A new shipment of COVID-19 vaccines arrived in San Diego today as cases continue to number more than 2,000 per day in our county.

A record number of cases has been reported in the past week, with the highest single day since the pandemic began having occurred last Friday when 3,611 new cases were reported. The past week has seen the five highest case counts of the year so far.

San Diego County’s COVID-19 death toll is now 1,311 after 28 more people died from the virus in the last week. Of the 16 male and 12 female patients, all but one of the 50 year-olds to 95 year-olds had underlying medical conditions.

The first shipment of vaccines arrived last week on December 15th when UCSD Health received 2,925 doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine. Since then, a total of 28,275 Pfizer vaccines have arrived and are being administered to at-risk health care workers in the county.

The newest shipment of vaccines received Tuesday were 5,500 doses of the Moderna vaccine that just received emergency FDA approval last Friday.

An undisclosed amount of vaccines were sent to Naval Medical Center San Diego and Naval Hospital Camp Pendleton last week as well.

Governor Newsom’s stay-at-home order for Southern California issued on December 6th is set to expire on December 28th, but the Governor said this week that the order will almost certainly be extended as hospital ICU capacity remains near zero throughout the 11-county area that includes San Diego.

The order closed down all bars, wineries, hair salons, and barbershops, limits retail stores to operate at only 20% capacity, limits restaurants to takeout and delivery service only, and restrict non-essential travel. The order also bans personal gatherings of people outside of immediate households, with some exceptions, and requires travelers arriving from outside the state to fill out an online form.

Cities including Los Angeles are urging their police and the city attorneys to enforce the stay-at-home order, which carries misdemeanor penalties.