With COVID-19 transmission and hospitalizations on the rise, health officers representing counties across the Bay Area, including Contra Costa County, are tightening local rules for indoor activities.
Contra Costa Health Services today issued an order to close, effective Tuesday, Nov. 17 at 8 a.m.:
- Indoor dining
- Indoor fitness centers
- Concession stands at movie theaters
Dine-in restaurant and gyms reopened at reduced capacities when the county entered the state’s red tier in late September. But recent increases in COVID cases and hospitalizations make the closures necessary to help contain spread of the virus.
“Indoor interactions at restaurants, movie theaters, and indoor gyms and fitness centers are high-risk activities,” said Dr. Chris Farnitano, health officer for Contra Costa County. “And given what we’re seeing happen across the country and the region, we must act now.”
Diners at restaurants remove their masks to eat or drink, as do movie patrons when snacking on food from concession stands. People also breathe heavily while they exercise at indoor gyms, increasing the risk of droplet and aerosol transmission of COVID-19, which can be only partially reduced by wearing a face covering, according to the health department.
Contra Costa recently moved from the state’s orange tier to the more restrictive red tier because of an increasing number of cases in the county.
Health officials are especially worried about people gathering indoors with the holidays coming up and may consider other closures in the days and weeks ahead. Contra Costa County, which is now in the red tier, could move into the state’s most restrictive tier, the purple tier, within the coming weeks. If the county moves into the purple tier, schools that haven’t reopened will have to remain closed until the county moves back into the red tier or until they receive a waiver from the state.
I would like to know the number of covid cases, confirmed to have been transmitted from each of these business sectors.
I bet zero!
But let’s make small businesses close, put people out of work and be surprised at the number of businesses who permanently close.
I’m right there with you on that mindset. I’d really like to know how many cases are because of the gyms, etc. I’ll tell you, from what I see at the gym, people are super respectful of the rules because we didn’t want the gyms to close again. They need to stay open for peoples’ health and sanity!
Agreed! It’s easy for Dr. F, who makes 450K a year, to shutdown business and jobs in the name of “safety”. Unbelievable!!!
Punitive, arbitrary, unnecessary are the first adjectives which come to mind.
They are abusing businesses big and small because they can, and it costs them nothing. Shameful.
Gyms operating at 10% capacity. Not closed.
Negative ghost rider – CLOSED
https://cchealth.org/press-releases/2020/1113-Move-to-Contain-Spread-of-COVID-19.php
But it’s ok for Governor Nuisance to attend a birthday dinner at the French Laundry with more than 3 different households?? Hypocrite!
oh that’s really disgusting TraumaRx, Needs to be exposed with photos.
Restaurants need to fight back, it’s too cold for outside dining.People will get sick from that.
We need to save the restaurants that have worked so hard,
Don’t know if there are photos, but if it smells like s#it, it probably is
https://www.sfchronicle.com/politics/article/Newsom-attended-French-Laundry-party-with-more-15725393.php
Auntie B – Cool air doesn’t make people sick. Breathing each others air does.
Right on time…. businesses are screwed with the freezing temperatures outside too.
Just wear your damn masks guys. We could have been over this months ago if people collectively gave a damn about anyone but themselves. There’s no medical exemptions for it. If you have breathing problems already, I can GUARUNTEE being intubated is much more uncomfortable.
Masks are not a panacea to stop the pandemic. Some of us prefer to breath fresh air which can also stop covid by boosting immunity. Some of us wear masks to get in stores and facilities that require them but we’re not going to wear them where not require like on our walks or driving in our cars.
If this were a conspiracy would the conspirators prefer to A) reduce the populace to those who followed the rules and are obedient slaves or B) reduce the number to the “creatives” who don’t like to follow absurd rules and will create profitable products for them? What do you think?
The ignorance is strong with this one.
Not all people who contract Covid need to be intubated. The majority of the people hospitalized are gravely sick already and old.! I know this cause I see it first hand. Stop pumping fear in people. If you wanna hide in your house and wear a mask forever than go ahead.
