Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Covid19 topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
San Francisco health director: reproductive rate edges below 1 but city remains on state watch list
Summary
Director of Health Grant Colfax told the Health Commission that San Francisco's estimated COVID-19 reproductive rate had fallen to about 0.93 and testing capacity has risen toward a 5,000-tests-a-day goal, but the city remains on the state's watch list, pausing reopening.
Grant Colfax, director of health, gave the commission a data-heavy COVID-19 report on Aug. 18, saying San Francisco's estimated reproductive rate had fallen to about 0.93 and that the city's 7-day testing average has climbed to roughly 3,900 tests per day as DPH works toward a 5,000-tests-a-day target for September.
Colfax said the department has seen an influx of backlogged test reports from the state CalREDIE system and that most of those results were negative, a change that could lower reported positivity rates for some dates. "The state is now telling us that those data are fixed," he said, and DPH is repopulating its records based on when tests were drawn and resulted.
Colfax reported roughly 84 hospitalizations at the most recent data point, a total of about 70 resident deaths to date, and that the city is seeing a higher share of cases among younger people and elevated case rates in Latinx communities. "We are on pause on our reopening," Colfax told commissioners, noting San Francisco remains on the state watch list because of hospitalizations and that the health officer is developing gating criteria for potential future reopening steps.
On testing and tracing, Colfax described expanded "CityTestSF" mobile sites in neighborhoods with high positivity and said DPH has increased contact-tracing staffing and expects turnaround-time improvements as backlogged results are incorporated. He said public messaging about heat safety and COVID-19 precautions is being coordinated amid an excessive heat advisory.
Commissioners asked about age-group trends, turnaround times and the effects of targeted testing on positivity rates; Colfax and DPH clinicians said mobile testing may initially raise positivity by focusing on higher-prevalence neighborhoods but that saturation and prevention interventions should reduce positivity over time. DPH reported large-lab turnaround times of about 2.2'2.8 days and public-health-lab and CityTestSF results generally within 24'48 hours.
The commission did not take a vote on policy during the update; Colfax said the department is developing a reopening-gates plan led by Health Officer Dr. Tomas Aragon to be shared when available.
