California officials lifted regional coronavirus stay-at-home orders on Monday due to improved conditions across the state, particularly citing a drop in intensive care unit predictions.

The state will now return to a system of county-by-county restrictions, with most counties operating from the most restrictive tier, and will allow businesses like outdoor dining and nail salons to open, as well as outdoor religious gatherings. Bars that only serve beverages, however, cannot open.

“Together, we changed our activities knowing our short-term sacrifices would lead to longer-term gains. COVID-19 is still here and still deadly, so our work is not over, but it's important to recognize our collective actions saved lives and we are turning a critical corner,” Dr. Tomás Aragón, director of the California Department of Public Health and state public health officer, said in a statement.

California is also lifting a 10 p.m. to 5 a.m. curfew.

Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) imposed the order in December when infections surged statewide and in regions where ICU capacity dipped below 15 percent. Northern California never went under the order’s restrictions and the Sacramento Region exited the order just last week. As of Monday, the order covered the San Francisco Bay Area, San Joaquin Valley and Southern California regions, areas that have been hardest hit with the deadly disease and where the state is most populated.

The decision came after four-week projections indicated that ICU capacity would be above 15 percent, though current state data shows ICU statewide capacity at just 4.7 percent as of Monday afternoon.

“Seven weeks ago, our hospitals and front-line medical workers were stretched to their limits, but Californians heard the urgent message to stay home when possible and our surge after the December holidays did not overwhelm the health care system to the degree we had feared,” California Health and Human Services Secretary Mark Ghaly said.

California has over 3.1 million confirmed cases, with more than 37,000 deaths, according to state data. Health departments have administered about 2.4 million doses.

Considering the current data, health experts have sounded the alarm over the state’s most recent decision.

“With each surge, we have relaxed our guard too quickly and have paid the price for that. I think we're making the same mistake again,” Dr. John Swartzberg, a professor emeritus of infectious diseases and vaccinology at the University of California, Berkeley’s School of Public Health, said. “I realize we have ‘met the metrics’ to relax things, but we remain at a very high level of daily Covid-19 infections. Throughout the pandemic, we have taken one step forward and two back.”

While the San Francisco Bay Area’s ICU capacity is now at 23 percent, the San Joaquin Valley is only at 1.3 percent capacity—which is still an increase from its previous zero percent.

Southern California still remains at zero percent capacity, according to state data.

“Just until recently, I understand the State was using the [less than] 15 percent ICU capacity as a threshold to make this decision, but clearly, not all regions of the state have reached this threshold,” Dr. Lee W. Riley, professor and chair of the Division of Infectious Disease and Vaccinology at Berkeley’s School of Public Health, said. “They may be using other predictive models to make this new decision, but I am not sure what they are. In either case, we will discover in the next [two to three weeks] if this was a right decision.”

Last year, Newsom released a system of color-coded tiers that determined county-based restrictions on businesses and individuals that were dependent on the number of cases and other virus-related conditions in the area.

The recent initiative enables counties to resume to the purple tier, one that counties must stay in for at least three weeks before moving onto the second tier—red—which is followed by orange and then yellow. The colors translate to widespread, substantial, moderate and minimal.

Rachel Bucchino is a reporter at the National Interest. Her work has appeared in The Washington Post, U.S. News & World Report and The Hill. 

Image: Reuters