A San Mateo County supervisor says the county should join others in the Bay Area and not wait for the state's order to shut down.
Supervisor David Canepa said the county needs to go into life-saving mode, with only six available beds left in intensive care units countywide as of Friday.
But the county remains open in terms of outdoor dining, hair salons and other businesses that are restricted in most other counties in the region.
"And now what we've done is we've created a regional center for people to come visit us, and that is not cool," he said.
Troy Morris at Captain's Barbershop said he's seen a lot of out-of-towners lately.
"We got a lot of people from different places: San Jose, Hayward, San Francisco, a couple from Modesto," he said.
As of Friday morning, the ICU bed counts in the Bay Area, by county, were as follows:
- Alameda County: 75
- San Francisco: 45
- Santa Clara: 34
- Contra Costa: 33.
Napa, Solano, Sonoma and Marin counties each have less than 15 beds available.
Remaining ICU capacity is statistic health officials are continuing to monitor. If the rate across the Bay Area region, which includes Santa Cruz and Monterey counties, drops below 15%, Gov. Gavin Newsom’s regional stay-at-home order takes effect, shutting down a lot of businesses.
Canepa says his county needs to shelter in place now.
"We should join the others in the stay-at-home order, and we should do it now because it's the responsible thing to do. San Mateo County is not an island," he said.
Earlier this week, Santa Clara County had 63 beds available. That number plunged to only 38 open beds in a single day and now stands at 34.
