronicle.com/health/artic...372556.php

On another note, San Diego is re-closing bars.  It seems intuitive to me that social distancing is antithetical to the purpose of a bar, so it was always going to be a long shot.  Nonetheless, it sucks for my brother, whose job is liquor sales to bars and restaurants.  No sooner was the announcement made than he was told that his furlough, which was initially supposed to last 3 months is now expected to last a full year.

BC

[M T]

This article may have already been posted, but if not it suggests reasonable success at test and tracing in the Bay Area.
https://www.sfchronicle.com/health/artic...372556.php

I posted that in its own thread on Contact Tracing, along with the Mercury News article that gives a less rosy picture.  The SFChronicle article's rosy picture is "Many local counties are approaching their goal of contacting 90% of the region’s positive cases, while others are still scrambling to ramp up their contact-tracing operations."

but then look at the article's data:

• Alameda County’s .. contact tracers were able to reach about 85% of cases as of Wednesday.
  
• Marin County, ... reached 70% of confirmed cases and only 46% of their contacts in the past two weeks.
  
• Contra Costa County contacted 74% of confirmed cases and 68% of their contacts in the first three weeks of June.
  

... that's it.

The article doesn't indicate how quickly they get to the contacts.

The SJMN article also has this data

• San Francisco’s dashboard reports the percentage of new cases and their contacts that health officials reach — both currently 83%, short of the city’s 90% goal. But it doesn’t indicate how quickly the connections are made.
  

---

I'm not sure if this is a new page, but it is new to me.  SCC has a Five Key Indicators page "for Assessing Progress on Containing COVID-19", that is being tracked for each of the Bay Area counties.  Indicator 4 is on tracking.

I was disappointed this was the only indicator that didn't have data behind it.  It indicated the infrastructure must be designed to accomplish

• We reach at least 90% of cases and identify their contacts;
  
• We ensure 90% of the cases that we reach can safely isolate;
  
• We reach at least 90% of all contacts identified; and
  
• We ensure at least 90% of identified contacts can safely quarantine.
  

---

And, to see that contact tracing works, see LA County.  They're contacting 98.1% of their cases each day, within a day (oh, sorry, within a day of assignment).  Of course, it was easier last week. 

• June 29 (latest numbers), they announced 2903 new cases. 
  
• A week before (June 22), it was a leisurely 2571 cases. 
  
• A week before (June 15) was in the doldrums, 1071 cases.  
  
• A week before (June 8), 823 cases.
  

But, as you can see, high case contact percentage means contact tracing is helping to bring down the case counts.

If you don't get my drift, I wonder if LA Co is BBQing on the beach the numbers they give the state.  Today, the state was finally told the percent positive in LACo is 8.2%, the first time they've reported above 8% or higher to the state. (Per the county's website, in 29 days, they've been below 8% one day.  They've been 9% or higher for 16 days.)

Whatever they've been smoking there on the beach, they seemed to have passed it to this tracking site as well.  Look at those COVID infection rate ( R ) numbers.  The entire month of June has been between 1.02 and 1.05, meaning "that COVID continues to spread, but in a slow and controlled fashion."

[M T]

Hospitalizations in Santa Clara County have more than doubled in the past week to 83 hospitalized and 32 in the ICU.
. . .
We are still a long ways off from places like Orange County, which has 175 people in the ICU, but still, I feel like the thread should be re-named:
What's happening in NORTHERN California. (YIKES for SCC!)

California's Step 2 (Targeted Engagement with CDPH) has this for Santa Clara County (I added italics)

Santa Clara County is experiencing increasing hospitalization. Drivers of increased hospitalization may include

    1) increased testing of county residents and individuals from neighboring counties who seek hospital care in Santa Clara County, resulting in an increase of COVID+ patients admitted for observation and treatment;
    2) patient transfers from outside the county;
    3) patient transfers from long term care facilities; and/or increased transmission among residents or individuals from neighboring counties who seek care in hospitals in Santa Clara County.

Although the percentage change in hospitalizations shows an increase, the increase in the absolute number of patients hospitalized is low relative to the size of the population in Santa Clara County and is low relative to the number of hospital beds available in the County.

