Pasadena Nail Salons to Remain Closed for Time Being, Officials Say, As They Report 6 New COVID-19 Cases

Pasadena saw six new COVID-19 infections and no new fatalities on Tuesday, as health officials said local nail salons would remain closed for the time being, despite state public health officials removing the statewide ban on their operation.

The new infections brought Pasadena’s total case count to 2,536, while the death toll remained at 122.

Twenty-five COVID-19 patients were being treated at Huntington Hospital, according to hospital data.

And while the California Department of Public Health revised its order to allow for nail salons to resume operating throughout the state in a modified fashion, with county approval, the ban on such businesses remained in effect in Los Angeles County as of Tuesday evening.

The L.A. County Department of Public Health “will be consulting with the Board of Supervisors to determine the timing of adopting changes to the County Health Officer Order that would allow nail salons to resume modified indoor operations,” the agency said in a written statement.
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Once county approval to resume running nail salons is granted, the Pasadena Public Health Department will have to decide whether to follow suit, city spokeswoman Lisa Derderian said.

Meanwhile, county officials reported 810 new cases of COVID-19 and 40 additional deaths on Tuesday. L.A. County had recorded 262,133 infections and 6,401 deaths since the onset of the pandemic.

A downward trend of hospitalizations continued to encourage health officials.

The L.A. County Department of Public Health said 745 COVID-19 patients were hospitalized on Tuesday, with 28% of them in intensive care units.

“The County continues to see the number of daily COVID-19 hospitalizations decline from the July 20 peak of a 3-day average of over 2,200 hospitalizations,” the statement said. “Even in the last month, since the end of August, there has been a significant decrease from an average of 1,200 daily hospitalizations to the average this past week of under 800 hospitalizations per day. We are hoping that we do not see an increase in the number of daily hospitalizations in the upcoming weeks associated with activities that occurred over the Labor Day holiday.”

Los Angeles County had met the criteria to transition from the state’s most severe COVID-19 county monitoring tier, or “widespread” virus transmission, to the second-highest level, or “substantial” transmission.

But under state guidelines, the county must remain at the level for two weeks before formally switching tiers, L.A. County Director of Public Health Barbara Ferrer said.

“Public Health is heartened that Los Angeles County has met the thresholds that may allow us in the near future to move into Tier 2 of California’s Blueprint for a Safer Economy. We plan to closely monitor our data to understand how effectively we are slowing the spread of COVID-19 after the Labor Day holiday and the impact of re-opening schools for high need students and re-opening hair salons for indoor operations,” she said.

“We thank Los Angeles County residents, workers, and businesses who have continued to take the steps needed to slow the spread, including wearing their face coverings, physically distancing, and not gathering with people outside their household,” Ferrer added.

The county’s positivity rate was 9%, with more than 2.56 million tests administered.

Statewide, the California Department of public health announced 2,630 new detected COVID-19 infections and 53 new deaths, raising the state’s totals to 784,324 cases of the virus and 15,071 fatalities.

The state’s positivity rate over the prior seven days had reached 2.8%, while the 14-day rate was 3%, the CDPH said in a written statement.

As of Tuesday, Los Angeles County represented 33% of California’s COVID-19 infections and 42% of the state’s total fatalities.