Alto Lucero, a healthcare facility within walking distance of La Cumbre shopping center, has emerged as a hotspot of coronavirus cases on the South Coast, with 39 residents and 21 staff testing positive. The facility has been in quarantine for at least three weeks, according to family members of a resident. It is unclear how many deaths took place there, but state data give a number between one and 11. Efforts by Independent reporters to get in touch with Alto Lucero managers have remained fruitful. These case numbers are an increase of 27 residents and fewer than 11 employee cases reported on July 28th.
At a news conference Tuesday, emergency medical officer Jan Koegler identified a new death at a reputable nursing home in downtown Santa Barbara, the fifth this past week for South County. They declined to discuss specifications regarding Alto Lucero; Buena Vista Care Center has also reported deaths. But in June, public health officials confirmed five deaths at the Santa Maria Oaks Care Center in Santa Maria; Since then, seven more have died, bringing the total to 12. Public Health did not respond to requests to explain the contradiction between providing statistics for the Santa Maria facility, but not for those in Santa Barbara.
The uncertainty surrounding these deaths is exacerbated by the underreporting and data errors that Santa Barbara County and California’s COVID statistics system have posted since July 31st. Koegler added that the cases reported on the county’s website for knowledgeable nursing institutions may not reflect the past two weeks. Public Health was now looking for death certificates to determine COVID deaths, instead of waiting for the state’s CalREDIE system.
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To date, 73 people have died from COVID-19 in the province, an increase of four people since the previous Public Health press conference on 7 August. At that time, 462 people were known to test positive, although Koegler also pointed out that the state reported snafu, its department did not in fact know the total number of positive and negative cases in the province. It threw up their calculations, and they did not know the ‘extent or timing or effect on the positive rate’ of the as yet unreported cases, Koegler said.
Twenty-eight new cases were reported today: 45 in Santa Maria, 13 in the City of Santa Barbara, five in Lompoc, four in the unincorporated area of North County, three in Orcutt, two each in Isla Vista and the unincorporated Goleta and Gaviota areas, one in the city of Goleta, and three of unknown geographical location. Since the outbreak began in March, about 90,000 tests have been done that they know of, Koegler warned; of those, 82,000 were negative, and 7,400 were positive. Koegler said another 250 were inconclusive. Hospitals hold 76 coronavirus patients, 31 of them in ICUs.
Because of the test delays – it took about a week to get an appointment at the free test sites – Public Health had a contract with another lab called Let’s Get Checked in hopes of a quick turnaround, Koegler said.
Koegler outlined the steps employers and employees should take when a worker becomes ill, which are described on publichealthsbc.org. They claim that people without symptoms but who were in close contact with an infected person should stay home for 10 days after the test to make sure they were not contagious. Anyone with symptoms of illness should stay home, they added, but especially those of coughs and colds, gastrointestinal illnesses, headaches, or the loss of taste or smell.
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