Health officials note gains in Orange County’s coronavirus hotspots
Public health officials, city and nonprofit groups still are working to tip the scale in residents’ favor in parts of Anaheim and Santa Ana, where pandemic metrics have outpaced the rest of the county. But conditions in these neighborhoods are improving, they say.
Shares of tests returning positive have fallen and free COVID-19 swabs and other resources are being rapidly deployed.
The signs of hope for Orange County’s hardest-hit communities come as Orange County businesses begin to reopen under an improved red-tier status and some school districts elsewhere plan to welcome students back to classrooms by the end of the month.
As the pandemic wore on, it became clear to county health officials that an even, countywide spread of testing and resources wouldn’t work against outbreaks in certain ZIP codes.
So the largely Latino neighborhoods were targeted with health and financial information in Spanish and other languages about resources available, which now range from free masks and tests to free hotel rooms when people need somewhere to quarantine.
Months ago, government agencies and the nonprofit Latino Health Access came together as a united front called the Latino Health Equity Initiative, which has been successful in improving 10 troubled ZIP codes around Santa Ana and western Anaheim, said Dr. Clayton Chau, Orange County Health Care Agency director and county health officer.
“I’m happy to report that we are seeing a drop in positivity rates in those ZIP codes – in those hot spots,” Chau said Thursday, Sept. 10, during a news conference.
Testing positivity is the rate at which tests are coming back positive for the virus.
“Some of the drop is very dramatic,” he said, from neighborhood-level rates as high as 19% – meaning nearly one-in-five swabs were coming back COVID-19 positive – to lower than 10%.
Orange County as a whole this week had a positivity rate of 4.2%.
In larger cities with diverse needs, it’s important for health officials to get granular with their strategies.
Health Care Agency data shows the central Anaheim ZIP code area of 92805, which includes downtown, this week had 11.4% testing positivity.
That’s more than double the positivity rate of nearby 92807, which includes more affluent parts of Anaheim Hills, where it is perhaps easier for residents to work from home and separate themselves from household members with COVID-19.
An ethnic disparity in the pandemic’s impact also has become apparent.
Latino and Hispanic people make up 35% of Orange County’s population and 46% of COVID-19 cases and 44% of deaths, while non-Hispanic White and Asian people account for shares of cases and deaths lower than their shares of the population, according to Health Care Agency data.
-
The smoke filled skies caused by brush fires casts a yellow haze over the baseball field at Madison Park in Santa Ana on Wednesday, September 9, 2020 as medical assistants working with Santa Ana CARES Mobile Resource Center register Santa Ana residents for free COVID-19 tests. The mobile resource center will be visiting 11 Santa Ana parks during September and October offering Santa Ana residents free COVID-19 tests, resource information, rental assistance information, and free masks. (Photo by Leonard Ortiz, Orange County Register/SCNG)
-
Medical assistants working with Santa Ana CARES Mobile Resource Center register Santa Ana residents for free COVID-19 tests at Madison Park in Santa Ana on Wednesday, September 9, 2020. The mobile resource center will be visiting 11 Santa Ana parks during September and October offering Santa Ana residents free COVID-19 tests, resource information, rental assistance information, and free masks. (Photo by Leonard Ortiz, Orange County Register/SCNG)
-
SoundThe gallery will resume inseconds
-
Santa Ana residents visit information booths during a Santa Ana CARES Mobile Resource Center at Madison Park in Santa Ana on Wednesday, September 9, 2020. The Santa Ana CARES Mobile Resource Center will be visiting 11 Santa Ana parks during September and October offering Santa Ana residents free COVID-19 tests, resource information, rental assistance information, and free masks. (Photo by Leonard Ortiz, Orange County Register/SCNG)
-
Santa Ana residents lineup on the baseball field at Madison Park in Santa Ana on Wednesday, September 9, 2020 to get free COVID-19 tests during the Santa Ana CARES Mobile Resource Center at Madison Park. The mobile resource center will be visiting 11 Santa Ana parks during September and October offering Santa Ana residents free COVID-19 tests, resource information, rental assistance information, and free masks. (Photo by Leonard Ortiz, Orange County Register/SCNG)
-
