Category Archives: Face coverings

#wearamask, Benicia CA, Benicia City Council, Coronavirus, Covid 19, Face coverings, Hospitalizations, Omicron variant, Solano County CA, Solano County Health Department, Vaccine, Vaccine mandate

Solano Health Dept: Benicia back in HIGH community transmission rate, countywide 2-day increase of 186 cases

NOTE: The information below is not the latest.  CLICK HERE for today’s latest information.
By Roger Straw, Friday, December 10, 2021
[See Important new details on the extension of Benicia’s mask mandate BELOW.]

Friday, December 10: Solano County reports
186 new infections. Solano remains in a SUBSTANTIAL rate of community transmission;  Benicia moves up into HIGH transmission rate over past 7 days.

Solano County COVID dashboard SUMMARY:
[Sources: see below.]

DEATHS: Solano reported no new deaths today.  The County reported 27 COVID deaths in September, 18 in October, 11 in November, and 13 so far in early December (24 of us are dead in the last 23 days, since November 17).  A total of 339 Solano residents have now died of COVID or COVID-related causes over the course of the pandemic.

CASES BY AGE GROUP: The County reported 186 new COVID cases in the last 2 days.  43 of these 186 new cases (23%) were youth and children under 18.  90 (48%) were age 18-49, 34  (18%) were age 50-64, and 19 (10%) were 65+.  BELOW: color-coded analysis of CASES REPORTED BY AGE GROUP, expressed as a percentage of TOTAL CASES.  Increases are in red and decreases are 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 children and youth aged 0-17 as percentage of total cases is at 15.7% as of today, up from 15.5% on Wednesday. (From the CDC covid-data-tracker.)

COMMUNITY TRANSMISSION RATE: Over the last 7 days, Solano has seen SUBSTANTIAL community transmission, with 397 new cases, up from 328 on Wednesday and approaching HIGH transmission (450 new cases).  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 402 ACTIVE cases is up from Wednesday’s 373, and far above our summer rates.

CASES BY CITY on Friday, December 10:

  • Benicia added 10 new cases today, a total of 1,627 cases since the outbreak began, and 28 cases over the last 7 days.  This moves Benicia back into the HIGH rate of community transmission for the first time since October 18.  (see chart below).  Based on Benicia population, MODERATE is defined as less than 14 cases over the last 7 days, SUBSTANTIAL is 14-27 cases, and HIGH is 28 or more cases.  Benicia will need to maintain fewer than 14 new cases-per-7-days for 30 consecutive days before relaxing its mask mandate.  Note above that Solano County is currently experiencing SUBSTANTIAL transmission.

  • Dixon added 10 new cases today, total of 2,615 cases.
  • Fairfield added 50 new cases today, total of 12,698 cases.
  • Rio Vista reported 5 new cases today, total of 640 cases.
  • Suisun City added 8 new cases today, total of 3,353 cases.
  • Vacaville added 46 new cases today, a total of 12,539 cases.
  • Vallejo added 56 new cases today, a total of 13,846 cases.
  • Unincorporated added 1 new case today, a total of 147 cases.

POSITIVE TEST RATE:  Solano’s 7-day percent positivity rate was 4.6% today, down from Wednesday’s 4.9%.  COMPARE: Today’s California rate is 1.9%.  [Source: Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Tracking Center]  Today’s U.S. rate is 7.5%. [Source: CDC COVID Data Tracker.] 

HOSPITALIZATIONS:

CURRENT hospitalizations were steady today at 21 persons, 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 did not update its age and race hospitalizations charts today.  Solano hospitals reported a total of 3,180 COVID patients since the beginning of the outbreak.  (Data on age is more reliable than that on race/ethnicity.)

ICU Bed Availability is down today, from 39% on Wednesday to 33% today, in the County’s GREEN zone.

Ventilator Availability today is up a bit today from 74% to 75%.

