COVID PM: Vaccine delivery clears the path for in-person school possibilities countywide
Hello everyone, it’s holiday weekend time for many folks and that’s a very good reason to be reminded about where these holiday events have gotten us recently. We’re on a really good trajectory, and now is not the time to mess it up, y’know?
I’ll get off my soap box, but still point you to this story on double masking and this other story on mask effectiveness, just in case it serves us all the necessary reminder that carefulness can be a virtue.
We’ve got big news that vaccination has helped clear the path for elementary school teachers to plan for an in-person return countywide. And we’ve also got an easy-to-digest runback of all the key county vaccination details we got from local health officials this week.
Tell friends and foes both to sign up for this newsletter and my text alerts here — or to just text “Covid” to (831) 508-7524.
And now on to this evening’s headlines . . .
Vaccination push leads to back-to-school push
BREAKING THIS AFTERNOON: A program to vaccinate teachers and support staff countywide is moving ahead full steam, enabling the return of some 17,000 elementary students starting next month. We’ve got all the details here.
Vaccination 831: What we’ve learned this week
VACCINE WATCH: Santa Cruz County health officials have produced slides about the rollout using statistics from the California Immunization Registry, and Lookout’s Tulsi Kamath went over them with a fine-tooth comb to see what could be learned. Here’s Tulsi’s rundown of what those stats showed.
COVID TODAY: Local active cases continued to decline, though hospitalizations remained constant at a level consistent with what was seen in December at the beginning of the winter surge. Case rates and positivity rates in Santa Cruz County continue to improve after all-time highs in early January. There are now 955 active cases, which is 30 less than yesterday. More from Mallory Pickett here.
More from here & elsewhere
➤ California to open COVID-19 vaccine to people with cancer, obesity, other conditions (LA Times)
➤ California’s COVID-19 surge is receding, but officials still call for holiday caution (LA Times)
➤ Scientists like their odds against the wily coronavirus from South Africa (LA Times)
➤ Seven ways to make your COVID-19 mask more effective with a better fit (LA Times)
➤ Story keeps getting worse for Andre Cuomo on COVID-19 (CNN)
➤ At least 109 employees at a Colorado ski resort have tested positive for Covid-19 (CNN)
➤ A California school district required teachers do in-person learning. 60 of them are now on leave (SF Gate)
#BOLO
As our Wallace Baine highlighted in his The Here & Now column this week, things will be a bit different on the chowda front this year. But, fear not, and pull right up to the drive-thru at the Boardwalk on Monday. It’s part of the city’s Restaurant Week, which runs from Monday through Feb. 21 and participants include The East Side Eatery, Malone’s Grille, Makai Island Kitchen, Firefish Grill, The Farm Bakery Cafe & Gifts and more. For more info on Restaurant Week, go here.
Get some R&R this extended weekend — and definitely some chowder — and we’ll do it again next week.
Mark Conley
Deputy Managing Editor