Fresno is set to fully reopen — but will some COVID rules stay? What you need to know
Months of pandemic-driven masking and social distancing for residents in Fresno, the central San Joaquin Valley and throughout California will mostly draw to a close next week.
Gone will be the state’s color-coded Blueprint for a Safer Economy system of risk-based tiers governing business reopening — as the state adopts federal health guidance for people who are fully vaccinated against the novel coronavirus.
Tuesday is the date set by Gov. Newsom for fully reopening California’s economy, based on availability of COVID-19 vaccines for anyone who is eligible. Plus hospitalization burdens from the disease are now small fraction of what they were during the pandemic’s peak in December and January.
Reopening the economy, however, doesn’t mean the pandemic is “over” — thus life won’t return to a pre-COVID level of normalcy just yet.
“What we do now, our choices, our behaviors, whether or not we get vaccinated, makes a huge difference in what happens here in California and in the United States, in terms of whether we beat this virus back,” Dr. Nadine Burke Harris, California’s surgeon general, said Thursday in a visit to a coronavirus vaccination clinic in Kerman.
Since March 2020, almost 103,000 Fresno County residents have contracted COVID-19. Plus thousands have been hospitalized at some point over the past 15 months, and more than 1,700 have succumbed to the disease.
Furthermore, dozens of new cases continue to surface each week in the county, and 11 deaths have been reported just since June 1.
The good news is that if you’re fully vaccinated – if you’re two weeks past getting the second dose of the two-shot vaccines by Pfizer or Moderna, or two weeks past getting a single shot of the one-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine – you’re going to be able to shed that mask in most indoor situations, including many indoor events and businesses.
If, however, you’re among the 65% of Fresno County’s overall population who are not yet fully vaccinated – or the 57% who have not received even one shot – wearing a mask and maintaining 6 feet of space from other people remains the guidance by the California Department of Public Health and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
“Fully vaccinated people can resume everyday activities without wearing a mask except in in a few limited settings that are required by federal and now state rules,” Dr. Mark Ghaly, secretary of California’s Health & Human Services Agency, said this week. “Individuals who are not fully vaccinated must continue to wear a mask in indoor public settings.”
On Tuesday, Fresno County and its neighboring counties in the central San Joaquin Valley all will move from business and capacity limitations in orange Tier 3 of the state’s four-tiered coronavirus blueprint to an atmosphere of more or less full reopening of all economic activity.
They will do so without having achieved the sustained reduction in new COVID-19 cases required to advance into yellow Tier 4, which represents minimal spread of the virus.
Here’s a glance at what’s in store for residents, businesses and customers as the tier restrictions evaporate.
I’ve had my shots. Where can I go without a mask?
If it’s been at least two weeks since you got your second dose of Pfizer or Moderna vaccine, or the single dose of Johnson & Johnson, you’re going to be free to go pretty much wherever you want, indoors or outdoors, without wearing a face mask.
But there are a few exceptions in which masks will still be required, whether you’re vaccinated or not:
- On public transportation, such as airplanes, trains, buses, ships, ferries, taxis and ride-shares such as Uber or Lyft; and in transportation hubs including airports, bus and train stations, marinas or seaports, subway stations or other areas that provide public transportation.
- Indoors at elementary, middle and high schools (grades kindergarten through 12), child-care centers and other youth settings.
- Hospitals and health-care settings, including senior-care or long-term care centers.
- State and local correctional facilities and detention centers.
- Homeless shelters, emergency shelters and cooling centers.
It’s uncertain when mask requirements will go away entirely. The latest state guidelines will be in place at least until Oct. 1, as California health officials monitor vaccination and infection rates through the summer.
I don’t have my shots? Do I still have to wear a mask?
Masks will still be required for unvaccinated people in businesses and indoor public settings, according to the guidance from the state Department of Public Health.
That includes retail stores, restaurants, theaters, family entertainment centers, meetings, and state and local government offices that are open to the public.
In addition to people who are eligible to get a vaccine but haven’t done so – almost 400,000 in Fresno County alone – “we know that about 15% of the population across the state, those young people under the age of 12, are not themselves eligible to be vaccinated, so we have a whole cohort of Californians who remain susceptible,” Ghaly said.
Exceptions to the masking requirements for people who aren’t vaccinated include:
- Children younger than age 2 because of the risk of suffocation in a mask.
- People with a medical or mental health condition or disability that prevents wearing a mask, including medical conditions in which a mask could obstruct breathing, or people who are unconscious, incapacitated or cannot remove a mask without help.
- People who are hearing impaired, or communicating with a hearing-impaired person, in which the ability to see the person’s mouth is necessary for communication.
- People for whom wearing a mask creates a risk related to work, depending on local, state, federal regulations and workplace safety guidelines.
What about businesses?
With few exceptions, the new guidance issued by the state Department of Public Health allows all business sectors to reopen without any capacity restrictions.
In Fresno, Kings, Madera, Merced and Tulare counties, all under orange Tier 3 restrictions until Tuesday, the changes will include:
- Restaurants going from 50% indoor capacity to fully reopening their dining rooms.