IMPORTANT NEWS!  BENICIA’S MASK MANDATE REMAINS IN PLACE – NEW DETAILS…
On Tuesday, Benicia City Council chose to keep the city’s mask mandate in place for another 30 days and review again in January. All Councilmembers expressed confidence that Benicia’s case numbers are likely to remain in MODERATE transmission for a 30-day period soon, at which time the City Manager is empowered to unilaterally lift the mask mandate.  But four Councilmembers (excluding Mr. Largaespada) chose to remain cautious under the current mandate.  If all goes well, the mandate may have been lifted before a possible reconsideration at the January 18 Council meeting.  But if the mandate is still in place on January 18, Council has now directed staff to bring a recommendation then for changing the METRICS by which the City will determine a safe cutoff date for lifting the mask mandate.   All members agreed that the 7-day-case-rate metric would be strengthened if in some fashion it could be combined with hospitalization rates and vaccination rates.  How to determine those rates, and how to combine them for a determination would be covered in the staff recommendation.
See the video discussion of the Dec. 7 Council meeting – CLICK HERE (then scroll down on the agenda and click on item number 21.A – UPDATE ON FACE COVERINGS MANDATE.)
Vallejo also passed an indoors mask mandate on August 31.  In the Bay Area, Solano County REMAINS the only holdout against a mask mandate for public indoors spaces.

SOLANO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS failed to consider an agendized proposal for a countywide MASK MANDATE on Tuesday, September 14.  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
#wearamask, Benicia CA, Benicia City Council, Coronavirus, Covid 19, Face coverings, Hospitalizations, Omicron variant, Solano County CA, Solano County Health Department, Vaccine, Vaccine mandate

Benicia City Council continues the Mask Mandate – County reports 1 new death, 7 hospitalizations, 59 new infections

NOTE: The information below is not the latest.  CLICK HERE for today’s latest information.
By Roger Straw, Wednesday, December 8, 2021
[See BREAKING NEWS on Benicia’s mask mandate BELOW.]

Wednesday, December 8: Solano County reports
1 new death , 7 hospitalizations, and 57 new infections. Solano County remains in a SUBSTANTIAL rate of community transmission;  Benicia returns to SUBSTANTIAL transmission over past 7 days.

Solano County COVID dashboard SUMMARY:
[Sources: see below.]

DEATHS: Solano reported 1 new death today.  The County reported 27 COVID deaths in September, 18 in October, 11 in November, and 13 so far in early December (24 in the last 3 weeks, since November 17).  The new death was one of our elders age 65+, a Hispanic/Latinx person.  A total of 339 Solano residents have now died of COVID or COVID-related causes over the course of the pandemic.

CASES: The County reported 57 new COVID cases in the last 2 days.  CASES BY AGE GROUP: 4 of these 57 new cases (only 7%) were youth and children under 18.  31 (54%) were age 18-49, 14  (25%) were age 50-64, and 8 (14%) were 65+.  BELOW: color-coded analysis of CASES REPORTED BY AGE GROUP, expressed as a percentage of TOTAL CASES.  Increases are in red and decreases are 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 children and youth aged 0-17 as percentage of total cases is at 15.5% as of today. (From the CDC covid-data-tracker.)

COMMUNITY TRANSMISSION RATE: Over the last 7 days, Solano has seen SUBSTANTIAL community transmission, with 328 new cases (down from 343 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 373 ACTIVE cases is down from Monday’s 402, but still far above our summer rates.

CASES BY CITY on Wednesday, December 8:

  • Benicia added 11 new cases today, a total of 1,617 cases since the outbreak began, and 20 cases over the last 7 days.  This moves Benicia back into the SUBSTANTIAL rate of community transmission after only one report in the MODERATE rate (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 its mask mandate.  Note above that Solano County is also currently experiencing SUBSTANTIAL transmission.

  • Dixon added 2 new cases today, total of 2,605 cases.
  • Fairfield added 17 new cases today, total of 12,648 cases.
  • Rio Vista reported 0 new cases today, total of 635 cases.
  • Suisun City added 2 new cases today, total of 3,345 cases.
  • Vacaville added 12 new cases today, a total of 12,493 cases.
  • Vallejo added 13 new cases today, a total of 13,790 cases.
  • Unincorporated added 0 new cases today, a total of 146 cases.

POSITIVE TEST RATE:  Solano’s 7-day percent positivity rate was 4.9% today, down slightly from Monday’s 5.0%.  COMPARE: Today’s California rate is 1.9%.  [Source: Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Tracking Center]  Today’s U.S. rate is 8.18%. [Source: CDC COVID Data Tracker.] 

HOSPITALIZATIONS:

CURRENT hospitalizations were steady today at 21 persons, 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 showed 7 previously unreported hospitalizations today, including 2 young adults age 18-49 and 5 Solano residents age 50-64 (notably none of our elders age 65+).  Solano hospitals reported a new total of 3,180 COVID patients since the beginning of the outbreak.  (Data on age is more reliable than that on race/ethnicity.)

