Edhat StaffBy edhat staff
The Public Health Department reports Santa Barbara County reached 11,602 COVID-19 cases as of Monday.
There was one additional death reported. The individual was between the ages of 50-69 years old, did not have underlying medical conditions and resided in the City of Santa Maria. The death was not associated with an outbreak at a congregate living facility.
The county’s death toll is now 136.
Of the total cases, there are currently 410 that are active and infectious. Of those, there are 33 hospitalizations including 7 in the intensive care unit.
In the past week, there have been nearly 600 new cases reported averaging 75 new cases per day. This past Saturday alone, 149 new cases were reported by the Public Health Department.
Due to the testing and reporting time lag, new cases due to the Thanksgiving holiday may take up to a week to appear in data counts.
More data can be found at https://publichealthsbc.org.
Play stupid games – win a trip to the ICU. I’ve been trying to warn people for months – but some populists minds just want to continue spewing anti-science jargon.
General, you’re quick to call anyone who disagrees with your position “anti-science”. Can you please show me one state, even one county, that saw a sustained decrease in cases after maskmadates and heavy restrictions went into effect? Can you please show me the science the LA Public Heath Department used to shut down outdoor dinning? Can you please show me the science that says schools should be closed? Can you please show me the science that the lockdowns and heavy restrictions are less detrimental to public health than covid itself? (hint: you can’t).
Andrea – I’m worried you’re right. I have a sneaking suspicion we will see a significant increase in numbers over the next week. As for a shut-down, I bet he announces it tomorrow. That’s what happens when people choose to ignore health and safety. Choices have consequences. This isn’t like disagreeing over political opinions. There is no “opinion” about a global pandemic. You choose to either take the relatively minimal, albeit inconvenient, precautions, or you choose to ignore them and put yourself and your family at risk.
Andrea, you will not catch covid by walking past someone outside on the street unless someone contagious sneezed/coughed directly into your face. Downtown, most people are wearing a mask outside, and everyone is wearing them inside. If masks worked as well as people on this board think they did, cases wouldn’t be spiking everywhere. The science behind masks as it relates to covid-19 is psychology not epidemiology. Do you think surgeons would preform a surgery if they had a viral infection? No, they wouldn’t because they know a paper or cloth mask, even those used during surgery, won’t stop a virus. Stay home if you chose, stay safe if you venture out, wash your hands, don’t live in fear and don’t let the government micro manage your life (they do a crummy enough job managing their own issues)
Sac, you’re correct for the most part. People’s behavior changed early on (i.e. wash hands, limit large groups, stay home when sick, mind your sneezing/coughing) that, combined with the natural seasonality of virus, is why CA went into the red tier (which is a completely arbitrary threshold from politicians not scientists). If the purple tier restrictions worked we shouldn’t be spiking. Most of the spread is in the home with small gatherings, why would shutting down businesses and outdoor dining be the response when we have data these aren’t vectors? How many times are you going to fall for our politicians taking credit for their restrictions when numbers fall then blaming a small group of non-compliers when cases increase? Is everyone who is turning up positive a non-complier?
Sac you’re clearly a keyboard warrior who hasn’t missed a paycheck this entire time.
shutting down someone’s business they worked years to build, who employ workers who live pay check to paycheck and now will go without one, is hardly “minimal” or “inconvenient”.
VOR – You clearly have no capacity for basic comprehension. I’m talking about choices. The relatively minimal precautions people like you are freaking out against and CHOOSING to ignore – masks, distancing, staying away from family during the holidays, etc etc. Closing businesses are not “choices,” no one had a say in that. So read my comment again with my explanation in mind. It’s amazing (and embarrassing for you) that I have to spoon feed you simple reasoning.
Just look at IHME predictions. It’s what the current white house uses and has different outcomes based on levels of restrictions (Masks – no masks). So yes, there is data supporting this.
VOR when I see people standing and talking with no masks, and kids running around with no masks touching everything, then yes I am concerned. As you pointed out, these shutdowns are seriously impacting people financially especially small businesses. So why can’t people hunker down and do what needs to be done so we can get out of this?
New fearporn… show the overall number of cases in big bold letters to scare the sheep. VOR, the fact that anyone would disagree with your 5:20 comment is just sad. I can’t believe the county has businesses shut down because of “private gatherings”. This is a total joke. Lockdowns don’t work but they are leading to bigger problems we’ve only just begun to see.
