By Jondi Gumz
To the relief of many and the frustration of just as many, Santa Cruz County beaches will open before the Fourth of July.
Santa Cruz County Health Officer Dr Gail Newel said Thursday the beach closure will end at midnight, lifting limits on hours and prohibitions on sunbathing, picnicking and other summertime activities on the sand.
“It’s impossible for law enforcement to enforce that closure,” she said at a press conference announcing the change.
Other changes: Children ages 2 to 12 must wear a face covering in public, which was not required before, and the shelter in place order is likely to be lifted after July 6.
Dr. Gail Newel said Santa Cruz County had so many new COVID-19 cases, the epidemiological graph at santacruzhealth.org had to be redesigned.
If you choose to gather for Fourth of July, Newel advises: Keep your visit short, make it outdoors, wear your face covering, don’t share utensils or sports equipment; bring your own food rather than share a potluck.
She had made beaches off-limits from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. as of May 2 to slow the spread of the contagious coronavirus COVID-19 when the county reported 136 confirmed cases and two deaths and was pushing to increase testing and procure personal protection equipment for health care workers.
As of Thursday, the county reported 337 cases, 15,266 negative lab results and three deaths, the latest being a 90-year-old man in hospice.
On Monday, 21 new cases were confirmed, the most since the pandemic arrived and residents were ordered on March 16 to shelter in place.
People 65 and older are more likely to have complications from COVID-19 because they are more likely to have conditions such as heart or lung disease or diabetes.
Millennials
But in Santa Cruz County, a third of the cases ━ 106 ━ are among millennials ages 18 to 34, which Newel said is a trend across California and across the nation.
“Young people feel less vulnerable,” Newel said. “They are putting other household members and community members at risk.”
She recommends people over 65 stay home unless absolutely necessary.
About 55 percent of the cases are Latino, which Newel noted is out of proportion because Latinos comprise 34 percent of the county population.
She said it was too soon to tell if attendance at recent political protests, memorials and vigils has affected the case count. It can take up to 14 days from exposure for symptoms to appear, and some people show no symptoms at all yet pass the disease on.
Asked if graduation gatherings ━ which were not allowed under the shelter in place ━ were a factor in the increase, Newel said, “Yes.”
She’s talking about informal family gatherings as COVID-19 forced formal graduation ceremonies to go virtual ━ Cabrillo College on May 22 ━ or drive-through, like the Pajaro Valley school district had, starting June 1.
The increase in cases is not due to the increase in testing, she said, noting the positive rate is below 2 percent.
Active cases
What concerns Newel is having a record 106 active cases, up from 40 not so long ago.
The county aims to find out within 24 hours who the active cases have had contact with and advise them to be tested, but is lagging on that timetable.
“We are triaging cases,” said Mimi Hall, director of the county’s Health Service Agency.
That means the county is prioritizing calls by severity of condition.
Hall said the stumbling block is the new state platform for contact tracing, which is called CalConnect. Because it’s a new system, staff have to be trained on how it works.
Calls that show up as “COVID CA” with 916 or 454 in the phone number are not scam calls but contact tracing calls, Newel said, encouraging people to answer.
Testing Site
For those who want to be tested, free testing is available via your health provider or by appointment 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. Wednesday through Sunday from OptumServe at Ramsay Park, 1301 Main St., Watsonville.
Newel again voiced concern about the speed to reopen businesses, which comes from the governor, but when asked about transmission of COVID-19 in the workplace, she said, “Very rarely are cases acquired in the workplace.”
She said some happen in the break room or in the parking lot when employees are talking and their face coverings are off.
Asked about youth sports, she said the governor has promised to release guidance soon.
She noted Disneyland delayed its reopening due to the increase of COVID-19 cases statewide and she declined to predict when the Boardwalk might reopen rides, saying she’d been wrong before.
Despite the increase in cases locally, she said Santa Cruz County is “a long way from approaching a trigger” that would require going back to earlier shelter-in-place conditions.
But neighbors such as Santa Clara County have many more cases, she added, so “as tourism increases and beaches open, those counties’ cases will affect our own.”
Visit santacruzhealth.org for the most up-to-date local information.