Gov. Newsom announces regional stay-at-home order that could take effect in the next few days
Governor Gavin Newsom announced a new regional stay-at-home order that will be triggered when fewer than 15% of beds are available in ICUs for regional hospital networks.
Watch Newsom's full announcement below:
Newsom said the order isn't currently in place for any of the regions, but that could change within the next few days. ICU capacity in the region of Southern California, which Riverside County is apart of, is at 20.60% as of Dec. 3, according to the state's website.
When the new order takes effect in a region, the state will order them to close hair salons and barber shops, limit retail stores to 20% capacity and only allow restaurants to offer take-out and delivery. Non-essential travel will also be limited, but the governor offered no details on this at this time.
The order would remain in place for at least three weeks.
Sectors that will remain open when a region is placed into the order include schools that are already open.
CA's Five Regions:
- Northern California: Del Norte, Glenn, Humboldt, Lake, Lassen, Mendocino, Modoc, Shasta, Siskiyou, Tehama, Trinity
- Bay Area: Alameda, Contra Costa, Marin, Monterey, Napa, San Francisco, San Mateo, Santa Clara, Santa Cruz, Solano, Sonoma
- Greater Sacramento: Alpine, Amador, Butte, Colusa, El Dorado, Nevada, Placer, Plumas, Sacramento, Sierra, Sutter, Yolo, Yuba
- San Joaquin Valley: Calaveras, Fresno, Kern, Kings, Madera, Mariposa, Merced, San Benito, San Joaquin, Stanislaus, Tulare, Tuolumne
- Southern California: Imperial, Inyo, Los Angeles, Mono, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino, San Diego, San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara, Ventura
Newsom stressed that ICU admissions due to COVID-19 spiked by 67% in recent weeks, in conjunction with a statewide surge in cases that has also seen a disturbing rise in fatalities. He said the state reported just 14
deaths on Nov. 2, but now has had back-to-back days of 113 deaths, with nearly 1,000 fatalities in last four days.
"If we don't act now, our hospital system will be overwhelmed,''
Newsom said.
Newsom again said the state has 11 medical "surge'' facilities on
standby to open and provide hospital bed space. This includes the facility at the Riverside County Fairgrounds in Indio.
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Earlier this week, Governor Gavin Newsom shared startling numbers in his latest coronavirus update. He issued a warning of more drastic action if the case and hospitalization surge continues at its current rate.
Newsom has been holding briefings from home as he and his family are currently finishing up a 14-day quarantine. At the end of November, three of his children were exposed to a CHP officer who recently tested positive for the coronavirus.
"If these trends continue, we're going to have to take much more dramatic, arguably drastic action," Newsom said Monday.
The governor added that there could be "the potential for a stay-at-home order for those regions in purple."
MORE: Local small businesses may benefit from state aid as additional restrictions loom
As of Nov. 30, 51 of 58 counties are in the purple tier, this accounts for 99.1% of the state's population.
This is the update from November 30:
The action follows what Newsom on Monday called an 89% increase in hospitalizations statewide over the past 14 days, and projections that the number of hospitalizations could double or triple within a month, based on the surging case numbers over the past two weeks. The state projects that 78% of hospital beds will be filled by Christmas Eve, and all currently available intensive care unit beds will be occupied by mid-December.
California’s #COVID19 hospitalizations have increased by 89% in the last two weeks.
— Gavin Newsom (@GavinNewsom) November 30, 2020
If these trends continue, our current hospitalizations could increase by 2-3 times within ONE MONTH.
"We're now looking in real time at hospitalization numbers and ICU capacity in those regions," he said. "We are assessing this in real time over the next day or two to make determinations of deep purple moves in those purple tier status (counties) that is more equivalent, more in line with the stay-at-home order that folks were familiar with at the beginning of this year, with modifications in terms of the work that we are currently doing.''
This is the tipping point.
— Gavin Newsom (@GavinNewsom) November 30, 2020
CA has worked hard to prepare for a surge—but we can’t sustain the record high cases we’re seeing.
Current projections show CA will run out of current ICU beds before Christmas Eve.
Please stay safe & stay home as much as you can for next few weeks. pic.twitter.com/5NJYzHokhE
Newsom noted that all hospitals have the ability to increase bed capacity, and the state has 11 surge facilities planned statewide that can add nearly 1,900 beds. But providing staffing for all of those beds could be an issue, he said.
Dr. Mark Ghaly, the state's Health and Human Services Secretary, noted that since hospital numbers tend to rise about two weeks later than cases are confirmed, the impact of the infection surge over the past two weeks has not even begun to impact the already elevated hospitalization numbers. Ghaly said everything is on the table in terms of confronting the surge, including the possible stay-at-home order.
