The California Department of Public Health has updated its guidance and new business sectors will soon be allowed to open in the purple and red tiers.
Starting on Saturday, breweries, wineries, and distilleries that do not serve food will be allowed to reopen outdoors with modifications in the purple and red tiers. Reservations will be required and customers will have a 90-minute time limit. Service on-site must end by 8 p.m.
In the orange tier, counties can allow for indoor operations at 25% capacity or 100 people, whichever is fewer. In the yellow tier, capacity goes up to 50% or 200 people, whichever is fewer.
Bars that do not provide meals are not covered in this new guidance. Right now they are closed, but will be able to re-open outdoors in the Orange Tier, and with limited capacity indoors in the Yellow Tier.
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Santa Cruz County health officer Dr. Gail Newel today shared hopeful news during the COVID-19 update: She said that Santa Cruz County should enter the orange tier in three weeks, a spring infection surge no longer appears imminent, and it’s possible that California could reach herd immunity by late spring.
According to Dr Newel, Santa Cruz County is seeing “continued good news in terms of case rates, hospitalizations, death rates, [and] ICU availability.” Dr Newel added that she expects the county to progress quickly from the orange to the yellow tier, and even into the green tier (which doesn’t currently exist but Gov. Gavin Newsom has said is in the works).
The previously predicted surge in late March or early April also appears less likely, according to county health officials, who base their predictions upon a model that includes the impact of variants and vaccines.
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Good news for the Monterey Aquarium. That’s because Monterey County health officials now expect to move to the red tier in the coming weeks, which would allow the aquarium to open indoors with limited capacity.
When the aquarium does reopen, it plans to bring back members and donors first and then allow for general admission later in May. Specific dates have not yet been released.
Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, the aquarium has had to lay off about 240 staff members, about 40% of the pre-pandemic workforce.
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Federal officials on Wednesday issued new recommendations to nursing homes that are aimed at making it easier for residents to visit, hug and hold hands with their loved ones after almost a year of isolation.
The AARP says that citing widespread nursing home vaccinations and plummeting infection and death rates among residents and staff, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) said facilities should allow indoor visits “regardless of vaccination status of the resident or the visitor.”
There are some exceptions, including for residents who are quarantined, who have a confirmed COVID-19 infection or who are unvaccinated and living in a county with a high rate of COVID-19 transmission. But the AARP said the guidance represents the most dramatic step toward indoor visits since long-term care facilities were first shuttered to guests in March 2020.
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The new guidance also recommends that facilities move away from completely shutting down indoor visits if new infections crop up. If a facility finds that an outbreak is limited to a certain ward or unit, indoor visits should be allowed for other residents, the new guidelines say.
They also open the door to hugging, hand-holding, and “close contact” if a resident consents is fully vaccinated, is wearing a face mask, and washes or sanitizes his or her hands before and after the visit. Such interactions had previously been discouraged. CMS officials said they “acknowledge that there is no substitute for physical contact.
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