Rural Spread...

For these rural NorCal counties, a distinct pattern for coronavirus transmission emerges

By Eric Ting

Bars, gyms, hair salons and other high-risk businesses have been open in Shasta County for weeks now, but the county still has yet to trace a single new coronavirus case to a reopened business.

"There are some cases that our disease investigation team has not been able to identify where those people originally contracted COVID-19," county spokesperson Kerri Schuette told SFGATE. "We know we have community transmission, but haven’t had anything with an outbreak connected to specific store or business."

However, these cases of unknown community spread only make up a small fraction of the county's most recent cases; most known cases have been successfully traced. And a pattern seems to be emerging.

"Most of our new cases have been a result of small, at-home gatherings of some sort," Schuette said. "Most are contracting it from people they know. We had 12 test positive from a small family gathering recently, and another graduation party has four known cases associated with it so far."

Shasta County, home to Redding, has 107 confirmed coronavirus cases as of Monday. Just three patients are hospitalized, and the county believes it has ample hospital capacity to handle a surge. Next-door Tehama County has 62 confirmed cases, and county public health director Minnie Sagar told SFGATE in an email that most of the new cases in her county are also coming from private gatherings of friends and family. Sager stated that contact tracers have not linked a single case back to a reopened business.

The experiences of Shasta and Tehama counties track with what Yuba and Sutter counties reported earlier this month.

"Nearly all of new cases are coming from known cases, either household members, extended family, or people who made visits to the infected person," Yuba County spokesperson Russ Brown said. "Being in close settings where you don’t have safeguards because you're around people you know — that really opens it up to risks and that’s what we're seeing here."

Across the rest of the state, identifying the primary sources of transmission has proved more difficult. Gov. Gavin Newsom ordered that bars shut down in seven different California counties, citing the fact that indoor bars pose unique transmission risks. The massive protests against police brutality following the death of George Floyd have also been linked to the state's recent uptick of confirmed cases, with Los Angeles County public health director Barbara Ferrer stating it is "highly likely" the protests led to an increase in positive cases. However, other cities and counties that have seen large demonstrations have not seen a surge in cases or percent positivity of tests, creating conflicting evidence over the role of the protests on the spread of the virus.

During his press conferences, Newsom has repeatedly stated that social gatherings are major contributors to the spread of the virus,

"Many of us understandably developed a little cabin fever," he said last week. "Some of us, I would argue, developed a little amnesia. Others have just frankly taken down their guard. People are mixing and that is increasing the spread of the virus."