Governor Newsom announced the closure of indoor operations statewide Monday.
Effective immediately, ALL counties must close indoor operations in sectors including restaurants, wineries and tasting rooms, movie theaters, family entertainment centers, zoos and museums, cardrooms and ALL bar operations.
Also effective immediately, all counties on the state’s motoring list must close indoor operations in additional sectors including fitness centers, worship services, offices for non-critical sectors, personal care services, hair salons/barbershops and indoor malls.
The counties on this list include Riverside, San Bernardino, Imperial, Los Angeles, Orange and San Diego along with 24 other counties.
These changes impact 80% of Californians.
Newsom reiterated that the state’s enactment of health-restrictions was being handled with a “dimmer switch,” meaning the severity of the orders can be adjusted upward or downward based on the latest virus statistics and “trendlines.”
The state has been seeing record numbers of infections in recent days, along with increasing hospitalizations. As of Monday, Newsom said 6,485 were hospitalized across the state due to the coronavirus. The seven-day rolling average of people testing positive for the virus was 7.7%, Newsom said.
“This virus is not going away anytime soon,” Newsom said. “I hope all of us recognize that if we were still connected to some notion that somehow when it gets warm it’s going to go away or somehow it’s going to take summer months or weekends off, this virus has done neither. You’ve seen parts of the country with very hot … weather where you’re seeing an increase in positivity rates, an increase in hospitalizations and ICUs. Here in the state of California as we’re seeing triple-digit weather in many parts of our state, we’re still seeing an increase in the positivity rate, the community transmission. We’re seeing an increase in the spread of the virus.”
In a release from Riverside County health officials those businesses that cannot move activities outside must close and curb-side retail is still allowed, so long as there are no indoor operations.
“As we struggle with national laboratory issues artificially depressing new case counts, people need to realize we’re far from being out of the woods,” said Dr. Cameron Kaiser, Riverside County public health officer. “Summer heat isn’t stopping COVID-19, but for some of these sectors, the heat means there may be no good way to do them outdoors. We need to reduce the impact on our hospitals by reducing transmission, and as long as the numbers keep rising, the state’s need to reimpose restrictions will keep rising too.”
Riverside County health officials remind all residents that in addition to these new restrictions, there is still a statewide stay at home order in effect and residents should not gather with family and friends who live in different households, attend parties or join social gatherings. These are known places where the disease is spread.
