Latest From California Healthline:
California Healthline Original Stories
Vaccination Chaos Fuels Push to Recall Newsom
The growing public backlash over California’s messy vaccine rollout is putting immense pressure on Gov. Gavin Newsom, a first-term Democrat facing a Republican-driven recall effort. (Angela Hart, )
Covered California Will Reopen Enrollment: Leaders of Covered California have announced they will open a special enrollment period, allowing residents to continue signing up for health insurance coverage, once the annual open enrollment period ends Jan. 31, the agency’s director announced Thursday. Peter Lee said the decision was influenced by President Joe Biden’s executive order opening a special enrollment period in the federal marketplace. Read more from the Sacramento Bee.
Newsom To Extend Eviction Protections: Californians facing financial hardship because of the pandemic will be protected from eviction through June as long as they pay part of their rent under an emergency bill approved Thursday by the Legislature, just three days before an existing moratorium was set to expire. Gov. Gavin Newsom’s office said he will sign the legislation Friday. Read more from the Los Angeles Times and San Francisco Chronicle.
Below, check out the roundup of California Healthline’s coverage. For today's national health news, read KHN's Morning Briefing.
More News From Across The State
The Washington Post:
Single-Shot Johnson & Johnson Vaccine 66 Percent Effective Against Moderate And Severe Illness
A single-shot coronavirus vaccine from pharmaceutical giant Johnson & Johnson was 66 percent effective at preventing moderate and severe illness in a massive global trial, findings released Friday show. But its performance was stronger in the United States and weaker in South Africa, where a worrisome coronavirus variant now dominates — a complicated result that reflects the evolution of the pandemic. The results, reported in a news release, put a third vaccine on the horizon in the United States — one with logistical advantages that could simplify distribution and expand access to shots in the United States and worldwide. (Johnson, 1/29)
LA Daily News:
State’s Choice Of Blue Shield To Take Over Vaccine Distribution Spurs Questions
This week’s announcement that Healthcare giant Blue Shield of California had been tapped to take over the state’s much-criticized coronavirus vaccination rollout took many by surprise, and prompted concerns among some about equitable distribution to hard-hit communities. Los Angeles City Councilwoman Monica Rodriguez had to do a doubletake just hours after she and her colleagues left a meeting with county Public Health Director Barbara Ferrer. (Carter, 1/28)
The Hill:
CDC Reports 16 States Have Used Less Than Half Of Their Distributed Vaccine Doses
Sixteen states have used less than half of their distributed coronavirus vaccines even as the country at large faces a crunch in the number of shots going into arms, according to data released Thursday from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). According to the CDC’s vaccine tracker, Alabama, Wisconsin, Kansas, Hawaii, Arizona, Pennsylvania, California, Maryland, Minnesota, Idaho, Missouri, Mississippi, Illinois, Massachusetts, Nebraska and Ohio have all administered less than 50 percent of the vaccine doses they’ve received. (Axelrod, 1/28)
The Bakersfield Californian:
With Fairgrounds Booked, Some Residents Worry About Scheduling Second COVID-19 Vaccine Shot
As more and more Kern County residents line up to receive the coronavirus vaccine, some who have already received the first dose worry about their ability to get the required booster shot. Several senior citizens who were among the first to use Kern County’s mass vaccination site at the fairgrounds report difficulty scheduling follow-up appointments. A second dose of the COVID-19 vaccine is needed to complete the drug’s effectiveness. But the Kern County Public Health Services Department is no longer allowing eligible residents to sign up for visits to the fairgrounds, saying all time slots have been taken. (Morgen, 1/28)
Los Angeles Times:
Californians Face Anxious Wait For Second COVID Vaccine Dose
On Thursday, potentially thousands of people had their vaccine appointments postponed after the Ralphs supermarket chain — a large vaccine distributor — said the county’s Department of Public Health, at the request of state officials, had “recovered” 10,000 doses previously intended for scheduled appointments, according to emails obtained by The Times. A Ralphs spokesperson said only first-dose customers were affected, but it only added to the confusion. Many other residents are facing problems navigating the county’s online scheduling system, a confusing and frustrating process that can result in hours of wasted time. So many people have concerns about second doses that the county’s call center is jammed with 1,000 calls an hour at times, according to public officials. (Shalby, Cosgrove and Smith, 1/29)
San Francisco Chronicle:
'Nightmare' Of Confusing Tech, Guidelines Thwart Bay Area Seniors Trying To Get Vaccinated
