SD County reports 284 new COVID-19 cases as it considers suing state

SAN DIEGO (CNS) - San Diego County health officials reported 284 new

COVID-19 infections and no new deaths today, raising the region's totals to

44,577 cases with the death toll remaining at 760.

Of the 9,097 tests reported through Saturday, 3% returned positive,

bringing the 14-day rolling average of positive tests to 3.6% -- potentially a

good sign as San Diego County appears poised to regress into the state's most

restrictive public health tier due to increasing COVID-19 numbers, a decision

that could be made Tuesday, when state data is released.

The seven-day daily average of tests is 8,375.

Of the total positive cases reported as of Sunday, 3,404 -- or 7.6% --

required hospitalization and 800 -- or 1.8% -- had to be admitted to an

intensive care unit.

One new community outbreak in a grocery business was confirmed this

weekend. From Sept. 13-19, 21 community outbreaks were confirmed.

The number of community outbreaks remains above the trigger of seven

or more in seven days. A community setting outbreak is defined as three or more

COVID-19 cases in a setting and in people of different households over the past

14 days.

On Thursday night, the San Diego County Board of Supervisors met in a

closed session to discuss taking legal action against the state to prevent that

slide back into that most restrictive tier after Gov. Gavin Newsom rejected a

county effort Wednesday to discount the more than 700 positive tests recorded

by San Diego State University since the semester began.

As of 6 p.m. Saturday, SDSU had reported 819 confirmed cases and 32

probable cases, bringing the total number of cases to 851.

The county will find out Tuesday if it will slip back to the purple

tier of the state's coronavirus reopening roadmap. If so, it would likely

shutter indoor operations for restaurants, movie theaters, houses of worship

and gyms, limit retail businesses to just 25% capacity and have major impacts

on indoor business for most other industries until the county can improve its

numbers.

Should the county be placed in that tier, it would have to wait a

minimum of three weeks before moving back to less restrictive tiers.

Data released this week showed one of the two metrics the state

monitors being flagged as ``widespread.''

The supervisors did not make a decision on taking legal action against

the state in their meeting Thursday, but Supervisor Greg Cox said the board

will meet in closed-session Monday after receiving more information, ``to

consider any further actions.''

County Supervisor Nathan Fletcher was vague about the closed meeting

Thursday, but urged caution.

``In general, I believe we should be fighting COVID-19 and not the

state of California,'' he said. ``We do not yet know what our case rate will be

next Tuesday and will have to evaluate that number in order to understand any

possible impact.''

SDSU is playing an outsized role in the county's 7.9 new daily cases

per 100,000 population, the San Diego Public Health Officer, Dr. Wilma Wooten,

said Tuesday. The positive testing percentage for the county is 4.5%, good

enough for the ``orange'' tier of the state's four-tier reopening plan.

Should the county have a case rate higher than 7, it could be moved

into the purple tier -- the most restrictive. However, if the numbers from the

university were removed from the equation, San Diego County would suddenly drop

below the mark to remain in the red tier.

Cox said Wednesday he was writing a letter to Newsom to ask for

considerations in excluding SDSU cases or for other alternatives to avoid

rolling back business openings.

But Newsom said he isn't inclined to overlook the SDSU cases. The

governor said the county can't separate cases at a university because it goes

to ``what a community by definition is -- and that is integrated individuals,

and as a consequence, you can't isolate as if it's on an island, a campus

community that is part of the larger community. So the answer is 'No.'''

According to Dr. Eric McDonald, the county's epidemiology expert, the

vast majority of those students live in the 92115 ZIP Code around the

university -- many just a few blocks off campus. He said that while it is true

they are technically in the community at large, they are close enough to campus

to make the county's request to exclude those positive tests from the

countywide number a realistic endeavor.

The university has not received any reports of faculty or staff who

have tested positive, SDSU health officials said, nor have any cases been

traced to classroom or research settings.