SACRAMENTO, Calif — Sacramento County hoped to move to the orange tier of California's reopening system by the end of April, but the chance of that happening is gone.
Sacramento County needed a seven-day average case rate of six cases per 100,000 residents with a seven-day lag for two consecutive weeks, and there is only one week left in April.
Since its case rate continues to stagnate, around 9 new cases per 100,000 residents, Sacramento Public Health Officer Dr. Olivia Kasirye said the county most likely will not move to the orange tier in the state's reopening plan.
"If you do look at our chart on the dashboard, you see that there is a plateau, and we've been in that plateau for quite a while," Kasirye said.
According to the California Department of Public Health [CDPH], if the county's case rate rose above 10 new cases per 100,000 residents with a seven-day lag for two weeks, usually, that would mean the county would move back to the purple tier. Although the Sacramento case rate is closer to 10 than six, Dr. Kasirye doubts the county will go back to the purple tier.
"I don't think there's a risk of us reverting back to the purple tier," Kasirye said. "One because the numbers have just plateaued, they're just remaining about the same, and also because the state has also changed the criteria for going to the purple tier. So it makes it's more difficult to meet all of those criteria to move back."
The new criteria set forward by CDPH involves the state looking at the stability and availability in hospitals in the county before deciding to move the county back to a more restrictive tier.
Previously Dr. Kasirye attributed the new cases to youth sports but remains steadfast in the fact that the outbreaks are small.
"It's not due to any major outbreak; it's just due to community spread," Kasirye said.
Sacramento County also reported some coronavirus variants but has limited information on them. Dr. Kasirye explained not every sample is tested for the coronavirus, and the state decides which samples will be tested for a coronavirus variant.
California has found a total of nine cases of the two west coast variants, B.1.427 and B.1.429, and the 16 cases of the U.K. variant, B.1.1.7, within Sacramento County. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said these variances seem to spread quickly and seem to be prevented by the vaccine. Research is still being conducted.
