No coronavirus surge post-Labor Day in LA County, officials say
Unlike the spike in COVID-19 positive cases in L.A. County after the Fourth of July holiday, public health officials say so far the region has not seen a surge in cases following Labor Day.
LOS ANGELES (KABC) -- Unlike the spike in COVID-19 positive cases in Los Angeles County after the Fourth of July holiday, public health officials say so far the region has not seen a surge in cases following Labor Day.
"That's in part because people took actions to make sure we didn't see that surge," L.A. County Public Health Director Dr. Barbara Ferrer said Monday during a coronavirus briefing.
But there is concern about what's ahead in regard to the flu season converging with COVID-19 and the demand it could place on health care providers.
"This fall and winter, however, we will probably see both flu and COVID-19 at the same time," Ferrer said.
Gov. Gavin Newsom on Monday also urged Californians to get a flu shot and went as far as to get a shot live during his press conference, saying the vaccine was safe and simple.
Meanwhile, L.A. County is trying to move out of the state's most restrictive purple tier. County officials say it may be hard to meet the threshold for the red tier due to daily new COVID-19 case rate.
Ferrer said the county will rely on lessons learned from past decisions on reopenings, as well as its level of confidence in the ability of impacted businesses to adhere to restrictions once they're permitted to begin operating.
"We're a very large county, but we have a lot of really good information from the data that allows us to really look at both what happened in the past, what kinds of decisions we were making and then what does that tell us about how to proceed in the future," Ferrer said Monday.
Until the overall level of the virus is much lower, school officials say public schools in L.A. cannot open to in-person classes.
However, the Students First Coalition of Los Angeles has sent a letter to the L.A. County Board of Supervisors urging them to consider a balanced, safe approach to returning to the classroom soon.
"We are not trying to cram every child into a classroom," said Paul Escala, Los Angeles Archdiocese superintendent of schools. "We want a safe approach. We believe given our current health conditions and all the preparation we have done and all the equipment we have purchased we can make classrooms safe for children and we can see especially the youngest return soon."
The Board of Supervisors on Tuesday will talk about allowing school districts to apply for waivers to offer some in-person instruction.
The board will also talk about the possibility of reopening additional businesses, like nail salons. Nail salons in the state are allowed to reopen, but those reopening decisions are left up to individual counties.
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