Arlene Moon, called “Goochie” by her family, is a 95-year-old great-great-grandmother with chronic lung disease. She’s exactly the kind of person California wants to vaccinate — but she hasn’t gotten her first shot yet. Moon has short-term memory loss and can’t navigate a plethora of websites. She can’t drive herself to get a vaccine and would have trouble, given her balance issues, if she had to stand in line. That’s if she can even get a slot, since her luck depends on her location and health care provider. (Moench, 1/29)
San Diego Union-Tribune:
Scheduling Difficulties Persist As San Diego's Vaccination Effort Expands
County officials pleaded for patience Thursday as scheduling issues, and long wait times for service, plagued San Diego’s coronavirus vaccination system. Many say they are struggling to schedule first or second appointments and those visiting local vaccination super stations, especially the one across the street from Petco Park, reported hours-long waits for service Thursday morning. (Sisson, 1/28)
Voice Of OC:
Language Translations Delayed For Orange County’s Coronavirus Othena Vaccine App
Diverse language options for Orange County’s $1.2 million coronavirus vaccination app will take another week to rollout, officials announced late Wednesday, reacting to a mounting tide of public concern as many residents struggle to get an appointment for the shots. The county government’s vaccination registration service, called Othena, is currently only offered in English — despite a November contract calling for Spanish, Mandarin, Vietnamese and Korean translations. (Custodio, 1/28)
Los Angeles Times:
Ralphs Cancels COVID-19 Vaccine Appointments
Some L.A. County residents who were scheduled to receive their first COVID-19 vaccine shot will have to wait longer after officials pulled back some doses allocated for Ralphs pharmacies. The L.A. County Public Health Department, acting at the request of the California Department of Public Health, has “recovered” 10,000 doses from Ralphs pharmacies that were intended for upcoming appointments, officials with the supermarket chain said. The doses will be used instead to support the county’s “mega-PODS,” or mass vaccination sites. Residents with appointments were notified of the change via phone calls and emails Thursday. (Smith, 1/28)
San Diego Union-Tribune:
Have Questions About San Diego's COVID-19 Vaccine Rollout? Here Are Some Answers
Having trouble knowing if, when and where you can get a COVID-19 vaccine? You’re not alone. The vaccine rollout is being managed by a complex web of drug companies, health care providers and federal, state and county officials. It’s not easy keeping track of who’s saying what, or how that impacts you. (Wosen, 1/28)
San Jose Mercury News:
Coronavirus: Vaccination Effort Takes Shape In East San Jose
After months and months of suffering through the coronavirus ravaging their community, residents of hard-hit East San Jose are seeing a glimmer of hope: the arrival of the coronavirus vaccine. While people across the Bay Area spend hours online and on hold trying to snag coveted appointments to get inoculated, a collection of nonprofits has joined with Santa Clara County and Gardner Health Services to make sure those who have been hammered the hardest by the deadly disease don’t fall through the cracks. They’re trying to reach people without health insurance, those who speak limited English, and the elderly — people such as Cuc Ngo, who at 73 struggles to use the internet. “I’m very, very happy,” Ngo said while waiting in line, her eyes gleaming above her mask as she huddled in a heavy coat and hat. “We’re scared about COVID-19.” (DeRuy, 1/28)
Modesto Bee:
Novato Schools Chief Ripped For Early COVID Vaccine Shot
A California schools chief who got a COVID-19 vaccine shot from leftover doses at an event for top-priority educators faces outcry from teachers who have yet to be vaccinated. “For me, what it feels like is we’ve got the captain and co-captain of the Titanic getting on lifeboats and watching the Titanic sink while they’re safe,” said Adam Babendir, whose wife works in the Novato Unified School District, the Marin Independent Journal reported. Kris Cosca, district superintendent, received his first dose of the coronavirus vaccine Jan. 18 at a county event for special education teachers, custodians, food workers, bus drivers and other top-priority education workers, KTVU reported. (Sweeney, 1/28)
San Francisco Chronicle:
Newsom's $2 Billion Plan To Reopen California Schools Fizzles
Gov. Gavin Newsom’s widely touted $2 billion proposal to give California schools up to $750 per student to reopen by mid-February has stalled in Sacramento, with no timeline for when the money might be available. While reopening schools remains a priority for Newsom, as well as national and state health officials, the plan is tied up in the Legislature, where elected officials have questioned whether it’s fair or logistically feasible to implement the stringent testing requirements of staff and students required in the proposal. (Tucker and Gardiner, 1/28)
Politico:
Newsom: California Schools Won't Reopen 'If We Wait For The Perfect'