Medical assistant Javier Lara, top, guides a woman on the use of a nasal swab to obtain a sample for a free COVID-19 test provided by the Santa Ana CARES Mobile Resource Center at Madison Park in Santa Ana on Wednesday, September 9, 2020. The Santa Ana CARES Mobile Resource Center will be visiting 11 Santa Ana parks during September and October offering Santa Ana residents free COVID-19 tests, resource information, rental assistance information, and free masks. (Photo by Leonard Ortiz, Orange County Register/SCNG)
-
Santa Ana residents, left, get instruction from medical assistants Hazin Nguyen, center, and Javier Lara, right, on how use nasal swabs to obtain a sample for a free COVID-19 test provided by the Santa Ana CARES Mobile Resource Center at Madison Park in Santa Ana on Wednesday, September 9, 2020. The mobile resource center will be visiting 11 Santa Ana parks during September and October offering Santa Ana residents free COVID-19 tests, resource information, rental assistance information, and free masks. (Photo by Leonard Ortiz, Orange County Register/SCNG)
-
Santa Ana residents use nasal swabs to obtain a sample for a free COVID-19 test provided by the Santa Ana CARES Mobile Resource Center at Madison Park in Santa Ana on Wednesday, September 9, 2020. The mobile resource center will be visiting 11 Santa Ana parks during September and October offering Santa Ana residents free COVID-19 tests, resource information, rental assistance information, and free masks. (Photo by Leonard Ortiz, Orange County Register/SCNG)
The hot spots of virus still seen in some neighborhoods have school officials in both communities taking a wait-and-see approach to planning a transition from complete distance learning to some in-person learning. Elsewhere in Orange County, districts are counting down to Sept. 22 date when it is expected the broad ban on in-person learning will be lifted with many setting reopening days in the weeks following.
“We have to be really careful about reopening,” Anaheim Union High School District Superintendent Michael Matsuda recently said of the need to further watch the higher trends in some of his community. “It’s still dangerously high. I believe in reopening, but we have to be responsible.”
Santa Ana district leaders also haven’t set any sort of timeline for reopening.
On Wednesday, a fleet of city vehicles that make up Santa Ana’s new CARES Mobile Resource Center, rolled into Madison Park with an arsenal of resources for residents to fight the pandemic in their neighborhood.
The ZIP code area around the park, 92707, has a positive test rate of 11.3%.
Residents lined up for free masks, hand sanitizer and swab tests, plus help applying for rental assistance and other city initiatives. Spanish and Vietnamese-speaking staff were on hand.
The first hurdle for many who need help is access, said Daisy Perez, senior management assistant at Santa Ana and a CARES organizer.
“Half of (the) population doesn’t have access to a car, so we want to be in the neighborhoods or near the neighborhoods, near our residents,” Perez said.
But as the pandemic spreads, resources and offerings must adapt. Santa Ana officials have learned that residents across the entire city, including less-impacted ZIP codes, need assistance.
“That’s why we’ve decided to expand,” Perez said, to reach people who want to be tested and use the city’s services, but are stuck at home with school-aged children, trying to help them navigate distance learning.
“They’re just not able to come out and access these resources because they’re focused on the education of their children,” Perez said.
Now, the city is offering free tests to every resident, not just those who are symptomatic. Perez said she hoped the new campaign would bring attention to some little-used resources, such as the city’s offer to put residents up in a hotel for up to two weeks so they can isolate from family members with COVID-19.
Only three families have taken the city up on that offer so far, Perez said. “We want our residents to know that this is available, for free.”
The Health Care Agency’s overall strategy of paying special attention to troubled ZIP codes hasn’t changed, Chau said, but a new state health department measurement of health equity that is expected to be introduced within a week could spark a renewed push against such disparities.
During a news conference Tuesday, California Health and Human Services Secretary Dr. Mark Ghaly said comparing testing positivity between higher- and lower-income communities within counties could factor into the new metric, which counties would have to meet in addition to case rate and testing positivity goals to progress to less-restrictive tiers in the state’s new pandemic tracking system.
Chau said the Health Care Agency was working on its own new health equity initiative and hinted it also could be introduced as early as next week.
Comments
Post a Comment