Captain, could you please point to some evidence that the fresh air you are breathing through a thin piece of cotton is less helpful to your immune system? Can you point to any evidence that mask free air is more healthful than wearing a protective barrier?
Popcorn, is that you?
Is wearing a mask a cure or vaccine for Covid? If not, then no we would not have been over this months ago if we simply wore a mask.
Wear a mask was intended to “flatten the curve” and “prevent hospitals from being overwhelmed”, it was not intended nor was is it ever going to cure the virus.
The governments plan causes a yo-yo effect. Close it down, cases drop but they do not magically vanish. You start opening up and miraculously cases go up. You don’t live in the 1800s. You live in an interdependent society where you can fly anywhere in the world in about 4 hours.
And by the way, according to California Department of Public Health people with respiratory disabilities, post-traumatic stress disorder, severe anxiety, claustrophobia, autism, and cerebral palsy, or individuals with a hearing impairment or who communicate “with a person with a hearing impairment, where the ability to see the mouth is essential for communication can be exempt from the mask mandate.
Hey Chuq, you do know that a thin piece of cotton worn as a mask will not block Coronavirus, right? Wearing a thin cotton mask or bandana is TOTALLY pointless, but it makes the higher-ups feel good. They like the power and control and all us useful idiots go along with it.
Masks serve one purpose, to tell normal people who the idiots in our community are. Except where your employer requires, anyone still doing the mask is a complete and utter moron. But please keep it up, it makes it easy to avoid stupid individuals.
Very informative article
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.washingtonpost.com/history/2020/09/01/1918-flu-pandemic-end/%3foutputType=amp
Honestly it’s time for small businesses to revolt. My gym is super safe and allows 10 people an hour max. These counties are being complete Nazis about thus.
How many struggling businesses affected will now go out of business? All for a virus with a 99.3+/- % rate of recovery??
A part of me envisions our elected controllers (grease head, ping pong ball eyes, corn row hair, etc.) sitting around saying, “we killed a lot of businesses, let’s see if we can finish the job.”
The county rate per/100K has is 8.3% (adjusted to 7.1% for testing) today and is a huge jump from where it was a couple of weeks ago (below 3.9%).
I would be interested in knowing from the Health Department if these three sectors are the drivers of the increase in cases or if it it primarily large private gatherings of people and the Casino San Pablo. The casino is exempt from any health orders because they are a tribal casino.
The County is very transparent in terms of data, but severely lacks in disclosing the root cause of the numbers.
See what happens when y’all don’t follow the rules, y’all asked for this
3 deaths in the last 23 days, all of which were in long term care facilities.
WHY ARE WE PRETENDING LIKE WE DON’T HAVE 8 MONTHS OF DATA, AND NEW KNOWLEDGE AND BETTER STRATEGIES FOR TREATING PEOPLE?
Dead is DEAD, no matter where. Have a little empathy and think of others sometime, not just yourself.
How is destroying businesses going to bring them back?
How about you think of others. Not everyone can shelter in place, some people have to earn a living and can’t hide in the basement.
Lockdowns do more harm than good, way more young people have died of suicide in the last 8 months than covid, and it isn’t even close.
@ The Masked (and gloved) Poster-
It seems like Mitch is just stating the facts. Has nothing to do with empathy. 3 deaths in 23 days due to Covid ain’t to bad. In those 23 days how many people have died from drug over doses, car accidents, heart attacks, suicides, and other health issues? We’ve probably had more fires in the last 23 days then Covid deaths 🙄
I do not care about anyone dying. It’s not my concern. People die every day. Not my problem. You guys can piss off with your guilt trips. All these “thousands” of people infected in our area, and still nobody knows anyone. Soon we will have more cases then people like Joe Biden had votes..All fraud by numbers
All of the cities in Contra Costa where the number of cases in the past 14 days exceeded the county average are located in either West County or East County. San Pablo has been the hottest of the hot spots for months and still leads the county. It’s amazing that there are still many people left there to infect.
Small businesses in Central County must be incredibly frustrated to find themselves shut down because of the high infection rates in West County and East County.
It’s not just businesses in Central County that should be frustrated. Those in both East and West County should be frustrated as well.
