COVID-19 Update: September 2, 2022

The Latest

In the latest report from the Santa Barbara County Public Health Department, coronavirus transmission levels have decreased to low according to COVID-19 guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control. For more info about how to determine the level of transmission in your community, check out the CDC’s website https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/your-health/covid-by-county.html

SBC Public Health Department reports the weekly average of PCR-confirmed cases have decreased by 7.3%. Given the increased use of at-home antigen tests, this number is an underreporting and cases are likely higher.

Hospitalizations have been decreasing and Intensive Care Unit bed availability has been steadily increasing. As of August 30th, there were three COVID-19 positive patients in local ICU’s.

As of September 2nd, the federal program enabling residents to order free at home COVID-19 test kits has been suspended due to lack of funding.

The Quarterly Report

Santa Barbara Department of Health has released a quarterly report on COVID-19. The report covers cases by date, geography, month and age group, cases and hospitalizations by age group, deaths by age, vaccinations by age, cases, hospitalizations and deaths by gender, vaccinations by gender, cases and hospitalizations by race and ethnicity, deaths by race and ethnicity, and vaccinations by race and ethnicity.

The report also states that cases have been above average since May 2022 and Goleta had the largest new case rate, followed by Isla Vista. Severe cases were more likely to be in the older population with 65% of deaths were residents older than 70. Only 2% of COVID-19 related deaths have been individuals under 30.

The largest percentage of cases were of Hispanic and Latino residents, especially hospitalizations.

To read the entire quarterly report, go to the County Health Department website at https://publichealthsbc.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/Q2-2022-COVID-Report.pdf.

For a full report on the latest local COVID-19 information, check out the Community Dashboard, https://sbcdashboard.info