Predictions aren’t data. And we have had some very dire predictions for 8 months that haven’t materialized. Remember the doomsday calls back in march? I do.
So cases are continuing to climb and are pre-planned (I mean expected) to skyrocket in the near future all while businesses have been at their strictest modifications or even closed altogether for over 2 weeks now. There is no science behind these business lockdowns, it is wrong and cruel and unnecessarily ruining the lives of healthy and hardworking individuals.
We open up, deaths increase. We shut down, deaths decrease. How many times do we have to repeat that loop before the conspiracy nincompoops get a clue? Weren’t you saying this would all disappear with warm weather? Then with the election? Then with cool weather? Lunacy!
@ 6:48: And what do we have now, other than dire? We have better therapies now, so fewer of the serious cases die, but we are overwhelming our hospitals, and that will mean no therapy at all, and doomsday will have arrived.
Voice of Treason -I know you have a hard time discussing basic science without a far right agenda, so you should probably just scroll on by. I prefer discussions with other educated people.
Voice, masks do help considerably, but I agree with you that they don’t work as well as people on this board are suggesting. I’ve posted plenty of peer-reviewed primary research on how masks are only 90-95% effective when used properly. Take our local healthcare workers for example. As of today, 586 of them have tested positive, despite safety training, masks, face shields, gloves and tons of sanitizers. If you are in proximity of an infected individual, there is a significant chance of being infected yourself unless you’re in a BSL-4 suit.
7:35 I never said this would disappear with warm or cool weather? Where do you come up with stuff like that? Nice try though and deaths did not increase while we were in the red, cases started going up recently (and quite magically) even in the most remote counties of California with teeny tiny populations that don’t see much tourism. Odd right? Why are they in the purple? We’ve had 100+ deaths out of a population of nearly 500,000 and almost all of them were elderly and sick to boot. There is NO need for this 3rd shutdown.
General tree-the fact that you only consider people that agree with your own thoughts as “educated” means you aren’t as educated as you think. The end.
And he’s quick to make fun or call names, how Trumpian of him.
Andrea, if you’re concerned about people standing and talking without masks, outside, and kids running around touching everything, YOU should hunker down. Lockdowns only delay, they don’t eliminate, so why force everyone else to hunker down and wait for what? A vaccine that might not even stop someone from being contagious? By the way, masks wont help kids touching everything, adults don’t even follow proper mask protocol let alone a little kid.
Chem I do agree masks are effective in certain situations, like being inside within 6’ of someone. The people walking their dogs by themselves with masks is an extreme I can’t wrap my head around (at least now, 9 months into this, there was a time I wiped down my groceries too).
I don’t think you understand the severity of the pandemic.
Do you think 270,000 deaths in the USA alone are faked?
International death totals are faked?
Other countries are in on the conspiracy?
Too little thinking behind such a comment.
@VOR, appreciate your request to provide distinct arbitrary metrics in support of science that no one can provide in any free state, county or city where self reporting is optional and many are asymptomatic. You raise a moot point that is taught in 2nd grade science experiments—variables play a part in the scientific method. Peace be with you and I hope your trips to Ralph’s without a mask works out. Maybe you can volunteer on the ICU floor at cottage or down in LA hospitals. Help there is always appreciated,
Or just sit on edhat as a couch scientist and public health expert to ramble and argue.
Of wait I just did the same thing.
Just to confirm, 100 dead kids as of 9/25 from a preventable disease is acceptable to you as long as it doesn’t impact your lives? How did we come to be so deficient in empathy? Like the Pope says, stuck in ‘their own little world of interests’.
VOR – 1) Show me the science that says kids can’t spread the virus to their families. 2) You’re not reading any of my posts – I am 100% for kids going back to school with safety precautions in place.
How about Facci and the Director of the CDC Dr. Redfield saying it? That’s science right? Scroll to Dr. Redfield in the transcripts below. It has also been repeated many times over the past 6 months by Faucci and others, but if you haven’t heard them saying covid doesn’t spread in schools you need to diversify your news sources because this has been common knowledge to many of us for a while. https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/press-briefing-vice-president-pence-members-coronavirus-task-force-november-19-2020/
Just to confirm Pit, having more kids die from other reasons as a result of schools remaining closed is acceptable to you but it isn’t acceptable for a smaller amount of kids to die from covid? You’re ignoring all the very serious, even fatal consequences of keeping kids out of school. Beyond the initial 15 days to slow the spread (which was about a month or two too early for CA) schools should have never been closed. Science told them they needed to open, political science kept them closed.
