Campaign banners to prevent the spread of COVID-19 are seen on a deserted Rodeo Drive during the COVID-19 lockdown on April 22, 2020 in Beverly Hills, California. COVID-19 has spread to most countries around the world, claiming over 175,000 lives with infections over 2.5 million people. (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) On April 24, Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors chair Kathryn Barger announced the criteria needed for the county to start easing shelter-in-place restrictions.
Barger said the criteria consists of four benchmarks: ensuring the county’s healthcare system has enough resources to handle a potential surge of COVID-19 patients; being able to protect the most vulnerable from being infected with COVID-19; having the capacity to test then isolate and monitor those who test positive for the coronavirus; and adhering to social-distancing guidelines.
She added that lifting the shelter-in-place order would happen in gradual phases once “our public health experts deem it appropriate and safe. We don’t want to undo all the good we’ve done and accomplished so far. We are not yet on the other side of this pandemic, and we don’t want to prematurely ease restrictions that can overwhelm our hospitals and unnecessarily put lives at risk.”
Barger also praised the people in the county “for adhering to these guidelines so far, which has successfully prevented a huge surge in cases.”
If we meet these guidelines, we can prevent or limit the spread of COVID-19 when we loosen physical distancing measures. We want to make sure as many people return to work as safely and quickly as possible while keeping your health as our top priority. pic.twitter.com/VmG6Ynw3E8
— Supervisor Kathryn Barger (@kathrynbarger) April 24, 2020
California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) laid out a series of similar criteria on April 14 for re-opening the state. He has yet to give an exact date on when the state is lifting its indefinite stay-at-home order.
“We will be driven by evidence,” he said at the time. “We will be driven by science. We will be driven by our public health advisers, and we will be driven by the collaborative spirit that defines the best of us at this incredibly important moment.”
There were 1,035 new cases and 52 new deaths in Los Angeles County on April 24, bringing the respective totals to 18,517 and 848. The county shelter-in-place order is slated to end May 15.
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