COVID-19 outbreak among UCSB Students expected to keep county in red tier
The COVID-19 outbreak among UC Santa Barbara students in fraternity and sorority houses in Isla Vista — and in other communities — will likely keep Santa Barbara County from advancing in California’s weekly tier assessment.
Public health officials had hoped the county would transition Tuesday into the second-lowest tier of the state’s new four-tier system.
“We were very, very close,” Public Health Director Van Do-Reynoso said of the orange tier during Friday’s press briefing. “We were on the edge. Now, we are solidly in the red.”
Santa Barbara County has been in the second-most restrictive red tier since Sept. 29. The county will return to a more restrictive tier if its metrics get worse for two consecutive weeks.
The COVID-19 outbreak in Isla Vista initially appeared to be contained, and “the residents have all been quarantined,” Second District Supervisor Gregg Hart said. “Unfortunately, additional testing now shows the outbreak was not contained within the residents in the affected sorority and fraternity.”
Several dozen additional COVID-19 cases among fraternity and sorority members were found through testing and contact tracing. Isolation and quarantine efforts are underway in cooperation with UCSB officials, according to Hart.
Public health officials are investigating and monitoring outbreaks at five fraternity and sorority homes, as well as investigating “the new batch of cases we just recently received,” Do-Reynoso said.
Officials now are working to confirm the exact number of new cases in the seaside community, according to Hart.
“An innocently intended gathering can lead to an outbreak,” he said. “A small outbreak can quickly spread in a dense community to become widespread community transmission.”
Hart said that “if the residents involved in the parties that started this outbreak had been more responsible and considered the potential consequences of their actions, this could have been avoided entirely.”
UCSB, Santa Barbara City College and county public health officials will send a joint letter to college students “reminding them about the critical importance of complying with the county’s public health order and reminding them about the consequences they face for failing to comply with the orders, which could include suspension and expulsion of school,” Hart said.
Isla Vista isn’t the only area that reported the largest daily coronavirus case count in Santa Barbara County this week, Hart added. Lompoc and Santa Maria this week also had the highest number of daily cases among county regions.
“It’s easy for folks to point to this outbreak in Isla Vista,” Hart said. “It’s not a situation where Isla Vista alone is the only problem we have.”
Under California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s color-coded tracking system, Santa Barbara County must meet the criteria for the orange tier for two consecutive weeks before it would be able to move from the red to the less-restrictive orange.
The orange tier indicates that the spread of COVID-19 is “moderate,” while the red indicates “substantial” spread of the virus in the county.
Santa Barbara County reported 45 new COVID-19 cases Friday, with a positive-test rate of 1.9 percent.
The county’s total number of COVID-19 cases is 9,760 on Friday, and the number of coronavirus-related deaths in the county remained at 120. The county reported 129 active cases, people who have tested positive and are still considered infectious, as of Friday.
There were 17 COVID-19 patients being treated in local hospitals, a decline from 18 the previous day. Three of those patients were in intensive care, a drop from four in the previous 24 hours.
“It’s good that our hospitalization rates are going down,” Do-Reynoso said. “But we need to be mindful of the increase in cases because the increase in cases may impact the vulnerable population. We are not ready to throw open the gates just based on one metric — hospitalization. We have to examine the case rate and the testing positivity.”
The countywide daily COVID-19 case rate dropped from 26 to five per 100,000 residents, Do-Reynoso said.
The county’s daily new confirmed cases fluctuate in the range of 4.5 to 4.9 from Oct. 11 to Oct. 14, Do-Reynoso said.
The positive-test rate continues its downward trend, according to Do-Reynoso. The rate of positive results from COVID-19 tests in Santa Barbara County ranges between 2.1 percent and 2.4 percent from Oct. 11 to Oct. 14.
The county has conducted an average of nearly 300 daily COVID-19 tests per 100,000 people during the past several weeks, Do-Reynoso said. That exceeds the state median testing parameter of 239.
Of Friday’s new cases, 18 were in Santa Maria, 12 in Isla Vista, three in Lompoc, and Santa Barbara and Orcutt each reported two. The Montecito-Summerland-Carpinteria area, Goleta, the unincorporated area of the Goleta Valley and Gaviota, and the unincorporated areas of North County all had one new case. Four cases were pending the location.
Do-Reynoso said California officials released updated guidance for several key sectors, including new or expanded guidance for movie theaters, family entertainment centers, personal care centers, hair salons and barbershops.
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.