This county has twice the population of Ada County, but fewer COVID-19 cases and deaths
My partner Kristy and I were hiking through the redwood forest Sunday at Muir Woods National Monument, a half-hour north of San Francisco’s Fisherman’s Wharf, when we encountered a couple walking toward us.
As soon as they saw us, they took the masks they were carrying in their hands and placed them over their noses and mouths.
The day before, we were headed back to our rental car after a visit to Golden Gate Park when we passed a man in a parking lot who was smoking. He took his cigarette out of his mouth, covered his face and waited for us to walk by.
Despite Boise’s mask mandate, in force for nearly four months, I’ve never had that happen here. A large percentage of the Ada County population doesn’t seem to take the mandate seriously, and people outdoors rarely put on a mask when they come within 6 feet of someone else.
During a five-day trip to Northern California that included stops in San Francisco, Sacramento, Oakland, Emeryville and Richmond, along with several Marin County communities across the Golden Gate Bridge, we saw only a handful of people without masks.
Where wearing masks in Idaho is largely seen as a political issue, with Democrats supporting masks and some Republicans saying masks infringe on their liberty, in San Francisco they mask up because it’s a good health practice during the coronavirus pandemic. It seems to be working to help drive down the number of infections.
Even in the North Beach neighborhood of San Francisco, a crowded area in Little Italy popular with locals and tourists alike, nearly everyone wore a mask Saturday evening.
Waiters at Sotto Mare, a popular Italian restaurant, wore both masks and thick rubber gloves. “I don’t want to take COVID-19 home to my family,” our waiter told us when we asked about the restrictions.
We ate next to a yellow “towaway zone” painted on the curb. A number of restaurants have been allowed to add tables in the street, but they must have partitions to separate diners. We felt safer there than in Boise, where some restaurants aren’t obeying rules to move tables at least 6 feet apart and have added no partitions for outdoor dining.
Idaho Gov. Brad Little announced on Monday that the Gem State was slipping backward to Stage 3 of Little’s four-part recovery plan. San Francisco is easing restrictions.
Next week, San Francisco restaurants and other businesses will be allowed to expand capacity from 25% to 50%. Offices on Tuesday were allowed to reopen at 25% capacity.
San Francisco took the pandemic seriously and shut down businesses early. Mayor London Breed and health officials emphatically encouraged residents to follow guidelines to protect themselves and others. And people complied. Without complaining.
The risk of infection is considered minimal, even though San Francisco is the nation’s second-densest city, behind New York City. The COVID-19 death rate is the lowest per capita among the 20 most populous cities in the nation.
At Golden Gate Park, the 150-foot-tall Sky Star Ferris Wheel brought to celebrate the park’s 150th birthday, sat idle for months after it was assembled in April. Health officials weren’t comfortable letting people ride inside the individual gondolas until the coronavirus risk subsided.
It opened last week. When we rode it on Saturday, passengers had to undergo a temperature check. Crews disinfected benches and other surfaces that were touched as soon as a party left. Although each of the 36 gondolas could hold six people, only families or friends were allowed together.
If the entire United States had followed San Francisco’s approach there would have been 50,000 from the coronavirus rather than more than 220,000, Dr. Robert Wachter, professor and chairman of the Department of Medicine at UC San Francisco, told the Los Angeles Times.
Ponder this for a moment: San Francisco County has had fewer coronavirus cases and deaths than Ada County, despite nearly twice the population and a much higher density.
San Francisco County, with a population of nearly 900,000, has had 12,192 coronavirus cases and 140 deaths. Ada County, with a population of nearly 482,000, has had 16,460 cases and 167 deaths, according to a database compiled by the New York Times.
In Idaho, coronavirus cases have increased dramatically in the past month, as the state’s seven-day moving average was nearly 890 new daily cases as of Sunday. That seven-day moving average was 481.3 on Oct. 1.
San Francisco has vast experience battling a health crisis. What they learned dealing with AIDS beginning in the 1980s has obviously helped them now. Maybe Idaho should look at their example to lower the number of coronavirus cases here.