ICU Bed Availability is up today, from 29% on Monday to 39% today, back into the County’s GREEN zone.

Ventilator Availability today is down a bit today from 76% to 74%.

BREAKING NEWS!  BENICIA’S MASK MANDATE REMAINS IN PLACE
Benicia City Council chose yesterday to keep the city’s mask mandate in place for another 30 days and review again in January.  Mayor Young writes, “There was lots of discussion about changing the metrics from case numbers to hospitalizations and vaccination rates as suggested by Dr. Fleming.”  Young continued, “Lionel argued for making the changes now and asserted that that would allow us to end the mandate immediately. However he did not have support for that idea. No vote was taken as we did not change the existing resolution.”
See the video discussion of last night’s Council meeting – CLICK HERE (then scroll down on the agenda and click on item number 21.A – UPDATE ON FACE COVERINGS MANDATE.)
Vallejo also passed an indoors mask mandate on August 31.  In the Bay Area, Solano County REMAINS the only holdout against a mask mandate for public indoors spaces.

SOLANO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS failed to consider an agendized proposal for a countywide MASK MANDATE on Tuesday, September 14.  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
#wearamask, Benicia CA, Benicia City Council, Coronavirus, Covid 19, Face coverings, Hospitalizations, Omicron variant, Solano County CA, Solano County Health Department, Vaccine, Vaccine mandate

COVID deaths increasing in Solano County

NOTE: The information below is not the latest.  CLICK HERE for today’s latest information.
By Roger Straw, Monday, December 6, 2021
[See also New York Times, Coronavirus: What we know about Omicron.]

Monday, December 6: Solano County reports
5 new deaths and 154 new infections. Solano County remains in a SUBSTANTIAL rate of community transmission;  Benicia rates MODERATE transmission over past 7 days.

Solano County COVID dashboard SUMMARY:
[Sources: see below.]

DEATHS: Solano reported 5 new deaths today.  The County reported 27 COVID deaths in September, 18 in October, 11 in November, and 12 so far in early December (23 in the last 19 days, since November 17).  Of the 5 new deaths, 2 were age 18-49, 1 was age 50-65 and 2 were 65+.  A total of 338 Solano residents have now died of COVID or COVID-related causes over the course of the pandemic.

CASES: The County reported 154 new COVID cases over the weekend.  CASES BY AGE GROUP: 37 of these 154 cases (24%) were youth and children under 18.  78 (51%) were age 18-49, 25  (16%) were age 50-64, and 14 (9%) were 65+.  BELOW: color-coded analysis of cases reported by age group, expressed as a percentage of total cases.  Increases are in red and decreases are 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 children and youth aged 0-17 as percentage of total cases is at 15.5% as of today. (From the CDC covid-data-tracker.)

COMMUNITY TRANSMISSION RATE: Over the last 7 days, Solano has seen SUBSTANTIAL community transmission, with 343 new cases (down from 368 on Friday).  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 402 ACTIVE cases is up from last Friday’s 333, and still far above our summer rates.

CASES BY CITY on Monday, December 6:

  • Benicia added 7 new cases today, a total of 1,606 cases since the outbreak began, and 13 cases over the last 7 days.  This moves Benicia back into the MODERATE rate of community transmission for the first time since November 22 (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 its mask mandate.  Note above that Solano County is also currently experiencing SUBSTANTIAL transmission.

  • Dixon added 7 new cases today, total of 2,603 cases.
  • Fairfield added 36 new cases today, total of 12,631 cases.
  • Rio Vista reported 1 new case today, total of 635 cases.
  • Suisun City added 17 new cases today, total of 3,343 cases.
  • Vacaville added 47 new cases today, a total of 12,481 cases.
  • Vallejo added 38 new cases today, a total of 13,777 cases.
  • Unincorporated added 1 new case today, a total of 146 cases.

POSITIVE TEST RATE:  Solano’s 7-day percent positivity rate was 5.0% today, down from Friday’s 5.3%.  COMPARE: Today’s California rate is 1.4%.  [Source: Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Tracking Center]  Today’s U.S. rate is 8.26%. [Source: CDC COVID Data Tracker.] 

HOSPITALIZATIONS:

CURRENT hospitalizations were down today from 22 to 21 persons, 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 did not update its age and race hospitalizations charts today.  Last week, updates showed 156 previously unreported hospitalizations.  Solano hospitals have reported a total of 3,173 COVID patients since the beginning of the outbreak.  (Data on age is more reliable than that on race/ethnicity.)

