Santa Barbara County residents can expect the regional stay-at-home order to stay for the foreseeable future, the state Health and Human Services Secretary Dr. Mark Ghaly reported on Tuesday.
“With the current surge, many hospitals are being stretched to provide the care we want and expect in California,” Ghaly said at the press conference. “You can certainly stretch many rubber bands pretty far as we are stretching many of our hospitals pretty far, but we know that that stretch has a limit before it breaks.”
The order goes into effect when a region’s intensive-care unit (ICU) capacity falls below 15 percent, as has now happened in four of the state’s five defined regions: Southern California — where Santa Barbara County is located — as well as the San Joaquin Valley, the Bay Area, and Greater Sacramento.