On March 3, Governor of California, Gavin Newsom was present in Wednesday’s press conference. The COVID-19 press conference was held in the Ventura County Office of Education vaccination site. The conference began with Dr. Cesar Morales who provided an update for staff in the education department to be vaccinated by the end of March in order to reopen schools.

Governor Newsom, “set aside vaccine supplies for educators” Morales stated. The county is on track with getting the first dose of vaccines to all school employees.

Many schools have stopped or put a pause to in-person meetings. It is prioritized for more schools to reopen.

According to County Executive Officer Mike Powers, “The main focus is essential workers, educators, health care workers, food service workers and emergency first responders to receive the vaccine.”

Thousands of educators will be vaccinated by the end of this week.

Representative of California’s 44th Assembly District, Assembly Member Jacqui Irwin expressed that, “Ventura County has been vaccinating 30,000 people per week.”

There are currently seven high capacity sites for vaccines in Ventura County, as well as 15 pharmacy partners and 15 mobile pop up teams. These pop up sites will be set up to make it convenient to people who struggle with transportation, translation and resources.

The number of vaccinated people are 202,000, which is over 21% of Ventura County residents successfully receiving the first dose of vaccines.

Over 190 staff members are helping vaccinate individuals. There are 360 disaster workers who were reassigned to work on vaccine sites. That is 15% of the workforce helping with all hands on deck.

Every staff member is working together to ensure that in these harsh and difficult times, there will be positive outcomes and opportunities for our community.

Governor Newsom acknowledged that, “ This state now has led this nation in total of 9.3 million administered vaccines.”

1.65 million vaccines were administered within the past seven days.

Another vaccine announced, the Johnson and Johnson vaccine, is approved to be disbursed and will have provided 300,000 J&J vaccines available next week.

Overall, with high demand in supply of vaccines, it is anticipated that 380,300 doses will be received this week in California. Unfortunately, a certain amount of doses couldn’t arrive in Ventura County on time last week due to bad weather.

“We have worked with 337 Community Based Organizations (C.B.O) and invested over 50 million dollars for outreach and meeting people’s needs,” Newsom explained.

Although, 6.6 billion dollars will be going to additional supports such as ventilators, school grants, school supplies, mental health support, counselors etc.

Over 50,000 positive COVID-19 cases decreased to 2,500 positive rates which is the lowest in the nation. That is 14% of COVID-19 positive cases decreased down to 2.3%.

“A message from all across this state is that these vaccines are safe and will save your life,” Newsom stated.

Newsom and all board members thank all essential workers for making it possible for Ventura County to re-open. The main focus is to be mindful of precautions such as keeping a social distance and wearing masks to maintain safety.

For more information on COVID-19 and COVID-19 vaccination visit Ventura County Recovers