Trying to introduce the inveterate COVIDIOTS here to common sense, let alone science, is like the proverbial mud wrestle with a pig. The stink just won’t wash off these guys.
If you’re trying to tie me up on my word selection “Can’t spread in schools” fine, you got me! though I don’t recall using such a definitive word as “can’t”, there is nothing certain about a virus. What they have found is that in areas schools have been open they haven’t traced a “spread” back to the school. Teachers or students who tested positive contracted the virus outside of school and didn’t spread it at school.
Yet you’re right back here with the derogatory comments and name calling… how very Trump of you.
At least you recognize it applies to you and you’re wrong about the pandemic – that’s a start.
3:11 – Or, in other words, “What I say doesn’t matter, because I don’t bother communicating well.”
Mostly the anti-science people here aren’t getting what they want so the right things are happening. Hopefully the vaccines will be rolled out, most of us will get them by June, and we can go back to arguing with the climate change deniers.
Mostly the same people; they’re multi-untalented.
Later this week, possibly as soon as tomorrow, New York State (heaviest restrictions in continental US, mask mandates, schools closed) will surpass Florida (no restrictions, no masks, schools open) in hospitalizations per capita. Let that sink is as our kids won’t be going to school tomorrow and small businesses throughout the state are wondering if they’ll be able to survive winter. Oh but “anti-science”….
You should stick to betting on the lottery or horse races if you’re going to go into the fortune-telling business.
It seems like the same people having the same discussion. How exciting. I feel sorry for the medical staff working themselves to the bone, and dying (1,700 of them) because of our lack of consensus on this issue. I feel sorry for the families of the 270,000 people that suffered the ultimate loss in this pandemic, and the many more patients that will have lasting effects from the disease such as heart and lung problems. None of the anti-mask pro-school daycare anti-dining limit people seem to acknowledge any of this.
Let’s indulge VOR’s soothsaying.
All data are from the CDC, and are hospitalizations or deaths per 100K population per day, rolling 7 day average to smooth out the bumps. Florida hasn’t submitted reports for a while, so they lag a bit behind. Latest report from each locale used here, even though that biases the results in Florida’s favor.
Hospitalizations
New York State–19.4
Florida————-17.5
Of course, VOR chose Florida because their governor has the habit of putting his finger on the scales with regard to COVID reporting by their health department. Death statistics for New York state and New York City are tabulated separately by the CDC.
Deaths
New York State–0.382
New York City—0.1157
Florida————0.3434
Why not pick a state more representative of VOR’s recommended freedumb approach like South Dakota? Because it doesn’t give VOR the desired result?
Let’s compare deaths for California and South Dakota.
Deaths
California——-0.1499
South Dakota–2.0565
Bit of a difference, wouldn’t you say? What will Friday’s data show?
420722 – The fact that you inferred that the person in the discussion be agreeable to my own opinion shows your lack of reading retention. Having something educated to say vs. being agreeable are two very different things. You’ve proved my point about discussions with educated people.
Show some proof that masks work. There are plenty of studies now that show masks do not work… and a couple of studies showing those who wear masks have a higher rate of contracting the virus. Let your immune system do the job it was designed for.
Stop lumping people into either boat A or boat B Pit. There are many common sense solutions and responses to covid-19, based on science and real data, that don’t involve the drastic and arbitrary measures taken by our state, who still can’t get public schools open even though throughout the pandemic the director of the CDC has said they are the safest place for children to be. Do you get that Pit? Our state, counties, and school districts refuse to open what the CDC says is the safest place children can be. Whose lives (or livelihoods) are they putting first to deny our kids access to literally the SAFEST PLACE THEY CAN BE? This is completely backwards and permeates our states decision making. Cannabis and booze an “essential service”, are you f-ing kidding me? Everyone acknowledges the devastation this has caused, even the “anti-maskers” but what you’re not acknowledging is that this is not a temporary thing, as we deal with this long-term it isn’t for some inexperienced politician to decided what’s best for an individual, what risks are acceptable for them to take. LA supervisors just banned outdoor dining with zero data showing outdoor restaurants are vectors, with one of the supervisors going out to eat at an outdoor restaurant after voting to close them because they weren’t safe. What scares me most are how so many have become so scared and incapable of their own decision making they’ve welcomed this government overreach, literally welcomed it into their homes to make decisions for them because they’re now unable to make those decisions on their own.
