Outdoor Dining To Resume, Salons Allowed To Reopen in Los Angeles

LOS ANGELES, CA — Los Angeles County will allow outdoor dining to resume as early as Friday, and personal care businesses such as salons and barbershops can reopen for indoor operations right away, county health officials announced Monday.

The sudden reversal of health orders comes just hours after Gov. Gavin Newsom lifted statewide stay-at-home orders. After weeks as the epicenter of the nation’s outbreak, Los Angeles County residents have grown accustomed to grim images of overburdened hospitals and mobile morgues along with dire warnings to stay home. The reversal of health orders triggered a sense of whiplash for many struggling to reconcile the dire warnings with the lifting of restrictions.

The state allows counties to impose tougher restrictions, and Los Angeles frequently has. Before the state stay-home orders, Los Angeles County instituted stricter local restrictions, including a ban on in-person dining. The county's ban, however, technically expired on Dec. 16, but patio dining remained prohibited under the state's order, which is now lifted.

Since then, the coronavirus death rate has spiked to its highest point of the pandemic. But new cases and hospitalizations have begun to fall — nascent signs that the worst could be behind Los Angeles County. At the same time, new strains of the coronavirus have taken hold in Los Angeles, posing an urgent health threat looming over the county's effort to get past the surge.

County Supervisors Janice Hahn and Kathryn Barger quickly staked out a stance Monday morning, advocating for the reopenings.

"Now that Governor Newsom has lifted the statewide stay-at-home order, the question is what is L.A. County going to do? We should align ourselves with the state as much as possible which means, among other things, reopening outdoor dining with commonsense health protocols in place as soon as possible,” Hahn said. “The restaurant industry was devastated by this lengthy shutdown and I know this would be welcome news to them."

Barger issued a statement saying, "I support following the governor's recommended guidelines for Southern California and reopening outdoor dining, personal care services, and other industries that were previously closed by these orders. A data-driven and pragmatic policy approach is essential to protecting public health while balancing the devastating social, emotional, and economic impacts of this virus."

The resumption of outdoor dining could be the biggest economic boon of the announcement.

On Sunday, the California Restaurant Association sent its members a letter announcing the pending state decision, saying, "we thought you'd like to know this good news."

The state's regional stay-at-home order was imposed in Southern California Dec. 6 when intensive-care unit capacity in the 11-county area dropped below 15%. The regional capacity subsequently dropped to an adjusted 0%.

But state officials said Monday that with hospitalization numbers trending downward, four-week projections now indicate ICU capacity will rise above the 15% threshold, even though the current regional capacity is still listed at 0%.

But state officials said Monday that with hospitalization numbers trending downward, four-week projections now indicate ICU capacity will rise above the 15% threshold, even though the current regional capacity is still listed at 0%.

"Californians heard the urgent message to stay home as much as possible and accepted that challenge to slow the surge and save lives," said Dr. Tomas Aragon, CDPH director and state public health officer. "Together, we changed our activities knowing our short-term sacrifices would lead to longer- term gains. COVID-19 is still here and still deadly, so our work is not over, but it's important to recognize our collective actions saved lives and we are turning a critical corner."

Bars remain closed in all counties in the "purple" tier of the state's four-level economic reopening matrix. The vast majority of counties in the state, including all of Southern California, are in the "purple" tier.

Meanwhile, Los Angeles County officials said appointments have completely filled up this week at the county's five large coronavirus vaccination centers at Magic Mountain, the Pomona Fairplex, Cal State Northridge, the Forum in Inglewood and the County Office of Education in Downey.

Residents who receive their first dose of the vaccine at a county-run large capacity vaccination site will be provided the date and location to receive their second dose, and automatically registered for their second dose appointment. They will also get email reminders.

On Sunday, the county reported 8,243 new cases of COVID-19 and 98 additional deaths, bringing the county's totals to 1,073,111 cases and 15,260 fatalities.

There were 6,697 people with COVID-19 hospitalized in the county as of Sunday, down from 6,881 a day earlier. That number had reached a peak of more than 8,000 earlier this year.

County health officials have noted that hospitalization numbers were leveling off, but patient populations were still dramatically high.

"We are also seeing a decline in hospitalizations and several other indicators we track, including test positivity rate, percentage of emergency department visits associated with COVID-19 and percentage of respiratory specimens positive for COVID at sentinel laboratory surveillance sites," said Dr. Paul Simon, the Department's chief science officer.

"However, despite these promising trends, I do want to emphasize that the numbers of cases, hospitalizations and deaths remain far too high," he said. "So while there's reason to be hopeful, we all must remain vigilant and continue to be disciplined, wearing masks, physically distancing when outside the home, avoiding gatherings and washing our hands frequently."

Officials with the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health have been urging patience among residents anxious to get a COVID-19 vaccination, with supplies remaining woefully short and the overburdened online reservation system leaving many people frustrated as they try to schedule appointments.

Simon said the county's five large-capacity vaccination sites -- each capable of administering 4,000 shots per day -- will be operating at much lower capacity this week, likely in the 2,000 to 2,500 range.

The county expects to receive about 143,900 more doses of vaccine this week. However, since people need to receive two doses of the medication, spaced three to four weeks apart, the bulk of the vaccine coming this week will be used to administer second doses to people who have already received the first shot. Public Health Director Barbara Ferrer estimated earlier that only 37,900 of the new doses will be available for people to receive their first dose.

Simon said Friday that the most recent figures showed that 441,140 doses of vaccine have already been administered in the county, although he said that number is likely much higher due to delays in tallying vaccination totals. As of this week, the county had received about 853,000 total doses.
Simon said people should not look at those numbers and assume there are 400,000 unused doses in the county, noting again the lag in vaccination reports and the daily administration of doses. If the county's weekly allotment doesn't dramatically improve beyond the current average of about 150,000, "the vaccination effort will likely extend well into 2022," Simon said.

He said if the county can get its allocation increased to 500,000 per week, "we would have the potential to reach 75% of the adult population in the county, or 6 million adults, by mid-summer."

In the meantime, he urged patience, saying, "We do understand how important it is to get vaccine out as quickly as possible."

He said the state is upgrading its vaccine-appointment website, to which the county system is linked, so it should operate more smoothly this week.

The county also has a call-in reservation system, which is available from 8 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. at 833-540-0473. But that line should be used only by people unable to use the website, since call volumes are already exceedingly high, Simon said.

City News Service and Patch Staffer Paige Austin contributed to this report.

Correction: Due to a reporting error, an earlier version of this story incorrectly stated that indoor dining would resume.

This article originally appeared on the Los Angeles Patch