[Editor’s note: Noozhawk’s weekly COVID-19 email newsletter is delivered to subscribers on Wednesdays. You can sign up here. We are republishing the newsletters on the website so more readers have access to them.]
Welcome to Noozhawk’s Weekly COVID-19 Briefing.
I’m Grace Kitayama, staff writer for Noozhawk.
This newsletter is a way for Noozhawk readers to get important updates in one place.
It is emailed out every Wednesday, for free, to everyone who subscribes.
Here’s What We Know
- The average number of new daily COVID-19 cases increased 43.4% in the past week, the Santa Barbara County Public Health Department reported Friday. As always, the number of cases is undercounted since the results of at-home tests are not usually reported.
- The test positivity rate for Santa Barbara County was 9.1% last week, a number that has been increasing since mid-November.
- The county remains in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s low COVID-19 community level, but is reporting an increase in new cases, test positivity rate, and number of coronavirus-positive hospital patients.
- On Monday, the county reported 42 coronavirus-positive patients in local hospitals, including six in intensive-care units. This includes people who have been admitted for COVID-19 and those who are in the hospital for other reasons and happened to test positive for COVID-19 while there.
- The state now offers free flu testing at its COVID-19 testing locations, the California Department of Public Health said last week. To find a testing site, visit publichealthsbc.org.
Bivalent Booster Shots
The bivalent booster COVID-19 vaccine is now authorized and available for children as young as 6 months old, according to the Food & Drug Administration.
FDA commissioner Robert Califf said it’s important for more people to get vaccinated in the winter months with more indoor social gatherings.
In Santa Barbara County, 69.8% of residents have been fully vaccinated for COVID-19 and 59.1% have received a booster dose, according to the California COVID-19 Vaccine Tracker.
The state reports 19.4% of Santa Barbara County residents have received the bivalent booster.
As of Monday, providers have administered a total of 937,043 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine.
Got Questions?
Readers have sent us dozens of questions about pandemic-related issues. Please send yours to news@noozhawk.com and we’ll try to include them in future newsletters and Noozhawk Q&As.
Reader Resources
- Find a COVID-19 vaccine provider near you on the Vaccine Finder search function of https://www.vaccines.gov/search/. You can search for providers by location and by specific vaccine available (Pfizer-BioNTech, Moderna, Novavax and Johnson & Johnson). You can also find providers on the county website, publichealthsbc.org/vaccine, or at myturn.ca.gov. Some facilities offer walk-ups as well as appointments.
- Text your ZIP code to GETVAX (438829) for a list of vaccine providers in English, or text your ZIP code to VACUNA (822862) for a list in Spanish.
- There are free COVID-19 testing facilities around the county.
- Find more local pandemic-related information on the Public Health Department website.
- Click here for Noozhawk’s complete Coronavirus Crisis coverage.
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