A frustrated Gov. Gavin Newsom on Thursday said school administrators and teachers unions should agree as soon as possible to reopen schools for younger students — or else be clear with families that they will not return to classrooms at all this academic year. Newsom was responding to growing demands that all teachers receive vaccines first, but also a long list of conditions that go beyond what the governor has proposed as safe to reopen schools that have been shut for nearly a year. The vast majority of California's 6 million public schoolchildren haven't been on campuses since March. (Mays, 1/28)
Los Angeles Times:
Super Bowl 2021 Could Become COVID 'Superspreader' Event
With coronavirus cases and hospitalizations continuing to decline, officials are worrying about the next potential super spreader event: the Super Bowl. Los Angeles County and California have managed to bend the curve after a deadly fall and winter surge in COVID-19, but the football championship is one of several concerns. Outdoor dining is expected to be allowed to resume at restaurants as early as Friday, the last of several stay-at-home restrictions to be lifted this week. L.A. Mayor Eric Garcetti on Thursday urged people to keep up their guard and limit exposure to the virus. (Money, Lin II and Ormseth, 1/28)
inewsource:
Tracking COVID-19 Inmate Deaths In California Proves Challenging
COVID-19 cases in California prisons and jails began to dramatically surge late last year, but there is no way to get an accurate picture of the pandemic inside these facilities because officials use different approaches to count in-custody deaths tied to the coronavirus. Using public records, inewsource uncovered reporting mistakes and delays in Southern California and at the state level in tracking inmate deaths from the virus, including in San Diego County. These issues have led to some deaths going uncounted. Undercounting COVID-19 deaths puts those incarcerated and detention center staff at risk because it leaves an impression that jails and prisons are doing a better job containing the virus than they actually are, said UCLA law professor Sharon Dolovich, who directs the university’s Prison Law and Policy Program. And that, she said, “inappropriately eases the pressure” to make substantial safety changes. (Plummer and Mejías-Pascoe, 1/28)
San Francisco Chronicle:
More COVID-Test Vending Machines Headed To Bay Area: Here's What You Need To Know
The new vending machines dispensing coronavirus test kits at the Oakland International Airport will soon roll out more widely in the Bay Area and beyond. Wellness 4 Humanity, the digital health company that designed the vending machines, is set to distribute more of them in major cities throughout the U.S., including San Francisco, Los Angeles and Dallas. The machines were developed in partnership with San Francisco-based tech company Swyft Inc. The company also launched its first vending machine Monday in New York and plans to get 1,000 more up and running in the next three to six months. (Flores, 1/28)
San Bernardino Sun:
Patton State Hospital On Fast-Track To Vaccinate Most Patients And Staff Against Coronavirus
Patton State Hospital has begun inoculating all consenting staff and patients with their second dose of the coronavirus vaccine in a rush to stem a rapidly spreading outbreak that has killed 16 patients and infected 548. Patton leads the state’s five psychiatric hospitals in the number of COVID-19-infected patients, and is second only to Coalinga State Hospital in patient deaths. Since May 30, 2020, 16 patients have died from the novel coronavirus at the San Bernardino facility, while 20 have died at Coalinga, according to the Department of State Hospitals. In the past week, 66 patients at Patton — the largest of the state’s five lockdown psychiatric hospitals — have been newly diagnosed with COVID-19, according to Patton Executive Director Janine Wallace in a declaration filed in federal court Tuesday, Jan. 26. She said 830 patients — 66.3% of the facility population — and 52.3% of its 2,516 staff members have been inoculated with the first dose of the vaccine. (Nelson, 1/28)
Los Angeles Times:
Hospitals Are Still Short Of Oxygen For COVID-19 Patients. Here's Why
COVID-19 hospitalization rates in L.A. County have come down from their alarming highs of two weeks ago, improving the oxygen pipeline to hospitals. But hospital administrators and medical suppliers say problems with refill and delivery of oxygen tanks are still hampering the medical response. It’s partly a hospital infrastructure problem, as some aging and overworked pipes that funnel oxygen to patients have frosted, slowing down or even stopping oxygen transmission. There’s also not enough concentrators, which extract oxygen from the air, and tanks to meet demand at hospitals or for patients to take home when they’re discharged. On the distribution side, the number of trucks available to deliver oxygen has been stretched thin. (Masunaga, 1/29)
LA Daily News:
Pandemic-Weary Medical Teams Watch Warily As LA County Widens Business Access
Dr. Thomas Yadegar sounded weary. After months of being worn thin by the pandemic’s waves of infection and death, however, the medical director of the Intensive Care Unit at Providence Cedars-Sinai Tarzana Medical Center was hopeful. To a point. (Rosenfeld, 1/28)
