Moments ago, Governor Gavin Newsom announced "soft closures" of State Parks with the closure of parking lots for State Parks to reduce mass gatherings at State Parks and encourage social distancing. The State of California is also significantly increasing patrols of State Parks. The Governor also announced he has increased the target for additional hospital beds from 20,000 to 50,000 and suggested the State's social distancing directives will likely be needed for at least another 8-12 weeks.
Governor Newsom referred to the parking lot closures as a "soft closure" of State Parks, noting, "We don't want to close big beautiful open spaces." He advised the public to, "Go outside with intention." The list of parking lot closures for State Parks is a "dynamic list." The public should go to parks.ca.gov to identify closures in real-time.
According to Governor Newsom, new modeling suggests 50,000 additional hospital beds is the new target (This assumes that we are social distancing and bending the curve). Governor Newsom stated, "If you want to bend the curve, we have got to bend to a deeper understanding to meet this moment and act differently. In the next week or two we've got a lot of work to do. We've got to get very serious and lean in."
Of the 50,000 additional beds needed, the Governor shared that our hospital system will provide for 30,000 of those beds. The state is looking at additional sources for the other 20,000 beds.
California has already brought on three new hospitals for a total of 3,000 new beds. Two field medical stations have arrived: one in Riverside and one in Santa Clara. These are two of eight committed to California for a total of 2,000 beds. A Mercy hospital ship provided by the United States Navy will provide 1,000 more beds. For the 14,000 additional needed beds, the State is looking at convention facilities, fairgrounds, motels, and hotels. Once the assets are identified, The State will need to resource them with both staff and protective gear.
A three-month surge capacity within hospital system alone, to serve the expansion to 125,000 beds, would require 200 million sets of PPE (gloves, gowns, masks, and shields). Governor Newsom stated that he is seeking 1 billion sets of PPE to address the anticipated need.
Asked if the Governor had any concerns of the State exhausting its funds with regard to unemployment insurance, he responded by noting the last seven-day unemployment insurance average was 106,000 and before the pandemic the seven-day average was 2,500. Governor Newsom then directly answered the question by stating: "Yes, is the answer to the question. It's incumbent that states get block-grants to meet this moment without exhausting their unemployment insurance fund."