san diego: dialed in: CoViD-19: San Diego Reports Under 1,000 New Cases For First Time Since November 29 | Dr. Ghaly Cautiously Optimistic

We went to the Zoo! The San Diego Zoo reopened on Saturday and I made a handful of reservations last Monday when the Stay-At-Home order was lifted. We arrived around 3pm and there was no line at the health screening and no line to get in, though there was a peahen walking through the gate when we got there which was pretty cute. It wasn't crowded at all which was nice, and everyone mostly seemed to be masked and compliant with distancing, except for the few Mommy Militias who always seem to have 18 kids running around shoving Cheetos or Takis in their grubby little vector faces. It was fun and there are a lot of babies...we didn't glimpse the few-day old giraffe who was hiding in its barn, but the babirusa piglets were adorable with their zoomies. We have reservations for Wednesday at Safari Park. After the zoo we got Tacos el Panson, so it almost felt like life is getting back to normal.

Which is also to say I have some catching up to do. I've got some media briefings to watch and emails to read. I'll make sure they make it to the next post if there's anything worthwhile to share. Stay safe out there!

COVID-19:

The temporal association of introducing and lifting non-pharmaceutical interventions with the time-varying reproduction number (R) of SARS-CoV-2: a modelling study across 131 countries - The Lancet (2.1.2021)
Will Virus Mutations Threaten COVID-19 Vaccines? We don't yet know whether new variants of the coronavirus may impede vaccines’ efficacy. But they shouldn’t change anything about our approach to public health. - Foreign Policy (1.29.2021)
The world has invested billions of dollars in coronavirus vaccine development. Now that safe and effective vaccines are becoming available, it’s essential we protect these precious resources. The best way to do this is to control virus transmission using the measures we know work—testing, tracing, isolating, mask-wearing, and physical distancing. Vaccination is, of course, also a very important part of this strategy, but must be rolled out alongside the tried and true methods. Controlling the pandemic globally requires us to work together. Only then can we be protected from the very real threat posed by virus mutations today—and in the future.
Despite drop in global COVID-19 cases, WHO says keep guard up - CIDRAP (2.1.2021)
Demographic Characteristics of Persons Vaccinated During the First Month of the COVID-19 Vaccination Program — United States, December 14, 2020–January 14, 2021 - MMWR (2.1.2021)
As the vaccination program expands, it is critical to ensure efficient and equitable administration to persons in each successive vaccine priority category, especially those at highest risk for infection and severe health outcomes.
The impact of vaccination on COVID-19 outbreaks in the United States - Oxford Academic (1.30.2021)
A study mathematically modeled the effect of COVID vaccines on the pandemic in the United States. The researchers took into account the known effectiveness of the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines, assumed 40% of the population would be vaccinated within 300 days, assumed 10% of the population had been exposed, and calibrated the model to how fast the virus is currently spreading. The results demonstrated that the vaccines would cut the transmission rate by half (especially among those over 65) and reduce hospitalizations by 64%, intensive care unit admissions by 66%, and overall deaths by 70%. (Summary by COVID Act Now)
Those Most Likely to Get Covid Are Last in Line for Vaccines. Distribution plans that favor people with time and internet access hurt Black and Latinx people disproportionately. - Wired (2.2.2021)
Weekly Epidemiological Update, as of 31 January 2021 - WHO
Globally, just under 3.7 million new cases were reported in the past week, a decline of 13% from last week, and the number of new deaths reported was over 96 000, comparable to the previous week. This brings the cumulative numbers to over 102.1 million reported cases and over 2.2 million deaths globally since the start of the pandemic.

Politics:

411 Mayors Sign Letter Demanding Congress Pass Joe Biden's Stimulus, Economic Relief Bill - Newsweek (2.2.2021)
Austin ousts Pentagon advisory board members as he roots out Trump appointees. The Trump administration booted several members of the advisory boards after losing the election and installed political operatives and loyalists in their place. - Politico (2.1.2021)

Other Reading/Watching:

Not snow nor pandemic keeps Punxsutawney Phil from his job - AP News (2.1.2021)

Global COVID-19 Stats (JHU 2.2.2021 10:23pm):

103,877,370 Known Cases
2,253,170 Known Deaths

US COVID-19 Stats

(JHU)

26,432,150 Cases
446,807 Deaths

(COVID Tracking Project):

115,619 New Cases/26,052,734 Known Cases (3.9%+ Change over 7 Days)
3,486 New Deaths/437,237 Known Deaths
92,880 Current COVID-19 Hospitalizations
18,388 Currently COVID-19 patients in ICU
6,047 COVID-19 patients currently on ventilator

Secretary of HHS Dr. Mark Ghaly Media Briefing:

Hospitalizations/ICUs
Projected ICU on 3/1

Southern CA 43.7%
San Joaquin 35.1%
Bay Area 33.3%
Greater Sacramento 31.4%
Northern CA 29.2%

Protected capacity depends on 4 variables

Current ICU
Community Transmission
Regional Case Rates
Proportion of cases admitted to ICUs

COVID-19 Variants:

