San Diego County will remain in the substantial, or red, tier of the state’s four-tier COVID-19 reopening plan for at least another week, the California Department of Public Health confirmed Tuesday.
The county’s state-calculated, adjusted case rate was 6.8 daily infections per 100,000 residents, up from 6.7 the previous week. The unadjusted case rate was 7.2, up from 7.0 last Tuesday. The adjusted rate is due to San Diego County’s high volume of tests, but still leaves the county on the precipice of the state’s most restrictive tier — widespread, or purple.
The percentage of positive tests was 3%, considerably less than last week, and that number would qualify for the moderate, or orange, tier.
To remain in the red tier, the county must continue to have an adjusted case rate of less than 7.0 per 100,000 residents and a testing positivity percentage of less than 5%.
A new metric the state released Tuesday is the health equity metric, which finds the testing positivity rate of the county’s least healthy quartile. San Diego County’s health equity rate is 5.7%, almost double the county’s average positive testing percentage, and in the red tier for this metric.
According to state guidelines, the health equity will measure socially determined health circumstances, such as a community’s transportation, housing, access to health care and testing, access to healthy food and parks.
Neighborhoods are grouped and scored by U.S. Census tracts on the Healthy Places Index. Some of the unhealthiest neighborhoods include Logan Heights, Valencia Park, downtown El Cajon and National City.