COVID-19 Update 2020-03-16

Spain has imposed drastic measures to fight the coronavirus, forcing people to stay indoors, with exemptions only for so-called exceptional circumstances. Spain has seen a dramatic increase in confirmed cases over the past week, reporting 9,428 cases today, up from 525 on March 7th.

There are currently 181,815 of COVID-19 confirmed globally, up from 142,783 last Friday, with 7,137 deaths and 78,340 recoveries.

The reports of confirmed cases outside of China continue to rise daily with 12,908 new cases on March 15, 8,363 new cases on March 12th, up from 4,543 March 10th.

There are 88,717 confirmed cases outside of China as of March 15th, up from 8,555 cases on March 1st.

South Korea has largely controlled the rate of new cases reporting just +74 new cases today, down from +851 new cases on March 3rd. Iran reports +1,053 new confirmed cases today bringing their total to 14,991.

Italy continues to bear the brunt, with +3,233 new cases reported today, bringing their total to 27,980, up from 17,660 last Friday.

Italy continues a dramatic nation wide “lockdown”, barring their 60 million citizens from all all public events, including school, entertainment and worship.

The disease is truly global at this point, with several African countries reporting their first cases in the last few days. South Africa reports 64 confirmed cases at this time.

According to the WHO, China has largely controlled the spread of the virus, with just +36 new cases reported today.

There were +781 new confirmed cases in the US so far today, bringing the total to 4,461.

The US had +106 new cases on March 8th and +461 new cases on March 12th.

Total US cases more than doubled in the past 4 days again, while Taiwan, South Korea, Singapore, Hong Kong and Japan have all controlled their local disease spread to a manageable rate.

At a Sunday evening press briefing at the White House with members of the Coronavirus Task Force, health officials said they are planning to ramp up coronavirus testing by tens of thousands of additional people a week, beginning this week.

A Seattle physician, in his 40’s, is in critical condition after testing positive for the Coronavirus.

NIAID director Dr Fauci said on NBC’s Meet the Press that, “Americans should be prepared that they are going to have to hunker down significantly more than we as a country are doing”.

The US Federal Reserve has cut interest rates close to zero in a bid to support the US economy.

School closures have spread across most of the US.

San Francisco, Santa Clara, San Mateo, Marin, Contra Costa and Alameda announced a ‘shelter in place’ order today. Residents are only permitted out of their homes to pick up medical supplies or food. Only police and fire departments, hospitals, grocery stores, pharmacies and a few other businesses will be allowed to remain open.

California Gov. Newsom calls for home isolation for all seniors, bars to close, restaurants to limit capacity and to practice “Deep Social Distancing”.

The Santa Cruz County Office of Education has decided in concurrence with the Santa Cruz County Health Services Agency to close all public Santa Cruz County schools for the week of March 16-20.

There are 329 confirmed cases in the Bay Area today, up from 210 last Friday.

The total cases confirmed in Santa Cruz county remains 7.

Many local department stores had unusually busy days over the weekend. Several stores limited the number of certain items per customer to prevent hoarding. There is no reason to expect food shortages. During the worst of China’s lockdown, family members were allowed to purchase food or food was delivered.

Montage Health in Monterey is offering free eVisits for locals who think they may have COVID-19.

Visit the Coronavirus Daily Update Page on KSCO.com for more info.

You can find out more from the County of Santa Cruz Health Services Agency, by going to santacruzhealth.org.

If you experience Fever, Cough or Shortness of Breath, please call your Health Care Professional.

Regardless of how healthy you are, to protect the most vulnerable, don’t be a disease vector. Take action by staying home as much as possible.

As is always true to prevent any communicable disease, stay home if you are sick, wash your hands frequently, cough or sneeze into your elbow, avoid touching your face, and remember, don’t pick your nose!!

– The COVID-19 Update from KSCO’s Director of Digital Media, Jonty McCollyer