The Santa Barbara County Public Health Department on Friday announced the first pediatric death related to COVID-19, as well as 186 new cases of the disease.
Officials said the Santa Maria resident who died was in the 12 to 17 age range and had underlying conditions.
“This devastating news reminds us all the severity of this pandemic,” Public Health Director Van Do-Reynoso said during Friday’s press briefing. “I am again urging all community members to keep each other safe by avoiding gatherings over this winter holiday season as cases, hospitalizations and deaths continue to increase across our country, our state and our county.”
In addition, the Public Health Department on Friday reported a second death from COVID-19. The person was a Lompoc resident older than age 70 with underlying medical conditions, officials said.
The two deaths reported Friday weren’t associated with a COVID-19 outbreak at a congregate facility in the county, according to the department.
The newest report brings the county’s case total to 14,376 residents who tested positive for COVID-19.
The county is currently experiencing a “second wave” of COVID-19 activity, according to Do-Reynoso.
“Our first wave was over the summer months,” Do-Reynoso said. “This second wave started in early November, and is likely going to be larger than our first wave.”
Public Health officials have been preparing to see a spike in positive COVID-19 cases after the recent Thanksgiving weekend, when some residents did not heed the urging to avoid travel as well as gathering with others outside of their immediate household.
There have been 1,519 new COVID-19 cases in the county in the past seven days, for an average of 217 cases per day.
An uncertain future looms as COVID-19 metrics continue to rise amid a surge in community transmission.
“It is unclear how long this increase in COVID-19 in our community will last,” Do-Reynoso said.
This holiday season, Do-Reynoso said, public health officials are concerned that COVID-19 positive cases from family and friends gathering will continue.
The number of COVID-19 hospitalizations is growing in the county, with recent tallies “as high as they have ever been,” Do-Reynoso said.
There were 90 patients being treated in local hospitals on Friday. Of those patients, 24 were in intensive-care units.
The Southern California region had 0% ICU bed capacity left on Friday, while the county’s availability was at 29.9%. The Southern California region’s ICU availability must hit 15% or above for the county to exit the regional stay-at-home order.
Cottage Health is temporarily reducing the number of elective procedures in response to COVID-19-related capacity concerns. The health care system operates hospitals in Santa Barbara, Goleta and Santa Ynez.
“While the good news is we have ICU capacity at this point, staffing continues to be a top concern,” said Dr. Lynn Fitzgibbons, an infectious disease specialist at Cottage Health.
Of Friday’s 186 new COVID-19 cases, Santa Maria had 50, Santa Barbara had 49, Lompoc had 25, Goleta had 20, the unincorporated area of the Goleta Valley and Gaviota had eight, and the Santa Ynez Valley had seven. There were five cases in Orcutt, three cases in the Montecito-Summerland-Carpinteria area, and two each in Isla Vista and in the unincorporated communities in the North County, which also includes Guadalupe. Geographic locations were pending on 15 cases.
Gregg Hart, chair of the county Board of Supervisors, spoke about how he had a Friday meeting via Zoom with California Health and Human Services Agency Secretary Dr. Mark Ghaly, along with local elected officials.
County officials asked Ghaly to “give our region an opportunity to better control our own destiny to the creation of a new Central Coast subregion” with Santa Barbara, Ventura and San Luis Obispo counties.
Ghaly “promised to seriously consider the county’s proposal and committed to continuing the dialogue,” Hart said, adding that Ghaly’s response to the proposal of a new Central Coast subregion was “very encouraging.” Ghaly “expressed appreciation for the excellent work our county has done, working in collaboration with the state to reduce the spread of the virus.”
The county Board of Supervisors voted unanimously on Dec. 8 to send a letter to California Gov. Gavin Newsom requesting that the county, along with neighboring Ventura and San Luis Obispo counties, be allowed to exit the Southern California region of the state’s stay-at-home order.
State Sen. Monique Limón, who represents the 19th Senate District, and Assemblyman Steve Bennett, the representative for the 37th State Assembly District, joined Friday’s remote meeting.
