San Diego County Avoids Purple Tier Again

SAN DIEGO COUNTY, CA — For yet another week, San Diego County avoided the fate of dropping into the dreaded purple tier of California's coronavirus monitoring system Tuesday, with an adjusted case rate of 6.5 new daily COVID-19 cases per 100,000 population.

While the county's unadjusted case rate is 7.4 per 100,000 — enough to be in the most restrictive purple tier, which has a floor of 7 per 100,000 — the high volume of tests the county is able to perform daily allows for an adjustment from the state. This adjustment has saved the county from shutting down nearly all non-essential indoor businesses for several weeks in a row.

The state data, which is updated every Tuesday, reflects the previous week's cases to determine the fate of counties in the state's four-tiered reopening system

San Diego County did show modest improvement, dropping .4 from last week's unadjusted case rate of 7.8. The testing positivity rate continued an upward trend, rising .2% from last week to reach 3.5%, but remains low enough for this metric to remain in the orange tier. If a county reports statistics meeting metrics in a higher tier for two consecutive weeks, it will move into that more restrictive tier for a minimum of three weeks.

The state's health equity metric, which looks at the testing positivity for areas with the lowest healthy conditions, dropped from 5.5% to 5.1% and entered the orange tier. This metric does not move counties backward to more restrictive tiers, but is required to advance.

San Diego County health officials reported 358 new COVID-19 infections on Monday, bringing the case total to 54,941, including four new cases in the Vista Unified School District. The county didn't record any deaths related to COVID-19 on Monday, and the death toll remains at 870. It was due to receive an update from the state Tuesday as to the county's reopening status.

UC San Diego announced Monday night that it had detected shed virus in wastewater in the Revelle College area between 11:30 a.m. Saturday and 9:45 a.m. Monday.

The virus is shed from the gastrointestinal tract and is present in feces early in the infection. UCSD has the ability to identify the virus in wastewater, even before someone tests positive.

The college advised anyone who used the restroom near the Revelle College area between those dates and times to get tested for COVID-19 out of an abundance of caution.

Less than a week after fully reopening its schools, the district reported four additional COVID-19 cases on Monday, including two Mission Vista High School students, one Roosevelt Middle School student and one Alamosa Park Elementary School student, leading to the quarantine of at least 150 students and four teachers.

According to the district, one of the Mission Vista High School student tested positive for the illness on Sunday. That student attended school Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday of last week and is not connected to the other case in a student confirmed last week, the district said.

While it is unlikely the student came into close contact with all 150 students and four teachers, the district said it was "proceeding with an abundance of caution" and placing all of them on a 14-day quarantine and a pivot to Zoom and Canvas distance-learning.

According to the district's COVID-19 safety dashboard, it has recorded eight cases since Sept. 8, with four of those coming after Oct. 20.

Of the 7,827 tests reported Monday, 5% returned positive, raising the 14-day rolling average percentage of positive cases to 2.8%. The 7-day daily average of tests is 10,981.

One new community outbreak was confirmed Monday in a youth sports setting. In the past seven days, 27 community outbreaks were confirmed. A community outbreak is defined as three or more COVID-19 cases in a setting and in people of different households over the past 14 days.

Of all cases, 3,859 — or 7% — have required hospitalization. And 892 — or 1.6% — of all cases and 23.1% of hospitalized cases had to be admitted to an intensive care unit.

All students at San Diego State University, meanwhile, remained under a stay-at-home advisory announced Thursday. The advisory began at 6 p.m. Friday and will run through Nov. 2 at 6 a.m. University officials said the move was made to discourage students from participating in Halloween events where physical distancing cannot be done. Students are advised to stay home unless they have an essential need.

As of Monday afternoon, the university has had a total of 1,252 COVID- 19 cases since the fall semester began, including 420 among students living on- campus, 803 among students living off-campus, 16 among faculty and staff and 13 among "visitors" — defined as someone who has had exposure with an SDSU-affiliated individual.

— City News Service