El Dorado County and South Lake Tahoe remain in state's orange reopening tier

EL DORADO COUNTY, Calif. - During Tuesday's El Dorado County Board of Supervisors meeting, the county's Public health Officer Dr. Nancy Williams said the region remains in the orange tier of the California reopening plan.

During the meeting, Dr. Williams told the supervisors it is now obvious that California is in the midst of a second wave of coronavirus cases, and El Dorado County is experiencing a second wave as well, but so far the numbers have kept the region in the "orange."

The State monitors COVID activity trends and characteristics at county levels. The basis for assigning levels of restrictions is a) average daily case rate over seven days (with a 7-day lag), and testing positivity (the percentage of positive tests among all tests performed). They use these two metrics to assign the tiers from red to white.

When El Dorado County moved to the orange tier on September 2 for a period of at least three weeks (ending October 13) before being able to possibly move into the lower, yellow tier if data agreed.

The county is remaining in orange because:

1. On October 6, the area actually had red-tier numbers in the average new case level while the testing positivity remained orange. If the new case level remained red for a consecutive week, the county would have gone to red tier.

2. On October 13, both new cases and testing positivity were orange.

If assessed as "yellow" for two consecutive weeks, the county will be assigned to yellow, but a backwards movement is always possible.

Last week, Dr. Williams was worried that El Dorado County would be moving into the red-tier on October 13. She said people should look at the state's website (https://covid19.ca.gov/safer-economy/) for the data instead of solely relying on the county's dashboard. There are differences at times due to reporting dates and the state will only go by their data, not the more pin-pointed statistics at the county level.

The state has El Dorado County at 3.3 new COVID-19 cases per day per 100,000 with a 2.2 percent positivity rate. This is right in the middle of the orange/moderate tier.

Last Thursday Dr. Williams told South Tahoe Now she had concern over the rising rates in El Dorado County. Although we were down close to one percent testing positivity recently, that rate doesn't raise many eyebrows until it exceeds 3.5 percent, Williams said.

Supervisor Shiva Frentzen asked the public for a bit of sacrifice and do what is needed to move the county forward into the yellow tier: wear a mask, practice social distancing and wash hands. "All it takes is a bit of sacrifice from each one of use, so please, please, please wear that mask," she said so things can get back to a more normal situation.

There are now new state guidelines due to the rising number of cases:

Private gatherings:
- Maximum three households (general gatherings still prohibited). Transmission is happening most in small group gatherings.
- Face Coverings (protect family and friends, not just strangers)
- Distancing
- Outdoors
- Limit duration to a recommended under two hours (the shorter the better)

Halloween
COVID-19 rates have seen a surge after the last two holidays. Guidelines released Tuesday, trick-or-treating is discouraged. Plan lower-risk celebrations, like:
- Joining online parties for costume contests or pumpkin carving
- Enjoying activities from your car like drive-through Halloween displays or drive-in movies
- Having fun at home with scary movies, a candy scavenger hunt, or turning your home into a haunted house
- Putting on costumes and going on a physically distanced walk with your household
- Dressing up your home or yard with Halloween decorations

The Lake Tahoe Historical Society is creating a map for South Lake Tahoe area displays for drive-by entertainment. When it is completed, the information will be posted to their website, http://www.laketahoemuseum.org/home.html.

Many traditional Halloween celebrations – such as parties and in-person, door to door trick-or-treating – pose a high risk of spreading COVID-19 and could put your family and loved ones at risk. These activities involve face to face interactions with people from different households, and if an infection is detected among a participant, it will be very difficult to find and notify those who may have been exposed.

Dr. Williams said it is important to not relax diligence about protections, and we have been very lucky that lapses in precautions haven't let to outbreaks in vulnerable populations.

She said that schools haven't been a point of transmission so far with the opening of schools on the West Slope. South Lake Tahoe elementary schools started their two-day-per-week cohort schedule on October 12.

There will be a virtual town hall meeting on the coronavirus on November 19 5:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m.