Fresno County again fails to reach coronavirus red tier. What’s next
Fresno County and neighboring counties in the central San Joaquin Valley inched closer Tuesday to breaking out of the state’s most-restrictive tier of COVID-19 business limitations.
But despite two months of steady reductions in the number of new coronavirus cases arising each week, Fresno, Kings, Madera, Merced and Tulare counties all remained assigned to purple Tier 1 of California’s Blueprint for a Safer Economy by the state Department of Public Health.
Tuesday’s latest state update reveals that Fresno County had an average rate of 12.6 new COVID-19 cases per 100,000 residents each day for the week ending Feb. 27. That’s the lowest new-case rate for the county since mid-November, and it’s the eighth consecutive week in which the rate has fallen since peaking at 76 per 100,000 in January.
But it’s still above the threshold of 7.0 cases per 100,000 that the county must reach to graduate from purple Tier 1 into red Tier 2 in the color-coded state blueprint.
Tier 1 represents “widespread” risk for COVID-19 to spread from person to person in a community, and includes the most stringent limitations on businesses to prevent transmission, including: barring indoor dining and allowing only outdoor seating or take-out orders at restaurants, outdoor-only operations for gyms and fitness clubs; and limiting retail stores both large and small to 25% of their normal capacity.
The new-case rate is one of three key measures that govern the state’s tier assignments. Fresno County and the other Valley counties already met the other two for promotion to red Tier 2, denoting “substantial” risk of viral transmission.
That includes having less than 8% positive results among people tested for COVID-19 over the course of a week, and also having 8% or lower testing positivity among residents who live in neighborhoods that fall in the bottom 25% of the state’s Healthy Places Index.
The health equity measure assesses whether such disadvantaged areas are falling behind the rest of the county in keeping the virus in check.
But to progress into the lower tier, a county must meet all three requirements for two consecutive weeks.
Mariposa County was promoted on Tuesday from red Tier 2 to orange Tier 3, representing “moderate” risk for COVID-19 to spread from person to person in the county.
Statewide, 33 counties remain in the purple tier. Six counties – Alameda, Butte, Calaveras, Imperial, Santa Cruz and Solano – climbed into red Tier 2, making 21 counties in which restaurants can be open for indoor dining at up to 25% capacity.
Mariposa and Plumas counties moved from the red tier into orange Tier 3, in which already-opened businesses can expand their indoor operations and additional categories of businesses are allowed to reopen.
And for the first time in weeks, a county has made its way into yellow Tier 1, the least restrictive tier representing “minimal” risk of viral spread. Alpine County, on the California-Nevada border, is the only county currently in the yellow.
A directive by California Gov. Gavin Newsom last week could accelerate when counties could move forward on the tier ladder based on the state’s success in getting more people vaccinated in areas that are considered socially and economically disadvantaged – many of which have significant numbers of Latino, Black and other ethnic-minority residents.
When the state reaches a total of 2 million vaccine doses given to residents in those neighborhoods, the threshold for the new-case rate would rise from seven per 100,000 to 10 per 100,000 – a mark that’s already being met by Tulare County and is very close to being achieved by Kings and Madera counties.
As part of the push to ensure vaccine equity for lower-income and minority residents, the state is focusing 40% of its vaccine allocations into areas that fall into the lowest 25% of the California Healthy Places Index, which considers factors including access to health care, economic well-being, transportation, race/ethnicity and education, housing, and clean air and water.
Across Fresno, Kings, Madera, Mariposa, Merced and Tulare counties, 213 out of 382 census tracts fall into that bottom 25%.
This story was originally published March 9, 2021 at 12:05 PM.
