SANTA FE — Two small counties in northeastern New Mexico qualified for relaxed public health restrictions Wednesday by hitting statistical targets on the spread and prevalence of COVID-19.
Harding County moved into the green level — the least-restrictive of the state’s three tiers — while Union County advanced to yellow.
The move means restaurants in each county will be allowed to offer indoor dining at partial capacity.
The rest of the state, however, is in the red, including Catron County, which two weeks ago had made it into the yellow designation.
The map is updated every two weeks on Wednesday.
To move out of red, a county must meet at least one of two standards: either a COVID-19 test positivity rate of 5% or less, or fewer than eight new cases a day per 100,000 people.
Reaching both targets puts a county in the green. Reaching just one is enough for yellow.
Bernalillo County’s test positivity rate was at 10.5%, with 51.5 cases a day per 100,000 people.