CA is actively sequencing and building up capacity to do more
West Coast Variants

B.1.429 767 Cases
B.1.427 290 Cases

UK Variant:

B.1.1.7 133 Cases (across 5 counties)

Masking Matters:

It protects wearers and others around us
Needs to be made of materials that filters out more aerosols
Fits closely to face without gaps around the sides
Consistently wear over mouth and nose
Wear when around people not in your home
If you work in public-facing work or live in vulnerable communities or have vulnerable wear masks in your home, too

Vaccinate All 58

3.5+ Million Vaccinations Reported Administered (3,523,111 as of 2/1)
Sign up for MyTurn
Advancing Equity with Payments for performance: hardest hit communities, communities of color, targeted outreach and engagement efforts, facilitating evening accessibility, tranlastion/physical services, etc.
Other tactics include public education, ethnic media

All CA Counties are back in Blueprint, 18 Counties are under 25/100,000 residents
Safer Super Bowl Tips

Keep our guard up so a surge like post-Thanksgiving doesn't happen again
Don't turn Super Bowl into Super Spreader events
Only watch game with your household
Move it outdoors, wear a mask, stay 6 feet apart
#StopTheSpread

Lunar New Year

Celebrate Year of the Ox safely
Avoid in-person gatherings
Limit celebrations to your household
Move it outdoors, wear a mask, stay 6 feet apart

Media Questions:

Working on racial data with local partners/data gathering
Working on third party administrator agreements with Blue Shield and Kaiser. More information next week.
COVID rates are lower, but still high, far above threshold for moving to less restrictive tiers for most counties. A spring surge of variants could still happen.
People with severe disabilities will be addressed with a new plan rollout to come at unspecified time
Specifics and order of 1B will be rolled out between now and next week
State is working with county partners to determine when homeless and incarcerated individuals will be vaccinated, also prioritizing older/vulnerable, people with chronic illnesses

California COVID-19 Data:

State of California Safe Schools For All Hub
Vaccination progress dashboard
Aggregate California ICU Bed Availability: 11.7%
R-effective: 0.78
12,064 New Cases/3,270,770 Total Cases (0.4% increase)/16,798 7-Day Average
422 New Deaths/41,330 Total Deaths (1% increase)
7.2% 14-day test positivity rate/6.4% 7-Day Positivity/38% decrease from 2 weeks ago
14,999 COVID-19 Hospitalizations (-213 patients, -1.4% from prior day)
-28.8% COVID hospitalizations in past 2 weeks 18.9%
3,894 COVID-19 ICU hospitalized in CA (-55 patients, -1.4% from prior day)
-18.9% COVID ICU in past 2 weeks
1,284 ICU beds available (-6 from prior day)

California’s Office of the Small Business Advocate announced today that Round 2 of the Small Business COVID-19 Relief Grant Program is open.
The $500 million grant program is intended for small businesses and nonprofits impacted by COVID-19. Grants range in size from $5,000 to $25,000.
Waitlisted applicants automatically moved into round 2 and don't need to reapply.
Important Dates for Round 2:

Application Opens: February 2, 2021 at 8:00am PST
Application Closes: February 8, 2021 at 6:00pm PST
Notifications about Selection: February 11-18, 2021 (notification will be sent out on a rolling basis)
Notifications about Waitlist: begins February 22, 2021
Notification about Not Selected: February 24, 2021

San Diego County

Free Testing Sites and Schedule in San Diego
VaccinationSuperstationSD
Vaccination Dashboard
State Data:

Southern California ICU Bed Availability: 9.1%
R-effective: 0.81
1,082 New Cases/239,121 Total Cases
16 Deaths/2,619 Total Deaths
50.5 cases/100k population (Assessed on 2/1. Unadjusted Case Rate)
10.5% Test Positivity (Assessed on 2/1)
14% Health Equity Positivity (Assessed on 2/1)
1,334 COVID-19 hospitalized patients (-13 patients, -1% from prior day)
386 COVID-19 ICU hospitalized patients (-1 patients, -0.3% from prior day)
154 ICU beds available (-7 from prior day)

County Data:

San Diego County Update - County News Center
San Diego County COVID Watch February 2

1/17-1/30: 26,341 Cases
11,641 Interviewed:

7,300 reported no community exposure 62.7%
381 bars and restaurants
1,006 retail locations
350 childcares and TK-12 schools
1,063 travel related exposures

926 New Cases/240,050 Total Cases
10 New Daily Deaths/2,629 Total Deaths
525,675 Doses Shipped/343,470 Doses Administered
9% Daily Test Positivity/9.8% (7-day avg after 7-day lag)/8% Test Positivity (14-day average)
42.5 cases/100k population (Assessed on 2/1. Adjusted case rate per 100,000 excluding prisons.)
91% Case Investigation
-2.9% Day Over Day COVID-19 Hospitalizations (1,246 patients. -18% increase over 30 days)
17% ICU Capacity (372 patients. 0% increase over 30 days)
44 Staffed ICU Beds Available
4 New/57 Community Outbreaks (7-day)