33 hospitalizations- hardly worth locking the county down for!!
there are 3 types of lies- lies, white lies and statistics.
“Voice of Reason” (?) All the infection curves went down after the lockdown. It’s a highly contagious virus, spread by spittle from infectious people, with 40% asymptomatic. Unfortunately current U.S. government leaders trumpeted a policy that the virus was a “hoax” and not dangerous, and approximately 50% followed. That half, with no masks and no social distancing, led to the continuance of the viral spread.
“Just” 33 in the hospital, huh? Not worth taking precautions to avoid more folks joining them? Unless you happen to be the one in the hospital or a family member not able to visit a critically ill family member. If 2,000 American soldiers were dying every day in a foreign war, wouldn’t we care? And what’s with the, “they’re old and sick” b.s. . Folks over 65 are 1/3 of the U.S. population. So people over 65 don’t matter any more? Sick and heartless.
I’ve hear about enough of the “wait two weeks”…. that has been said over and over again this entire pandemic. Florida still rocking it, two weeks later, two weeks after that, two weeks after that, and if you take out the initial deaths here in CA and FL from the failure to isolate the at-risk and nursing homes, there is only a nominal difference between the two and certainly not worth destroying the state and keeping kids out of school.
AS, you seem to believe their predictions- they haven’t been right since this mess started. How many school aged children have died in SB county – ZERO! yet the schools are shut down….
Voice of Something, teachers have died after being in the classroom. They appreciate you throwing them to the mercies of the virus. Trump’s CDC has lost any trust they might have had. Won’t get it back for a while. You don’t seem to care about reason, but try listening to the facts for a change. https://www.newsweek.com/coronavirus-us-deaths-teachers-dead-covid-19-infection-pandemic-1546912
100 kids dead from virus as of 9/25. I guess you don’t care about them? https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/covid-children-deaths/2020/09/25/9df39bf4-fdad-11ea-8d05-9beaaa91c71f_story.html
Did you even read the article Pit? HEADLINE: Child deaths tied to covid-19 remain remarkably low, months into U.S. pandemic Other LINES: Covid-19 has become the nation’s third-leading cause of death this year, but 18 states had not seen a single fatality among people under 20. AND: Children are much more likely to die of homicides (there were 1,865 in 2016, according to government data), drowning (995) or even fires and burns (340). AND: the flu, which killed an estimated 24,000 to 62,000 people last winter, but 188 people age 17 and below. [more died from the flu last year but we kept schools open] AND: “It seems notable that this pandemic, which has had so much of a toll in mortality and morbidity, does seem to spare kids in a dramatic way,” AND: ” this is for the most part a very mild infection in children ” But by all mean keep schools closed because… SCIENCE! [as in political-science when the teachers unions get too much power over elected officials and public school administrators who put the unions interests ahead of the children’s]
Per CDC, a total of 522 children between the ages of five and 14 died of suicide in 2017. In that same age group, only 42 children have died with covid-19 so far this year. Whose “best interests” do the school boards really have in mind?
PITMIX- so dramatic…”he must not care about the kids”. Spare me your BS, look at the whole picture – more kids have died from suicide – open the schools
PITMIX- so dramatic…”he must not care about the kids”. Spare me your BS, look at the whole picture – more kids have died from suicide – open the schools
VOR – Of those 42 kids who died from Covid, how many of their friends and families also died (or are suffering life long complications) due to being infected by the kids? See… this is what you keep forgetting. The concern isn’t so much about the kids getting sick as it is the staff and families who are in contact with infected kids. If you have kids and have been listening to the board meetings, you’d know this is the main concern. Again, you seem to conveniently forget what makes covid so dangerous – its ability to spread undetected.
Voice of Treason – leave your sausage-fingered populist comments on 4chan. Let the adults in the room have a discussion.
