California Governor Gaven Newsom, lifted the state’s Stay-at-Home order today and shortly after, Los Angeles County announced during its L.A. City Council meeting that restaurants will be open again for outdoor dining at 25% capacity, and hair and nail salons will be allowed to re-open, also at 25%.
Los Angeles County will allow outdoor dining to resume as early as Friday, January 29, 2021. Personal care businesses such as hair/nail salons, barbershops can reopen for indoor operations right away, county health officials announced Monday.
“Today, we can lay claim to starting to see some real light at the end of the tunnel as it relates to case numbers,” Said Newsom at a news conference today. “Each region’s a little bit different, but we are in a position projecting four weeks forward with a significant decline in the case rates, positivity rates. We are anticipating…still more decline in hospitalizations and more declines in ICU, and that’s why we’re lifting that stay at home effective immediately today.”
“California is slowly starting to emerge from the most dangerous surge of this pandemic, which is the light at the end of the tunnel we’ve been hoping for,” said Dr. Mark Ghaly, State’s Health Secretary in a statement. “Our surge after the December holidays did not overwhelm the health care system to the degree we had feared.”
“The sudden reversal of health orders comes just hours after Gov. Gavin Newsom lifted statewide stay-at-home orders,” states a West Hollywood Chamber of Commerce press release. “After weeks as the epicenter of the nation’s outbreak, Los Angeles County residents have grown accustomed to grim images of overburdened hospitals and mobile morgues along with dire warnings to stay home. The reversal of health orders triggered a sense of whiplash for many struggling to reconcile the dire warnings with the lifting of restrictions.”
“The state allows counties to impose tougher restrictions, and Los Angeles frequently has,” adds the Chamber. “Before the state stay-home orders, Los Angeles County instituted stricter local restrictions, including a ban on in-person dining. The county’s ban, however, technically expired on Dec. 16, but patio dining remained prohibited under the state’s order, which is now lifted.”
The lift comes at as new reports cases hospitalizations have begun to subside. Data released Monday shows that the state’s winter surge of COVID-19 is beginning to diminish.
The WeHo Chamber reminds its members to proceed with caution as a new strains of the coronavirus have taken hold in Los Angeles, posing an urgent health threat looming over the county’s effort to get past the surge.
