[BREAKING NEWS: Benicia City Council decides to keep mask mandate in effect at least until Dec. 7 – click here to scroll down. – R.S.]
Wednesday, November 17: Solano County reports 3 deaths, 27 hospitalizations and 99 new infections, remains in SUBSTANTIAL rate of transmission. Benicia sees 7 new infections, just barely remains in MODERATE transmission.
Solano County COVID dashboard SUMMARY:
[Sources: see below.]
DEATHS: Solano reported 3 new COVID-related deaths today. One who died was age 50-64 and 2 were over 65. All 3 were white. The County reported 27 COVID deaths in September, 18 in October, and today’s 3 in November. A new total of 318 Solano residents have died of COVID or COVID-related causes over the course of the pandemic.
CASES: The County reported 99 new COVID cases today. CASES BY AGE GROUP: 23 of these 99 cases (23%) were youth and children under 18. 61 were age 18-49, 10 were age 50-64, and only 5 were 65+. Below is my color-coded analysis of cases reported by age group, as a percentage of total cases. I am showing increases in red and decreases in green as reported by Solano County since April of 2020. Note the steady increase among children and youth of Solano County. The population of those age 0-17 in Solano County is roughly 22%.
COMPARE: U.S. cases among age 0-17 as percentage of total cases is at 15.4% as of today. (From the CDC covid-data-tracker.)
COMMUNITY TRANSMISSION RATE: Over the last 7 days, Solano has seen SUBSTANTIAL community transmission, with 298 new cases (up from 268 on Monday). CDC FORMULA: Based on Solano County’s population, 450 cases in 7 days would move Solano up into the CDC’s population-based definition of a HIGH transmission rate, and we will need to drop below 225 cases in 7 days to rate as having only MODERATE community transmission.
ACTIVE CASES: Solano’s 352 ACTIVE cases is up from Monday’s 331, and still far above our summer rates.
CASES BY CITY on Wednesday, November 17:
- Benicia added 7 new cases today, a total of 1,567 cases since the outbreak began. Benicia remained at the very top of the MODERATE range of community transmission with 13 new cases over the last 7 days. Benicia has now seen MODERATE 7-day spread for 6 consecutive Solano updates (14 days, since Wed. Nov. 3) – SEE CHART BELOW. MODERATE is defined as less than 14 cases, based on Benicia population. Benicia will need to maintain fewer than 14 new cases per 7 days for 30 consecutive days before relaxing the mask mandate. See update on Benicia’s mask mandate below. And note above that Solano County is currently experiencing SUBSTANTIAL transmission.
- Dixon added 2 new cases today, total of 2,569 cases.
- Fairfield added 20 new cases today, total of 12,449 cases.
- Rio Vista reported 2 new cases today, total of 627 cases.
- Suisun City added 7 new cases today, total of 3,285 cases.
- Vacaville added 32 new cases today, a total of 12,241 cases.
- Vallejo added 28 new cases today, a total of 13,568 cases.
- Unincorporated added 1 new case today, a total of 143 cases.
POSITIVE TEST RATE: Solano’s 7-day percent positivity rate was 5.2% today, up from 4.6% on Monday. COMPARE: Today’s California rate is 1.5%. [Source: Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Tracking Center] Today’s U.S. rate is 5.81%. [Source: CDC COVID Data Tracker.]
HOSPITALIZATIONS:
CURRENT hospitalizations were down today from 31 to 24 persons, but still above the range we saw during last summer.
TOTAL hospitalizations: Solano County’s TOTAL hospitalized over the course of the pandemic must be independently discovered in the County’s occasional update of hospitalizations by Age Group and by Race/Ethnicity. Solano Public Health updated its age and race hospitalizations charts today. The age chart shows 27 previously unreported hospitalizations, one youth age 0-17, 12 persons age 18-49, 6 age 50-64 and 8 age 65+. The race/ethnicity chart shows 6 Hispanic/Latinx persons and 14 White persons. Solano hospitals have admitted a NEW TOTAL of 3,017 COVID patients since the beginning of the outbreak.
ICU Bed Availability is 32% today, up from 28% on Monday, back into the GREEN zone. We remain in the worrisome range we saw during last winter’s surge.
Ventilator Availability today rose today from 60% to 69%.
BREAKING NEWS on Benicia’s mask mandate
- Benicia City Council debates changing mask mandate, decides to keep in place, will review again on Dec. 7 and
- Open Letter to Benicia City Council: Dr. Richard Fleming on mask mandate
- Background: Mandate passed on August 24 – City Resolution 21-88
- Explanation of the CDC’s population-based transmission rate for Benicia and for Solano
SOLANO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS failed to consider an agendized proposal for a countywide MASK MANDATE on Tuesday, September 14. Recent Bay Area news put Solano in a sad light: all other county health officers issued a joint statement offering details on when they would be able to lift mask mandates (not likely soon). TV news anchors had to point out that Solano would not be considering such a move since our health officer had not been able to “justify” a mask mandate in the first place. The Solano Board of Supervisors has joined with Dr. Bela Matyas in officially showing poor leadership on the COVID-19 pandemic.
HOW DOES TODAY’S REPORT COMPARE? See recent reports and others going back to April 20, 2020 on my ARCHIVE of daily Solano COVID updates (an excel spreadsheet).
>>The data on this page is from the Solano County COVID-19 Dashboard. The Dashboard is full of much more information and updated Monday, Wednesday and Friday around 4 or 5pm. On the County’s dashboard, you can hover a mouse or click on an item for more information. Note the tabs at top for “Summary, Demographics” and “Vaccines.” Click here to go to today’s Solano County Dashboard.
Sources
- Solano County Coronavirus Dashboard (on the County website).
- See also my ARCHIVE of daily Solano COVID updates (an excel spreadsheet). I have posted full CORONAVIRUS REPORTS almost daily here on the Benicia Independent.
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