Sac are you intentionally not following my posts or the words from the all mighty Faucci and the CDC? This entire time they’ve been saying, based on the data, that kids rarely spread the virus. So those 42 kids who got it most likely caught it from their friends and family. Sad none the less. Does the CA constitution require that public schools educate our children or to provide employment for adults? It is literally in our constitution that the State of CA provide primary education to our children and that is not happening because the teachers unions spend a lot of money on politics (I believe they’re single largest donor to the Democratic party). Why would we ever consider elementary schools “non essential”, yet every other “essential” worker has to go to work, during a pandemic, if they want to get a paycheck? Our children’s lives should be held up above everyone else! Instead, they’re forced into the home to stare at a screen all day because the will of the teachers union is more important that our kids lives. Crazy world we’re in…
UM, that’s more BS. North Dakota was another freedumb state.
And we’ve never had any extreme restrictions, not even a simple shutdown. You’ve always been free to move around and grocery shop.
Your last 5 words say it all about your conception of the pandemic.
The CDC data for deaths per 100K population per day, rolling 7 day average to smooth out the bumps, show that VOR’s cited data is bogus:
North Dakota…1.4848
South Dakota…2.0565
You can see the values yourself at the CDC COVID Data Tracker site:
https://experience.arcgis.com/experience/030e625c69a04378b2756de161f82ef6
4:09 PM – Right! But that’s exactly what Voicey and his ilk are arguing against.
Wrong @ 4:15, what 4:09 posted is ALL we need! What I’ve been clearly against is some politician hundreds of miles a way telling us what businesses are “essential” and which aren’t, what capacity is okay for one business but not other, can’t eat outside but you can go to Target, schools should be closed, remote learning is learning, all based on arbitrary metrics and colors, all the while the politicians don’t think this is very serious (or necessary, or dangerous) as they blatantly disregard their own orders.
@4:49 You’re a champion of nescience, but there’s nothing arbitrary about the metrics and colors. You can see the criteria at the SBC Dashboard.
Mac, that wasn’t a CDC website you linked nor does it show other States info. The numbers I pulled were from googles dashboard. But I can use the CDC’s as well and property link it. You love your “gotacha’s” don’t you, but still miss that the only benefit these government mandates provide is some reassurance to scared people that we can control the virus (we can’t) while completely ignoring all the health and financial consequences to these mandates.
ND – 127 deaths per 100K
SD – 107 deaths per 100k
https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#cases_casesper100klast7days
Yes, that was a link to the CDC COVID Data Tracker. And you seem to be confused between deaths and cases.
Several elitist government officials have been caught disobeying there own overhanded covid rules and restrictions. What I see happening is were working our way closer to a Hunger Games type society. Elitist living in an excessively conspicuous consumption city while the loyal subjects toil to survive.
I guess that’s progressive?
EASTBEACH I read the articles and saw the loopholes they used to explain there actions. If the restrictions are worth implementing, they should be imposed immediately. Not delaying a start date so you can attend a party.
Eastbeach, the issue with the LA official is she had just voted to ban outdoor dinning as it’s “too dangerous” (without any actual supporting evidence) then went right to eat at an outdoor restaurant. Yes, the restriction wasn’t then in place but if outdoor dining really is “too dangerous” why did she go? That is the issue many have with these elected leaders who impose restrictions “for safety” the ignore them.
So I was right, you didn’t like it, made excuses why even though I was right I was wrong, name called, then picked a completely unrelated state to show how it’s worse than CA. Okay…
If you like South Dakota, compare it to North Dakota. Similar geography/climate/seasonality; South took a hands off approach North went with “government knows best” restrictions.
Results?
N. Dakota cases/deaths per million: 116,475 / 1,404
S. Dakota cases/deaths per million: 98,184 / 1,150
Even if South Dakota was worse off, which it isn’t, shouldn’t there be very compelling evidence that these extreme government restrictions are necessary vs. letting people keep themselves safe, letting businesses take their own precautions? Government restrictions have shown no benefit over just providing accurate information and expert recommendations for people to make their own determinations on how to keep themselves safe, their family safe, their customers safe, their community safe. This desire for a nanny state to do something (even if it doesn’t actually provide a benefit) just so that people can feel safer and cling to this imaginary blanket of control I simply do not understand.