Governor Gavin Newsom announced today that he is “pulling the emergency brake” on sector reopenings, allowing counties to be moved back a tier after one week instead of two in the state’s color-coded, four-tiered system. 30 counties will be moving backward - with 41 of the state’s 58 counties now in the state’s most-restrictive purple tier. The news comes as UC Santa Barbara officials are rolling out new technology to curb the spread of COVID-19 among students, staff, and faculty, with today’s launch of California COVID Notify — a new program that uses the exposure notification system from Google and Apple. The goal of California COVID Notify is to alert users if they’ve likely been exposed to COVID-19, encouraging them to seek medical attention and reduce risk to their community. KCSB's Ashley Rusch spoke with Dr. Laura Polito, medical director of UC Santa Barbara’s COVID-19 Response Team and associate medical director at Student Health, to learn more about the program and current COVID-19 outbreak in the Isla Vista community. For more information about the pilot program and next steps for opting in, visit canotify.uchealth.edu/ucsb.
