There has been a lot of talk, both amongst friends and in the media, in the last two weeks as panic spreads about the Delta variant, mask guidance, and the possibility of yet another lockdown. But infectious disease experts are not the ones sounding alarm bells.

The pandemic picture in the Bay Area hasn't entirely cleared up and turned sunny, and there continue to be pockets of new infection in multiple local counties, as well as an unsettling uptick in new COVID hospitalizations.

Despite the ongoing presence of the highly infectious Delta variant of COVID-19, and an average of 950 new daily cases around the state in the last several weeks, so-called "breakthrough" cases of the disease in vaccinated Californians continue to be very rare.

San Francisco announced what it said was an "important milestone" on Tuesday, saying that 70% of eligible Latinx residents, i.e. those over the age of 12, have received at least one vaccine dose as of today.

Don't call it a vaccine passport! But California now has made vaccination records available digitally through an online portal, which creates a scannable QR code that you can show to get into stadiums, concert venues, and the like.

California's vaccine lottery continued with its second drawing on Friday, awarding 15 more Californians with $50K for getting a COVID vaccine — including one more from San Francisco.