Should CA Reopen Before June 15? Patch Readers Weigh In

CALIFORNIA — Gov. Gavin Newsom previously set his sights on June 15 as the day he'd like to see California fully reopen — save for perhaps a lingering mask mandate.

The state has fully vaccinated more than one-third of its adult population. Plus, the state now has the lowest positivity rate in the country. By these hopeful projections, it looks as though the state could fully reopen sooner than many anticipated.

"I suspect we'll be open before June 15," Dr. Timothy Brewer, a professor of infectious disease at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA told Patch. "Between the rate with which people are being vaccinated and the current numbers if they stay the way they are — I think there will be increasing public pressure to open up more quickly."

In a recent non-scientific survey, Patch asked readers: "Do you think the state of California should remove all COVID-19 restrictions on businesses prior to June 15?" Out of a pool of 4,024 respondents, 48.4 percent said yes, 39.5 percent answered no and 12 percent said maybe.

The survey, which appeared in questionnaire form last week on Patch, is meant not to be a scientific poll but only to give a broad idea of public sentiment.

The survey asked readers to comment on whether they think the state should accelerate its reopening timeline and why. These were some of the anonymous responses:

"No need to rush, some [people] haven’t been fully vaccinated yet."

"If statistics are down to an acceptable level now, then why wait two more months to reopen? People and businesses have suffered enough."

"I think the state should hold off on reopening until more people are vaccinated and the new variant is under control. Otherwise, we'll do what we did last time and open right before we have it in our grasp."

"The risks are just too great. Do we want to be back where we were this time last year?"

"Our children are suffering emotionally, socially in isolation at home. Businesses are acutely aware of Covid safety precautions and are intelligent enough to follow protocol."

"I'm a nurse and they are rushing it."

"In Orange County we have a high percentage of anti-vaxxers and antimaskers and they will continue to keep the virus circulating and mutating making the vaccinations we have received less effective. If we lived in a state where more people listened to the science and cared about the health of our communities, I wouldn't worry but unfortunately, that's not the case."

"I'm still concerned there will be another surge if we let down our guard."

To date, more than 87 percent of Californians are living in orange tier counties, just one step above the state's most lenient tier on its coronavirus reopening map. At the rate California is reopening, counties could run out of tiers even as May quickly approaches.

For weeks, the threat of a surge looming in other parts of the U.S. has hung over the Golden State's progress. When numbers started to spike in late March, President Joe Biden urged states to pause reopening plans.

Some 33 states across the nation reported an increase in COVID-19 infections this month. But California's numbers have remained stable.

SEE ALSO: CA OK's Use Of J&J Vaccine After Reviewing 'Rare Adverse Events'

In the Patch poll, 49.5 percent of respondents said they did not expect a new surge to arise if the state reopens before June 15. More than 26 percent said they would anticipate a surge in cases and 24.3 percent answered "maybe."

While it's too soon to know exactly why the country's spring surge hasn't touched California yet — or if it will at all — Brewer said the state may be seeing what Brewer called "the beginnings of a herd immunity" — at least in hard-hit counties.

In Los Angeles County, dubbed the state's coronavirus epicenter, there have been about 1.2 million reported coronavirus cases. But those are only the infections officials can confirm, he said.

"Which means that we've had probably three or four times that number of cases that we don't know about," Brewer said. "Add on top of that the number of people that have been vaccinated, and you're starting to get up around where 50 to 60 percent of the population in L.A. County has either been infected or vaccinated."

Experts don't yet know what percentage of people would need to get vaccinated to achieve herd immunity, but vaccination is a safer way to build protection than getting sick with COVID-19, federal health officials have said.

In the Patch survey, readers were asked to rate their level of concern for public safety if the state reopens before June 15 on a scale of 1 to 5.

Of the respondents, 1,373 rated their concern at 1 and 820 gave a 5 rating.

A follow-up question prompted readers to express their level of concern, on a scale of 1 to 5, if the state were to stay its current course and reopen on June 15.

Again, most who voted on this question showed a low level of concern, while other answers were all over the board — 1,445 rated their concern at 1, while 820 respondents rated their concern at 5.

"People are tired of this, and I understand that," Brewer said. "But the virus is still in our community. Hopefully, people will not use their fatigue as an excuse not to get vaccinated or if they are vaccinated, to stop doing those other measures that are so important."

READ MORE: Could California Reopen Earlier Than June 15?