Covid Tracker: 33,613 cases, 394 deaths

Good Morning, Mission! Welcome to Virus Village, your daily Covid-19 data dump.

First the good news. There’s some evidence coming from Israel that shows the Pfizer vaccine (similar to Moderna), in addition to preventing serious illness and death, appears to be 89.4 percent effective in preventing infection and transmission.

As we’ve discovered with California’s Covid restrictions, Joe reports on the lack of enforcement at (where else?) DBI. And we’re still waiting for DPH to report workplace Covid outbreaks as mandated by state law AB 685.

Is this the calm before the storm? Dr. Michael Osterholm clearly thinks so. He also has some very worthwhile comments on the validity of double masking. If you are not familiar with his view of the variant hurricane on the horizon, it’s well worth checking out and is now available in transcript.

But MIT math whizkid Youyang Gu thinks there might be a flaw in that reasoning.

For those who want more than numbers, Naomi writes what it’s like to endure the pandemic in the adult residential facility at SFGH.

While waiting for The Vaccination, scroll down for today’s Covid numbers.

As of February 21, over 18 percent (137,983) of San Francisco residents over 16 have received one dose, while over 6 percent (47,260) have received two. On February 21, only 968 shots were delivered to San Franciso residents, bringing down the seven day rolling average of shots per day of 3649.3.   For information on where to get vaccinated in and around the Mission, visit our Vaccination Page.

Not much movement on the R Number front. Estimates remain relatively low with the  San Francisco’s R Number remaining at .75, while the average  California R Number estimate has risen a few ticks to .69.

Between January 19 and February 17,  the Mission recorded 318 new cases or 53.3 new cases per 10,000 residents. The hardest hit area over that period remains the area bounded by 22nd, Cesar Chavez, Valencia and South Van Ness with 47 new cases or 99 new cases per 10,000 residents.

For the week ending February 14, the seven-day average of daily new cases in the City was 89, or 10.2 new cases per day per 100,000 residents. 

As of February 19, San Francisco’s Latinx residents have 625 positive tests this month. Asians have  504, Whites 457, Blacks 138, Multi-racials 37, Native American 5 and Pacific Islander 0 positive tests thus far in February.

For the week ending February 20, the rate of weekly change in Covid positive patients fell 19 percent.   During that week,  the seven-day average availability of ICU beds was 33 percent and Acute Care availability was 27 percent. On February 19, DPH reported that 94 ICU beds, and 463 Acute Care beds were available. 

Most recent Federal data shows that although SFGH remains the City hospital most impacted by Covid, things are improving with 14 Covid patients (down from 19), and 4 ICU beds available (up from 0).   

 For the first time since November 24, the Citywide average positivity rate has fallen below 2 percent. 

Systemic inequality keeps Covid spreading. The disparities we’ve seen with respect to testing now show up in vaccinations on the local, national and international level.  In San Francisco, where DPH, UCSF and community activists have set up vaccination sites in the hard hit southeast sector of the City, Asians have received 31.6 percent of the SF vaccinations, Whites 30 percent,  Multi-racials 10.5 percent, Latinx 8.7 percent and Blacks 3.5 percent. .

Cumulative Covid Deaths in San Francisco

While we revise our Covid deaths graph, here’s the DPH chart taken from their website: https://data.sfgov.org/stories/s/dak2-gvuj.

San Francisco’s current Covid Case Fatality Rate (CFR) is 1.17.  On December it was 1.03.