City of Cupertino, CA County of Santa Clara COVID-19 Videos, 24 Feb 2022

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From YouTube: County Public Health Dept. Press Conference (Indoor Masking Metrics Update) - February 24, 2022

Description

The County of Santa Clara Public Health Department provides an update on indoor masking metrics at a press conference recorded February 24, 2022.

Dr. Sara Cody announces a plan to lift the indoor masking requirement for Santa Clara County on March 2, 2022.

For more information regarding the impact of the COVID-19 outbreak in Cupertino, please visit https://www.cupertino.org/coronavirus

A

For the latest information regarding the covid 19 pandemic in cupertino, please visit cupertino.org coronavirus.

B

Hello, everyone thank you for being here today. We are here to listen to dr sarah cody address the indoor masking guidelines for the county of santa clara. With that we will turn it right over to her. We will go to other languages after in english, and before we begin with our other languages, we will take questions in english and call on each outlet individually, so be patient. We will get to you and now we'll bring you dr sarah cody.

C

Good afternoon, everyone before I get started, I just wanted to first acknowledge the events that broke overnight and the tragedy unfolding in ukraine and europe, and just acknowledge that that's happening, and it does feel a little bit odd to be talking about masking in the context of these unthinkable events that have unfolded, but nevertheless it is our job to keep you updated on.

C

What's happening locally and locally, I actually have some very good and encouraging news to share, and that is that the level of community transmission of covet in our community continues to decline, and in fact today, for the first day, we have met our metric for community transmission.

C

So, as you recall, to transition from requiring indoor masking to recommending indoor masking, there are three metrics that we need to meet. The vaccination metric we've already met, that was 80 percent of our population uh being vaccinated and we're actually just under 85 percent we're at 84.7.

C

We have also met our metric around hospitalizations, our hospitalizations for covid are low and stable, and so that leaves the third metric around community transmission. So today we have met that metric. For the first time, and rather we've met, we've hit the metric for the first time. We need to stay there for seven days, so we are on track and given the steady decline in cases that we continue to see, I'm fairly confident that we will be able to lift the masking requirement on march 2nd.

C

So what does that mean between now and march? 2Nd?

C

That means that we will continue to require masking in indoor spaces and then, as of the second, we will transition to a recommendation, which is the case around the rest of the state, and I just want to recall for you why we've kept the masking requirement in place here in santa clara county and chief among them is that this policy is really an expression of our core values, one of which is health equity.

C

We need to ensure that we protect people who remain vulnerable to covid because of age or illness or underlying medical condition or station in life, and this universal masking will continue to protect our entire community because it what it does is.

C

It lowers the chance that someone can be exposed to covid and get therefore get ill from covid, um so these current trends are very encouraging, and I- and I know everyone look forward to the day when we won't even need to wear masks anymore and when they aren't part of our life, at least for a little bit.

C

I want to thank our community. I think our community has shown tremendous concern for each other by vaccinating and masking, and that has given us a level of safety and protection that will be durable, and I again, I think that it's very encouraging and I look forward to the day when we can all comfortably take off our masks inside. Thank you so much.

B

We'll now take questions for dr cody. We will start with abc7.

D

Given that we're now hitting these metrics, does that make it a situation in which the public should feel more.

C

D

um You know that we're removing the mass at this time, rather than with the rest of the counties that just pulled him when the state made that decision.

C

Yeah in santa clara county, we committed to metrics back last fall and we remain committed to those metrics.

C

As I said before, the idea is to ensure that we have safety in place with high levels of vaccination which we have and that we have overall community transmission low enough to support removing this very important layer or at least removing the requirement.

C

I want to note, however, it's important to know that across the state masking is still required in certain settings, so it is still required in child care, k-8, shelters, jails, public transit and other riskier places, and so that that will be true here too.

E

If, over the next seven days, any one or more of the three metric conventions should elevate, does that mean the recommendation will not go forward on the second margin of the state requirement.

C

So we have these three metrics we've met the vaccination metric that won't change. uh We've met the hospitalization metric hospitalizations are continuing to trend down, so I think that's pretty stable and I am confident uh relatively confident about the community transmission metric as well. I want to say that we purposefully chose a metric that the public could see because it's on our dashboard.

C

It is not the only metric that we look at internally to understand community transmission. The other really important metric is our wastewater surveillance and those data are very encouraging and very solid and that's actually a leading indicator, and that remains. It continues to decline and looks, looks very encouraging.

C

Yes, if we see in our data that the level of community transmission is rising, which again we do not expect, then we would continue to require masks rather than convert to a recommendation. But I want to just be very clear that the data that we are following looks very encouraging. We continue to see a downward trend in cases reported and we continue to see a downward trend in our wastewater surveillance.

D

D

To the bay area to compose health orders uh two years ago and we're one of the last to uh take off our masks here in the bay area, what do you want to say to your critics? We say that this is going too hard. It's overkill. This is a another case of dr cody parker.

C

What I can say is that we have we in the county, are committed to our core values, and one of our core values is health equity, and that means that everyone gets as much as possible a chance to be healthy, and when you translate that to masks, that means that, as a community, we need to continue to mask to protect people who still are not protected because of age or illness, or underlying condition or geography. Or what have you so this policy is really an extension of our core value.

C

In addition, throughout the pandemic, we have sought to understand the evidence for the policy decisions that we're making and understand the data, and we set these metrics across the bay area in the fall and to stay true to our commitment. We needed to continue to follow the metrics, as we had promised.

D

Nbc bay area.

C

So our top priority, as always, is to protect the public and to tell you what we know when we know it on our dashboards. You can see our epidemic curve the cases that what we're following is the seven day moving average.

C

So the seven day, moving average today of 501 reflects what's been having happening over the last seven days, which means that it's pretty stable, you're not going to see it bouncing around a lot. You can also look ahead on that dashboard and see the cases reported and see that that's also trending down. So that's what gives me confidence that the downward trend is going to stay and coupled with the other surveillance systems, including wastewater.

C

That's why I feel confident that we are headed in a um to a period of a lull or a valley between the peaks that we see.

B

San jose, spotlight, okay, we'll come back around abc7 anyone else. Ktv! You follow.

E

The possibility of a ford booster down the road have you had any discussions or considerations about requiring.

C

So far, what we're hearing from the cdc and the fda, my understanding is that there will not be a recommendation for a fourth shot anytime in the near future. What's unknown is that will that at some time in the future be recommended, and and again that's unknown at this.

C

Time guess so: yes, yes, right because uh remember we're doing a seven-day moving average and there's a one-day delay in reporting. So that means that yesterday was actually the first day that we met the under 550 metric. And so that's why it will lift on march 2nd.

A

For the latest information regarding the covid 19 pandemic in cupertino, please visit cupertino.org coronavirus.