(Bloomberg) -- Six of the biggest counties in the San Francisco Bay Area ordered people to stay home except for essential needs, marking one of the nation’s strongest local efforts yet to stem the spread of the coronavirus.
The area affected includes San Francisco, Silicon Valley and eastern cities such as Berkeley and Oakland. It will start at 12:01 a.m local time Tuesday and extend for three weeks, county health officers said at a press conference. All businesses outside of those deemed essential will shut.
“We must move aggressively and immediately,” said San Jose Mayor Sam Liccardo. “The time for half measures is over. History will not forgive us for waiting an hour more.”
The Bay Area has been among the hardest-hit regions from the coronavirus, with 258 cases in the counties ordering the measures as of Sunday. The requirements will grind an area of more than six million people to a halt, going beyond statewide limitations ordered by Governor Gavin Newsom.
The orders direct people to shelter at their home and maintain social distancing of six feet outside of their residences. Grocery stores, hospitals, banks, gas stations and other essential services will remain open. Mass transit will stay running for people who need to get to these places. Restaurants can remain open but are limited to takeout and delivery.
“This is a critical intervention that we know can reduce harm and save lives,” Grant Colfax, director of San Francisco’s Department of Public Health, said at a separate press conference with Mayor London Breed. “The coronavirus is spreading in our community and we need to slow it down.”
Many of the Bay Area’s biggest employers, including Google, Facebook Inc. and Salesforce.com Inc. had already encouraged or mandated employees to work from home. But the new order’s restriction of nonessential services means a broader range of businesses will be hit. Manufacturers such as Tesla Inc. may have to stop production, said Lindsay Wiley, a law professor at American University. The automaker, whose sole U.S. auto plant is located in the Bay Area town of Fremont, declined to comment.
County officials have significant discretion to take actions like this given the widely recognized threat posed by the coronavirus, said David Levine, a law professor at UC Hastings.
“I can’t imagine this successfully being challenged, because of the present worldwide emergency,” he said. “If anything is a compelling governmental interest, this is it.”
(Updates with company effects starting in seventh paragraph.)
--With assistance from David R. Baker, Joyce Cutler, Josh Eidelson and Dana Hull.
To contact the reporter on this story: Kara Wetzel in San Francisco at kwetzel@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Flynn McRoberts at fmcroberts1@bloomberg.net, Michael B. Marois
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