California: What Next?
As of this past week, both Los Angeles and San Francisco Counties fell into the state's least restrictive "yellow" tier of COVID restrictrions. The counties currently in "yellow" are otherwise sparsely populated and rural, but LA County alone, with over 10 millon people, accounts for about 25% of the state's population. As I've noted, other counties are likely to follow LA into the "yellow" tier within weeks. I have lots of questions. The first is that LA County's aggressive vaccination program has led the state, putting a quarter of California's population in the least restrictive tier. But it's done this with about 40% of the county's population "fully vaccinated" , two weeks after their final dose. It would seem that LA County, one of the hardest-hit areas of the state, is approaching herd immunity. But received opinion, as in the New York Times , is dismissing such ideas: “People were getting confused a...