If you look at the census data the County provides on the COVID website, it is certain pockets in those two areas that are causing the uptick.
For example, in East County, the largest percentage by census tract are in Pittsburg and Bay Point – both of those census tracts are on the north side of Hwy 4 and are adjacent to each other. The areas on the south side of Hwy 4 are for the most part within the county average.
The same thing occurs in West County, where one census tract in Richmond is high but others are within the county average.
Can someone please explain to me “the science” behind wearing a mask alone in your car or alone walking outside with no other human within 50 yards? Please, I’d love to hear the justification for this insanity.
The democrats have labeled it as such. Why do you question them?
Shameful, unreal…. My gym is huge and open at 10% capacity and I am NEVER next to someone when I work out, we all wear masks and clean all the time. However I have seen some Crossfit place in Pleasant Hill (that I am not going to name) where they are not wearing masks during workouts indoors, which is not permitted…because of irresponsible places like this, people gathering and not wanting to follow the rules, some businesses will have to close for good. I do not agree with COCO’s decision, they need to let these businesses open at a controlled, small capacity, it is ridiculous. We are still in the red tier but they decide to move us to the rules under the purple tier…this is poor judgment.
Fell you man. Gym honestly feels like the safest place in many ways. Mine is doing the same precautions. It’s a joke, time for small business to band together and protest this. I mean everything you can…
Look at Elon musk tweet these positives are turned around and deemed false positive but still goes against the count? This is bull.
They will stamp out this country if it takes 10 years !!!!!
AD
It’s the “Halloween” surge. Nothing to do with the protests, riots or tens of thousands of mask shamers who went out and celebrated Biden winning last weekend. It’s ok when it’s part of the Democrat agenda. Going to the gym is unhealthy and dangerous though…
@Tyler S – It’s not a “Halloween” surge or surge related to any event. If you look at the graphs of cases and hospitalizations you will see a steady increase. There are no jumps or spikes where we can point and say a specific event was the cause. The numbers have been increasing steadily since mid-October. When the restrictions were relaxed many people went back to near normal pre-COVID lives resulting in a steady and gradually accelerating increase of COVID-19 in the community. The lockdown was re-introduced to prevent that acceleration from increasing into exponential growth.
Exponential growth would overwhelm the hospital system which then leads to triage where patients that need ICU level care are instead routed to facilities with less patient support.
A surprising number of people seem to feel that when the standards were relaxed that it also meant that COVID-19 was somehow less contagious than it was before and so they could get away with fewer or no precautions.
You are correct Tyler. Just ignore the WC Idiot. Gyms are safe when proper guidelines are followed. WC idiot Is probably a fatass that doesn’t even understand the importance of maintaining physical fitness and its impact on the immune system. Actually, WC idiot sounds a lot like our scumbag governor.
If you really think the Covid spikes recently are because people are not wearing masks then you are an idiot. Yes, the virus is real and yes it can be very dangerous , even deadly, mostly in the elderly and those with pre-existing conditions. However, how does it make sense to destroy people’s livelihoods and businesses in an attempt to protect a small group of people. People are going to contract it even with lock downs. It makes no sense to lock everything down again. It is called selective quarantine people. We cannot destroy the lives of everyone trying to save some. Not only that, do you know these lockdowns are also causing upticks in depression, suicide, drug/alcohol abuse, divorce, domestic violence, and even child abuse. One other thing about masks, I have seen multiple people cut out the inside layer of cloth masks, turning a two layer mask into a one layer mask to they can breathe easier. So, who knows how effective wearing a mask even is.
@Savagette—I enjoyed reading your commentary and agree!
The virus is you. Humans are the virus. The sooner you understand this, the sooner you will understand. Climate change and the green new deal was never about the environment. Humans have been declared a plague. Official documents have referred to humans as useless feeders. The term nonessential is nonrandom. Some people own the world and you are the pest that needs to be controlled.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L5foZIKuEWQ
If people would do what they’re supposed to do, we’d be over this A LOOOONG time ago. But some folks are so selfish and irresponsible.