September 1, 2020
  • Redwood City – The County of San Mateo continues to work to protect public health and safety in response to the novel coronavirus known as COVID-19 and the CZU Lightning Complex fires.

    The County of San Mateo’s Emergency Operations Center (EOC) remains open to coordinate countywide response and communications in response to the situation. The EOC’s Joint Information Center will provide status reports every Tuesday and Thursday until further notice. Today’s report:

    COVID-19 Testing Available Sept. 2 – 4; New North Fair Oaks Location
    San Mateo County’s no-cost COVID-19 testing is available without restriction to anyone. It is advisable to schedule an appointment with Verily/Project Baseline, San Mateo County’s testing provider, at https://bit.ly/2xk73OL

    If you don’t have access to the internet, there may be a volunteer on site who can assist you. 

     

    Per Verily, due to increased lab capacity test results are now typically returned within two to four days. The following locations are open 8 a.m. to 3 p.m.
     

    San Bruno: Sept. 2
    The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
    975 Sneath Lane

    North Fair Oaks: Sept. 3 & 4 (New Location)
    Stanford Parking Lot
    2685 Bay Road

    See more testing dates and locations at https://www.smcgov.org/covid-19-testing

    Revised Reopening System Allows Indoor Salons, Modified Retail 
    As of Aug. 31, 2020, hair salons and barbershops are allowed to operate indoors in San Mateo County under Gov. Gavin Newsom’s new color-coded reopening system which ranks counties based on COVID-19 case counts and positivity rate.

    San Mateo County, which the state cites as having 8.6 new positive cases per 100,000 residents and a 4.8 percent positivity rate, is in the purple tier which denotes a “widespread” county risk level. Counties in that tier have more than 7 new daily cases per 100,000 and more than 8 percent positive tests. Although San Mateo County’s positivity rate falls in the “moderate risk” level, the stricter tier takes precedence.

    The state’s new “Blueprint for a Safer Economy” and the status of activities in specific counties is available at https://covid19.ca.gov/safer-economy/

    State’s Underreporting Reflected in San Mateo County COVID-19 Case Count
    A significant problem with the State of California’s reporting system for communicable diseases has resulted in significant underreporting of COVID-19 testing results to San Mateo County Health and local health departments statewide. SMC Health continues to work with the California Department of Public Health to identify any remaining potential data gaps to investigate, understand, and resolve additional data issues.

    San Mateo County Health has updated the number of positive cases to 8,260 as of Aug. 31, 2020.

    County Health provides detailed information on the number of COVID-19 cases and deaths within San Mateo County, including by day, age, race/ethnicity and sex of patients.

    Learn more at https://www.smchealth.org/coronavirus

    Call Center
    Residents with non-medical, non-emergency questions about the coronavirus can call 211 or 800-273-6222 at any time, day or night. Callers from landlines and cellular telephones located within San Mateo County are connected with a trained service professional from 211, a confidential service available in 180 languages.