San Francisco COVID cases reach 'all-time high'

SAN FRANCISCO - San Francisco's latest battle with COVID has reached unprecedented levels, prompting officials to introduce new testing requirements at hospitals and other medical facilities. 

"We are now at an all-time high in cases," said the city's health officer, Dr. Grant Colfax. "We are in the middle of the worst omicron surge."

An average of 1,386 San Franciscans a day are testing positive for COVID at testing sites, which is more than four times that of last winter’s peak at 373 cases per day, the city reports. City-operated testing sites have been running at 500-900% of capacity since the current surge began.

The uptick in infections has the city zeroing in on healthcare providers and demanding that they step it up when it comes to testing.

On Tuesday the city issued a new health directive for healthcare facilities to provide access to COVID testing for people with symptoms and people who have been in close contact with an infected person

Those hospitals will have to submit proof to the department of public health twice a week. Failure to comply may result in fines imposed by the City and County of San Francisco of up to $10,000 per day.

It's all part of a push to increase testing capacity in San Francisco. Health leaders said they are averaging 10,000 tests per day with about 1 in 5 of those turning up positives.

They said as challenging as the situation currently is, it's likely to get worse before it gets better.

"It's likely that rate will continue to increase over the next few days. And in keeping with these very high case numbers, our hospital census continues to climb," Colfax said.

When it comes to the city's public schools, San Francisco Unified is pledging to keep classrooms open for in-person learning. They said it's the safest place for students to be.

The school district plans to distribute 56,000 rapid at-home tests to students by the end of the week.