As the weather warms up, we continue to adjust to this new way of life, marked by face coverings, 6-foot social distancing, learning and working from home, and greeting people without handshakes or hugs. We have come to live with it, but there is nothing easy about this new norm. If you are like me, you realize how much of our pre-pandemic lives we took for granted. On the bright side, I think that when all of this is over, we will have new appreciation for a lot of things.
As county officials work closely with the state and public health experts, we are learning a lot about transmission numbers and trends in our community. One thing we are tracking closely is hospital beds. If you have followed the surge models on www.StanCounty.com/coronavirus, you will see that while our positive COVID-19 numbers have risen in the past several weeks, our rate of increase is slowing and we are nowhere near reaching the maximum capacity for our medical systems.
Because of this data, and a lot of scientific support in favor of a new, slightly modified stage of daily life, an updated public health order has been put into effect in Stanislaus County. The order now allows for outdoor recreation (like golf, dog parks, court sports you can play with your household members- think basketball and tennis), the opening of automated car washes, and “drive-in” church services. Please continue to exercise social distancing when you go out in public. We will continue to monitor and evaluate our local data and track any loosening of the Governor’s statewide order, so that our local public health officer can make decisions based on what the data and science in our community supports within the confines of the state order.
I know many of us are eager to get our freedoms back; we are getting closer. In the meantime, let’s stay the course. We can do this Stanislaus County.
Kristin Olsen, Chair – Stanislaus County Board of Supervisors
