CALIFORNIA—On Monday, December 21, Governor Gavin Newsom indicated the current regional stay-at-home order will most likely be extended into next year.
Within the last couple of weeks, there was a 63 percent increase in coronavirus hospitalizations. The governor reminded the public that “this disease remains deadly” during a press conference.
On December 3, California started its regional stay-at-home order with the state divided into five regions: Greater Sacramento, the Bay Area, San Joaquin Valley, Southern California, and Northern California.
A region would be required to be under a stay-at-home order if ICU [Intensive Care Unit] hospitalizations were under 15 percent.
Currently, every region is under a stay-at-home order except for Northern California, with 98 percent of California residents under the order.
While Governor Newsom noted an extension is likely, he did not confirm if it would happen. The stay-at-home orders are expiring soon, where San Joaquin’s stay-at-home order ends on Monday, December 28 and Southern California’s stay-at-home order expires on Wednesday, December 30.
In addition, the governor said that ICU capacity reached zero percent in San Joaquin Valley and Southern California. The Bay Area is at 13.7 percent and Greater Sacramento is at 16.2 percent.
Northern California, the only region not under a stay-at-home order, currently has an ICU capacity of 28.7 percent.
As of Tuesday, December 22 at 11 a.m., California had 1,925,007 cases with nearly 23,000 deaths. More than 30 million tests were given since the start of the coronavirus pandemic.