Both Limón and Bennett “expressed strong support for the county’s proposal to Dr. Ghaly,” Hart said.
“I shared with Dr. Ghaly my concern that local residents are getting frustrated because they believe their individual actions and our community-wide responses to COVID-19 are lost within the very large context of the 20 million-person Southern California region,” Hart said.
Hart said he remains “hopeful and optimistic that we can find a path to success.”
Local homeless shelters are closed to new admissions because of COVID-19 outbreaks or fear of outbreaks, Do-Reynoso said.
During the week of Dec. 6-12, Do-Reynoso said the Public Health Department began investigating and mitigating new outbreaks at 17 congregate settings and six businesses, including the Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Department.
“COVID activity is at the highest level it has ever been in our county,” Do-Reynoso said, adding that the disease is widespread.
Meanwhile, a sheriff’s deputy and a custody deputy have tested positive for COVID-19, and two COVID-19-positive inmates were booked into custody at the Main Jail near Santa Barbara, according to sheriff’s spokeswoman Raquel Zick.
That brings the total number of sheriff’s employees who have tested positive for COVID-19 to 61, and 50 have recovered and returned to work, Zick said.
She noted that the deputy wore a mask at work, and the custody deputy wore personal protective equipment while at work.
Two unrelated COVID-19-positive inmates were recently booked at the Main Jail, Zick said Friday.
“Both inmates were found to be positive for COVID-19 during the intake screening process and are each being housed in negative-air pressure housing areas, separate from the general population,” Zick said.
To date, a total of 89 COVID-19-positive inmates have been housed at the Main Jail. Of those, 68 inmates have recovered.
Dr. Henning Ansorg, the county’s public health officer, said Moderna and Pfizer are planning to ship COVID-19 vaccines “on a weekly basis.” Each immunization will be logged in a specially-created, national COVID-19 database, Ansorg said.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration on Friday issued an emergency use authorization for the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine, and the county anticipates thousands of doses by early next week, according to Do-Reynoso.
On Thursday, the long-awaited Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine arrived in Santa Barbara County, and local hospital health care workers were among the first to receive injections of the COVID-19 vaccine.
To date, at least 727 health care workers have tested positive for COVID-19, according to the county Public Health Department.
The supply of the COVID-19 vaccine remains limited, and Santa Barbara County will implement a phased approach to distribute the vaccine in the weeks and months ahead, according to public health officials. The phased distribution of the vaccine will begin with people at highest risk of contracting the virus, public health officials said.
After the vaccination of hospital staff, the COVID-19 vaccine soon will be available to long-term care facility residents and staff, and then first responders in the emergency medical service system and dialysis providers.
The initial 3,900 doses of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine arrived, with 1,950 doses going to Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital and 1,950 doses going to Marian Regional Medical Center in Santa Maria, public health officials said Thursday.
The COVID-19 vaccine is expected to be more available to the general public in spring 2021.
County public health officials said this week that the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine will “work to reduce the risk of contracting the virus and improve our natural defenses through increasing our antibodies to fight the virus.”
Fitzgibbons was one of the first frontline workers to receive the COVID-19 vaccination this week, and she described how she felt about 24 hours after receiving the shot in her arm.
“I had a slightly sore arm,” Fitzgibbons said at Friday’s press briefing. “I’m grateful I didn’t have any of the brief systemic side effects.”
Click here to search an interactive map to find a COVID-19 testing facility in California.
The county Public Health Department COVID-19 website, publichealthsbc.org, offers information about what to do if you have tested positive for the disease, are identified as a contact to someone who tested positive for COVID-19 or suspected to have COVID-19.
Click here for information about COVID-19 vaccination in Santa Barbara County.
Click here for Noozhawk’s Coronavirus Crisis section.
— Noozhawk staff writer Brooke Holland can be reached at bholland@noozhawk.com. Follow Noozhawk on Twitter: @noozhawk, @NoozhawkNews and @NoozhawkBiz. Connect with Noozhawk on Facebook.