- Movie theaters increasing from 50% indoor capacity to fully reopening their auditoriums.
- Shopping centers will be able to fully reopen indoor common areas, including food courts.
- Zoos and museums expanding from 50% indoor capacity to fully reopening indoor attractions.
- Family entertainment centers expanding from 25% capacity, or 50% if all guests were vaccinated or tested negative, expanding to full indoor capacity
- Water parks and amusement parks fully reopening after a 25% outdoor capacity limit under the orange tier.
- Gyms and fitness clubs increasing from 25% indoor capacity under the orange tier to full reopening with no capacity limit.
- Wineries, breweries and distilleries expanding from 25% capacity to full reopening.
- Cardroom gaming and satellite wagering facilities, increasing from 25% capacity to full reopening with no capacity limit.
- Bars that were closed entirely under the more restrictive purple Tier 1 and red Tier 2 of the reopening blueprint, and open outdoors only under the orange tier, can resume normal indoor operations.
The state’s Division of Occupational Safety and Health, or Cal-OSHA, is still in the process of establishing workplace rules that businesses must follow for their vaccinated and unvaccinated employees.
But businesses will be required to provide information to their customers or patrons about vaccination requirements, including the mask requirements for people who don’t have their shots. Ghaly said the state guidelines have several options available for businesses to verify the vaccination status of customers before they enter the store, restaurant, business or venue:
- They must provide information to all patrons and guests specifying the vaccine requirements and allow people to “self-attest” that they are vaccinated – essentially an honor system on the part of customers; or
- A business could also put in place a vaccine verification system to determine whether individuals are required to wear a mask; or
- Require all customers or patrons to wear a mask.
“This is the choice of the venue and the operators,” Ghaly said. “There is not a requirement or a preferred option. We are giving all three options to private and independent operators to choose which is best suited to their community and their business.”
Large “mega events” that attract more than 5,000 people to indoor venues will be required to confirm proof of vaccination or a negative COVID-19 test for admission. Outdoor events with at least 10,000 people will be encouraged, but not required, to seek the same confirmation, according to information from the state health department. Such proof, however, can also be through self-attestation.
What if people lie about their vaccination status to enter a business or event?
Just as some businesses in Fresno and other Valley counties chose to ignore or defy public health closure orders or indoor capacity limits under the state’s blueprint tiers, there is concern that relying on self-attestation may lead to people lying about getting their shots so they won’t have to wear a mask.
While state, county and city officials had some leverage, including fines and licensing consequences, to prompt businesses to comply with the rules, there’s not a lot that state or county officials can do if people aren’t truthful when they say they’ve been vaccinated before going into a store or business.
“If someone comes into a business without a mask, it should be considered a self-attestation for someone being vaccinated,” Ghaly said.
“Of course all systems of verification are fraught with some challenges,” he added. But state leaders “really came to determine that the people’s sense of being able to protect their own information (and) to operate a business in a certain way, it was important that people are notified very clearly of the importance of wearing a mask when you’re not vaccinated.”
“And business owners do have a choice,” Ghaly said. “Those who don’t believe that it is enough to have the self-attestation approach could require all individuals who enter a business or frequent an establishment to wear masks.”
There could be consequences for individuals, however, If someone falsifies documentation such as a vaccination card with the CDC’s seal. Faking a vaccination card or other unauthorized use of an official government agency seal is a criminal offense and is punishable under federal law.
If I’ve gotten my shots, can I still wear a mask in public?
A business cannot require someone to take off their mask before coming in. “We want to emphasize that no person can be prevented from wearing a mask as a condition of participation in an activity or entry into a business,” Ghaly said. “Even if they’re vaccinated, we want to make sure they’re protected and supported in their desire to wear a mask.”
Why does getting vaccinated or wearing a mask matter?
“We know that the risk for COVID-19 exposure in California, exposure and infection, will remain until we reach higher levels of community immunity,” Ghaly said.
Health officials say the pandemic has demonstrated the effectiveness of masks in hampering the person-to-person spread of the virus, while the vaccines offer a high degree of protection to people from infection, illness or hospitalization from coronavirus.
“Certainly if you’re vaccinated, you don’t need to lose sleep about the virus anymore,” said Dr. Rais Vohra, Fresno County’s interim medical officer. “So really, as soon as we get everybody vaccinated, (the pandemic) will be over.”
“It doesn’t even have to be 100%,” Vohra added. “But when we get the vast majority of people (are) vaccinated, then COVID will be over.”
Vohra and Burke Harris said they expect that coronavirus cases will continue to rise among people who opt against the vaccine and those who don’t want to wear masks — as restrictions ease on travel not only to other states, but countries that still have outbreaks.
But “the more people who are unvaccinated, the more opportunity the virus has to replicate, and when it replicates, it can mutate,” Burke Harris said. “We want to get to the point where this virus has no more opportunity to replicate, and it can’t come back and set us back after we reopen.”
This story was originally published June 11, 2021 at 7:00 AM.
