Shasta County Public Health has a better count of cases of COVID-19 after an update to the state electronic laboratory reporting system. 214 cases were confirmed Sunday and another 109 on Monday for a total of 4,470. No new deaths have been reported and the total remains at 43. Public health estimates that there are 760 active cases in the county. There are 43 people hospitalized and 6 are in intensive care. A new state testing site will open next week at the County Campus on Breslauer Way in Redding. Testing will be done Tuesday through through Saturday by appointment only in the Boggs Building. A mobile testing unit will offer tests at the Health and Human Services Offices in Shasta Lake, Anderson, and Enterprise. The unit will alternate between the offices. Appointments are required and they can be made online at lhi.care/covidtesting.
Shasta County took almost 7 months to reach 1,000 cases. The second thousand was reached in 28 days, the third thousand in 16 days, and the fourth thousand cases happened in just one week.
Tehama County has had 1,528 cases and two more deaths have been reported for a total of 25. Trinity County has had 124 cases. Siskiyou County has had 565 cases and 2 deaths. Butte County has had 3,812 cases and 59 deaths. Glenn County has had 848 cases and 7 deaths. 730 cases are reported in Humboldt County with 9 deaths. Lassen County has had two deaths among their 361 cases in the community and one death among the 1,354 cases in prison. Modoc County has reached 118 cases.
The Coronavirus surge is taking an increasingly dire toll across the U.S. just as a vaccine appears close at hand. The country is now averaging over 1,300 COVID-19 deaths per day. The number of people in the hospital with the virus hit another all-time high at more than 80,000.
Travel advisories and overnight curfews are not designed to be enforced by authorities, but are intended to be self-imposed by people who are concerned about spreading the virus to more vulnerable members of the population.
— Travelers are asked to self-quarantine for 14 days upon arrival.
— Thanksgiving gatherings with family from outside one’s home are not recommended. Most everyone has elderly or otherwise medically vulnerable family members who can be unintentionally exposed to the virus from across the dinner table.
— In the 41 counties in the purple tier of restrictions, all nonessential work, movement and gatherings are supposed to cease between 10PM and 5AM.
California officials have approved stricter new safety regulations requiring employers to implement safety measures. Cal/OSHA now requires businesses to educate employees on ways to prevent infection, provide free personal protective equipment and offer free COVID-19 testing to all employees if three or more employees are infected with the Coronavirus within a 14-day period.
There’s a lot of information at shastaready.org, The Facebook Coronavirus Information Center and cdc.gov.
Widespread testing is a vital component in getting Shasta County out of the purple tier. Free testing options can be found at shastaready.org.