Sacramento Bee:
10 Indicted In Federal Probe Of California Fentanyl Smuggling
A federal grand jury in Sacramento has indicted 10 people in connection with a massive drug smuggling operation based in Mexico that allegedly funneled tens of thousands of fentanyl-laced pills into the United States and caused numerous overdoses and several deaths in the capital region. The 11-count indictment announced late Thursday by U.S. Attorney McGregor Scott says federal agents seized more than 20,000 counterfeit oxycodone tablets that contained the deadly drug fentanyl, as well as methamphetamine and cocaine. “Wiretapped calls show awareness by at least some co-conspirators that these fentanyl pills had been responsible for multiple overdoses and overdose deaths in the area,” Scott’s office said in an announcement. (Stanton, 1/29)
Bay Area News Group:
A New Affliction In The Pandemic — Vaccine Envy
I have vaccine envy. There. I’ve confessed it. The thought of getting a COVID-19 vaccine makes me impatient, greedy, needy. I yearn for a vaccine the way some people want a mansion or a Tesla or Michelle Obama’s dresses. A friend in California emailed a couple of days ago to say she was likely to get her first dose of the vaccine on Monday. (Mary Schmich, 1/27)
San Diego Union-Tribune:
Newsom's Risky COVID Shuffle
Any joy over the loosening of COVID-19 restrictions has been muted, to say the least. That isn’t because cold, rainy weather put a damper on outdoor dining. First, it was a true “Wait, what?” moment as Gov. Gavin Newsom surprised Californians this week by announcing the limited reopenings of outdoor dining, hotels, salons and other businesses that had been largely shuttered. (Michael Smolens, 1/29)
The New York Times:
New COVID-19 Strains Make The Next 6 Weeks Crucial
I hope, in the end, that this article reads as alarmism. I hope that a year from now it’s a piece people point to as an overreaction. I hope. Coronavirus cases are falling. Vaccination numbers are rising. We are already jabbing more than a million people a day, which means President Joe Biden’s initial goal of 100 million vaccinations in 100 days was far too conservative. In California, where I live, Gov. Gavin Newsom lifted the statewide stay-at-home order. It feels like dawn is breaking. And that is what makes this moment dangerous. (Ezra Klein, 1/29)
Bay Area News Group:
High School Sports Pose Unacceptable COVID-19 Risks
Bay Area coaches, players and parents are understandably upset about school officials’ and county public health officers’ reluctance to resume high school sports. The coaches, players and parents have invested time, energy and financial resources into an activity that enhances the overall high school experience. But maintaining the region’s health and ending the coronavirus threat must be our primary goals. Everything else is secondary. The risk the pandemic poses to participants and those they come in contact with remains too great for those playing higher-risk sports, including football and basketball. That’s especially true given that new variants of the virus are spreading throughout California with the potential to be even more contagious and more deadly. Medical professionals also remain uncertain as to the long-term health effects for youth who have contracted the coronavirus. (1/28)
San Diego Union-Tribune:
There's An Added Protection Against COVID-19 That Fits In Your Pocket. Why Aren't You Using It?
More than 8.6 million Californians are quietly using a technology to help track the spread of COVID-19. They carry it in a pocket or handbag. In fact, you may have it in hand, just not turned “on. ”It’s your cellphone; and the technology is CA Notify, an exposure notification system. When activated, CA Notify has the potential to help quell the current SARS-CoV-2 surge. It’s an opt-in mobile technology that confidentially informs you when you’ve potentially been exposed to COVID-19 and need to get tested. (Christopher Longhurst, 1/26)
San Diego Union-Tribune:
Medicare Says A Procedure Is Worth $5,869. Scripps Hospital Imposed A 1,200% Markup
Opponents of “Medicare for all” and other single-payer insurance systems routinely decry what they call “socialized medicine,” insisting that private companies can do a better job of providing affordable treatment than a government entity. If that were true, of course, Americans wouldn’t spend about twice per person what people in other developed countries spend for healthcare yet have less to show for it. (David Lazarus, 1/27)
Bay Area News Group:
Together, Californians Can Prevent The Next Public Health Crisis
Nearly one year into the pandemic, California’s infection rate has risen to one of the worst in the world, with health care systems in major hubs such as San Diego and Los Angeles fast approaching capacity. At the same time — and in some of the very same areas — another public health crisis is readying itself to overwhelm the Golden State. There’s a mental health epidemic occurring within this pandemic, and early evidence shows that California is at risk of losing more lives to preventable causes — overdose and suicide deaths — if this dual crisis continues unchecked. (Benjamin F. Miller, 1/29)