ICU Bed Availability is down dramatically today, from 51% on Friday to only 29% today, falling once again into the County’s YELLOW danger zone.

Ventilator Availability today is down a bit today from 77% to 76%.

MASK MANDATE – ALERT!
Benicia’s mask mandate will remain in effect, but could be altered at City Council meeting TOMORROW – on December 7.
Vallejo also passed an indoors mask mandate on August 31.  In the Bay Area, Solano County REMAINS the only holdout against a mask mandate for public indoors spaces.

SOLANO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS failed to consider an agendized proposal for a countywide MASK MANDATE on Tuesday, September 14.  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
#wearamask, Benicia CA, Benicia City Council, Coronavirus, Covid 19, Face coverings, Hospitalizations, Omicron variant, Solano County CA, Solano County Health Department, Vaccine, Vaccine mandate

COVID won’t quit in Solano – reporting 4 more dead, 14 more hospitalized, 117 more infected

NOTE: The information below is not the latest.  CLICK HERE for today’s latest information.
By Roger Straw, Friday, December 3, 2021
[See also New York Times, Coronavirus: What we know about Omicron.]

Friday, December 3: Solano County reports
4 new deaths, 14 previously unreported hospitalizations and 117 new infections. Solano County AND Benicia remain in a SUBSTANTIAL rate of community transmission.

Solano County COVID dashboard SUMMARY:
[Sources: see below.]

DEATHS: Solano reported 4 new deaths today.  The County reported 27 COVID deaths in September, 18 in October, and 11 in November, and 7 so far in early December (18 in the last 16 days, since November 17).  A total of 333 Solano residents have now died of COVID or COVID-related causes over the course of the pandemic.

CASES: The County reported 117 new COVID cases over the past 2 days.  CASES BY AGE GROUP: 23 of these 117 cases (20%) were youth and children under 18.  66 (56%) were age 18-49, 18  (15%) were age 50-64, and 10 (6%) were 65+.  BELOW: color-coded analysis of cases reported by age group, expressed as a percentage of total cases.  Increases are in red and decreases are 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 368 new cases (jumping up from 251 on Wednesday).  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 333 ACTIVE cases is up from Wednesday’s 329, and still far above our summer rates.

CASES BY CITY on Friday, December 3:

  • Benicia added 2 new cases today, a total of 1,599 cases since the outbreak began, and 18 cases over the last 7 days.  This keeps Benicia in the SUBSTANTIAL rate of community transmission  (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 its mask mandate.  Note above that Solano County is also currently experiencing SUBSTANTIAL transmission.

  • Dixon added 7 new cases today, total of 2,596 cases.
  • Fairfield added 30 new cases today, total of 12,595 cases.
  • Rio Vista reported 1 new case today, total of 634 cases.
  • Suisun City added 4 new cases today, total of 3,326 cases.
  • Vacaville added 40 new cases today, a total of 12,434 cases.
  • Vallejo added 33 new cases today, a total of 13,739 cases.
  • Unincorporated added 0 new cases today, a total of 145 cases.

POSITIVE TEST RATE:  Solano’s 7-day percent positivity rate was 5.3% today, down from Wednesday’s 6.4%.  COMPARE: Today’s California rate is 2.7%.  [Source: Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Tracking Center]  Today’s U.S. rate is 8.36%. [Source: CDC COVID Data Tracker.] 

HOSPITALIZATIONS:

CURRENT hospitalizations were down today from 15 to 22 persons, 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 again today, for the third time this week.  The age chart showed 24 previously unreported hospitalizations on Monday, 118 on Wednesday, and 14 more today!  Today’s report added 1 youth age 0-17,  7 young adults age 18-49, 1 Solano resident age 50-64, and 5 of our elders age 65+.  Solano hospitals reported a new total of 3,173 COVID patients since the beginning of the outbreak.  (Data on age is more reliable than that on race/ethnicity.)

ICU Bed Availability is 51% today, up unchanged since Wednesday, and firmly in the County’s GREEN zone.

Ventilator Availability today rose today from 72% to 77%.

MASK MANDATE – ALERT!
Benicia’s mask mandate will remain in effect, but could be altered at City Council meeting on December 7.
Vallejo also passed an indoors mask mandate on August 31.  In the Bay Area, Solano County REMAINS the only holdout against a mask mandate for public indoors spaces.

SOLANO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS failed to consider an agendized proposal for a countywide MASK MANDATE on Tuesday, September 14.  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