Key actions to address the increase include
    1) coordination and communication between the local health department and hospitals in the county experiencing increases, to identify underlying causes,
    2) data collection from hospitals that serve large proportions of out-of-jurisdiction patients to identify county of residence,
    3) coordination and communication between the local health department and long term care facilities to support these facilities with caring for residents with confirmed COVID-19 when appropriate to avoid transfer to the hospital, and
    4) increased public messaging, in multiple languages, on the importance of personal protection measures and the risks involved with mass gatherings.

I believe the testing numbers MAY mostly be from SCC, but the above suggests that some of the hospitalized patients may have been transfers from other counties (Imperial County reportedly transferred patients to the Bay Area), and some may be from other counties (potentially Bay Area or maybe Santa Cruz, Monterey, ...) that came to Stanford Hospital for its renowned care or other big hospitals that have more resources than the more rural counties.

So, SCC's hospitalization numbers may not accurately reflect hospitalization of individuals from the county.  If you're worried about how many beds are available, they're the right numbers.  But if you're using hospitalization as a proxy for how widespread is COVID in SCC, the numbers are apparently not right.  If Action #2 is done, maybe we'll have the right numbers for that..

(From Sunday to Monday, there were 6 new LTCF cases and 1 hospitalization.)

[Mick]

This article may have already been posted, but if not it suggests reasonable success at test and tracing in the Bay Area.

https://www.sfchronicle.com/health/artic...372556.php

On another note, San Diego is re-closing bars.  It seems intuitive to me that social distancing is antithetical to the purpose of a bar, so it was always going to be a long shot.  Nonetheless, it sucks for my brother, whose job is liquor sales to bars and restaurants.  No sooner was the announcement made than he was told that his furlough, which was initially supposed to last 3 months is now expected to last a full year.

BC

I'm genuinely sorry to hear that, BC.  I have a brother in San Diego, too.  He's a public defender.  His wife owns a facility that hosts weddings.  Their cash flow is, not surprisingly, zero from that side.  Actually negative since there are some basic upkeep expenses.

31 days and counting until the Federal stimulus for the unemployed runs out...

[Genuine Realist]

This article may have already been posted, but if not it suggests reasonable success at test and tracing in the Bay Area.

https://www.sfchronicle.com/health/artic...372556.php

On another note, San Diego is re-closing bars.  It seems intuitive to me that social distancing is antithetical to the purpose of a bar, so it was always going to be a long shot.  Nonetheless, it sucks for my brother, whose job is liquor sales to bars and restaurants.  No sooner was the announcement made than he was told that his furlough, which was initially supposed to last 3 months is now expected to last a full year.

BC

I'm genuinely sorry to hear that, BC.  I have a brother in San Diego, too.  He's a public defender.  His wife owns a facility that hosts weddings.  Their cash flow is, not surprisingly, zero from that side.  Actually negative since there are some basic upkeep expenses.

31 days and counting until the Federal stimulus for the unemployed runs out...

I think Universal Basic Income (UBI), first cousin to my beloved Net Wealth Tax, is inevitable, and an idea whose time had probably come anyway. I contributed to Andrew Yang, who was running on a primitive version of the UBI - unfortunately, the only idea he had. The concept is actually capitalist, not socialist - t0 insure a thriving mass market for consumer goods - and I think necessary in the present stress.

[burger]

Newsom finally drops the hammer in advance of the 4th of July weekend:

Also, all beach parking closed in LA and Bay Area.  Even if there is not much of transmission happening outdoors, at least this sends the right signal that we have a big problem.  Thumbs up from me.

[OutsiderFan]

Newsom finally drops the hammer in advance of the 4th of July weekend:

Also, all beach parking closed in LA and Bay Area.  Even if there is not much of transmission happening outdoors, at least this sends the right signal that we have a big problem.  Thumbs up from me.

Arizona 28% positive tests. Newsom has a lot of leeway now.

[Snorlax94]

Newsom finally drops the hammer in advance of the 4th of July weekend:

Also, all beach parking closed in LA and Bay Area.  Even if there is not much of transmission happening outdoors, at least this sends the right signal that we have a big problem.  Thumbs up from me.

+1 Agreed

One step I might’ve taken it further — cardboarders might recall discussion about an Aqui restaurant famous for their “industrial strength margaritas”

The problem is some restaurants can be virtually outdoor bars, which leaves many outdoor bars open. This might be going to far for some, but I’d cease the serving of alcohol at any restaurant. It’s inconsistent and unfair to close only bars, when restaurants can turn around and essentially be bars.