Coronavirus weekend update: The latest on COVID-19 cases, deaths – Palo Alto Online

This past week, Santa Clara and San Mateo counties both allowed businesses that can offer curbside pickup of its merchandise to reopen. Under the revised orders, car parades are also permitted again — in time for high school graduations.

Santa Clara County on Thursday called on residents to volunteer for its coronavirus contact tracing team with a goal of getting at least 1,000 tracers to help slow the spread of the virus.

As of Friday, San Mateo County reported 1,833 cumulative cases of COVID-19 and 76 deaths. Seventy people are currently hospitalized.

On Saturday, Santa Clara County confirmed 2,571 cases of the coronavirus since the pandemic started, 30 of which are new and 99 of whom are hospitalized. One more person has died of the disease, raising the death toll to 139.

Newsom announces statewide COVID-19 contact tracing campaign

Gov. Gavin Newsom on Friday announced the launch of a public awareness campaign for the state’s COVID-19 case investigation program.

The state launched a partnership with the University of California at San Francisco and UCLA earlier this month to begin training thousands of coronavirus contact tracers that will attempt to limit the spread of the virus in real time.

The “California Connected” public awareness campaign — which will include radio and social media ads, billboards and videos in multiple languages — is intended to get state residents to “answer the call” when their local public health department reaches out to recruit them as a contact tracer, according to Newsom.

“That simple action of answering the call could save lives and help keep our families and communities healthy,” Newsom said.

Newsom has said the state hopes to train roughly 20,000 contact tracers by the first week of July through the partnership program and disperse them throughout the state’s 58 counties. The state has received some $5.1 million in private financial support to spur the California Connected campaign and reach the 20,000-tracer goal.

The state’s 58 counties and three cities with separate health departments have roughly 3,000 contact tracers already in the field, according to Newsom. More than 500 have already been trained through the state’s program as well, with another 300 scheduled to complete the 20-hour training course this week.

“We are bringing together the best minds in public health, academia and private industry to design a program that can help lower the risk for COVID-19 in all of our communities and keep us on the path to reopening,” California Department of Public Health Director Dr. Sonia Angell said.

Information on the state’s contact tracing program can be found at covid19.ca.gov/contact-tracing.

This story will be updated as more information becomes available.

Find comprehensive coverage of the Midpeninsula’s response to the new coronavirus by Palo Alto Online, the Mountain View Voice and the Almanac here.