Times Of San Diego: National Weather Service Says Heat Wave Will Continue Through Friday 
The National Weather Service office in San Diego said Monday the scorching heat wave will continue through Friday evening for all areas except the mountains and deserts. (Jennewein, 9/5)

Berkeleyside: What Emergency Services Are Offered In Berkeley On Hot And Smoky Days?
Berkeley has one official cooling and clean air center offering people respite from dangerous temperatures and smoky air. Public libraries also offer respite from poor weather conditions. The emergency shelter is located at the old Berkeley City Hall (2134 Martin Luther King Jr. Way), and the city will “start considering” activating it if temperatures reach 90 degrees or when there is a sustained unhealthy air quality index of more than 150, according to city spokesperson Matthai Chakko. (Kwok and Yelimeli, 9/2)

Sacramento Bee: How Can Sacramento Heat Turn Fatal? What To Know With Temps Headed To 110 Degrees 
Here are the symptoms of heat exhaustion and heat stroke and what to do if someone you know is experiencing either of the heat-related illnesses, according to the CDC. (Taylor, 9/5)

Bay Area News Group: Extreme Heat Is Creating More Fire Danger Throughout California, But Firefighters Make Progress On Mill Fire 
Fire crews made good progress Sunday night on the Mill Fire burning in Siskiyou County, achieving 40% containment, while the Mountain Fire near Gazelle has continued to spread in steep terrain, Cal Fire officials said. (9/5)

The New York Times: Heat, Water, Fire: How Climate Change Is Transforming the Pacific Crest Trail
In the desert near Agua Dulce, north of Los Angeles, hikers along the Pacific Crest Trail who reached mile marker 502 encountered a cistern of water that smelled bad and tasted worse, with a dead rat floating inside. They got out their filters and refilled their bottles anyway. “Will update if I get sick,” one wrote on a message board to those coming up behind. The message was just one sign of how global warming is affecting life along the trail, where, during a hot season nearly devoid of rain, water tanks and caches were more important than ever, the last line of defense against dehydration. At least some hikers were willing to take their chances. (Gerety, 8/31)

San Francisco Chronicle: COVID Omicron Booster: How To Identify New Shot At CVS, Walgreens
With the omicron-specific COVID-19 booster now available, how can you ensure that the booster you sign up for is the new one and not the old one? While some pharmacy sites, like Walgreens, make it clear when you sign up for an appointment that they are offering the “updated” booster, others, like CVS, don’t specify. (Echeverria, 9/2)

San Francisco Chronicle: New COVID Booster Shot Is Promising, Can It Prevent Next Surge?
When the first COVID-19 vaccines arrived nearly two years ago, they came with the promise that their formulas could be adjusted quickly and easily to target coronavirus variants and allow for a nimble defense to an evolving pathogen. Now that promise is being put to the test. (Ho and Allday, 9/4)

NPR: Omicron COVID Boosters: Do I Need One, And If So, When? 
After talking to several infectious disease experts, we found there's a whole range of opinions on who needs to boost and when. So, if you are navigating this decision, here are some things to consider. (9/5)

Forbes: New Bivalent Covid-19 Boosters: When Should You Get These BA.4, BA.5 Updated Vaccines
Going forward, bivalent versions of the Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna Covid-19 mRNA boosters are what’s going to be available, replacing the original univalent ones. ... In the word univalent, “uni” refers to “one,” as it does in unitard or unibrow, and “valence” refers to the immune system stimulating items in the vaccine. So a univalent vaccine is designed to stimulate your immune system to protect against a single antigen or single microbe. The original univalent Covid-19 mRNA vaccines included one type of mRNA to serve a blueprints for your cells to produce the spike protein that studded the surface of the original version of the SARS-CoV-2. While this univalent vaccine still offers some protection against the currently circulating Covid-19 coronaviruses, its protection is limited since the viruses spike proteins have changed quite significantly. (Lee, 9/5)

CBS News: Biden Administration Is Preparing For The End Of Free COVID-19 Vaccines As Funds Run Dry
Formal preparations are underway for the end of the federal COVID-19 vaccination and treatment effort, health officials say, with money for the Biden administration's campaign to buy and distribute shots to the public for free now set to run out "as early as January" 2023. (Tin, 9/2)

The Wall Street Journal: How Pfizer And BioNTech Modified Covid-19 Vaccines For Fall Boosters
Before new versions of the Omicron strain took hold in the U.S., Pfizer Inc. and BioNTech SE had begun tinkering with their widely used Covid-19 vaccine. In May, researchers tracking how coronavirus strains behave saw the potential for Omicron subvariants to predominate. Just in case, the companies started building blueprints of shots reformulated to target BA.4, BA.5 and other substrains, and laid the groundwork for testing them. (Hopkins, 9/5)

Stat: Pfizer Isn’t Sharing Covid Vaccines With Researchers For Next-Gen Studies
Researchers studying next-generation vaccines to fight an evolving Covid-19 threat are running into problems getting existing vaccines to use in their research. (Cohrs, 9/6)

East Bay Times: Unraveling The Interplay Of Omicron, Reinfections, And Long COVID 
The latest COVID-19 surge, caused by a shifting mix of quickly evolving omicron subvariants, appears to be waning, with cases and hospitalizations beginning to fall. (Bertolone, 9/3)

Associated Press: Silicon Valley Tech CEO Convicted In COVID-19, Allergy Test Fraud Case
A Silicon Valley executive who prosecutors said lied to investors about inventing technology that tested for allergies and COVID-19 using only a few drops of blood and charged up to $10,000 per allergy test was found guilty of health care fraud, authorities announced Friday. (Rodriguez, 9/5)

CIDRAP: Study: Previous COVID-19 Infection Offers Protection Against BA.5
Infections with previous COVID-19 variants offer more protection against the Omicron BA.5 subvariant in vaccinated people compared with vaccinated people who had no previous  infections, according to a New England Journal of Medicine study yesterday. (9/1)

CIDRAP: Low Testosterone In Men May Raise Risk Of COVID Hospitalization
Men with low testosterone levels and COVID-19 were more than twice as likely as men with normal concentrations to be hospitalized, but those treated with hormone replacement therapy weren't at elevated risk, suggests an observational study today in JAMA Network Open. (Van Beusekom, 9/2)

Los Angeles Times: HIV/AIDS History Prompts Fears Of Racial Disparities For MPX
Shawn Griffin remembers his first — and subsequently last — attempt to ask his doctor to prescribe him PrEP. Griffin, a gay Black man, had hoped to be prescribed pre-exposure prophylaxis medication, known as PrEP, as a way to protect himself against HIV. But in 2012 his primary care doctor, a white man, said no. (Evans, 9/6)

The Hill: WHO: Declining Monkeypox Cases Prove Outbreak Can Be Stopped Or Even Eliminated 
World Health Organization (WHO) Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on Friday that the recent decline in monkeypox cases that has been observed in North America and Europe is evidence that the current outbreak can be stopped or eliminated outright. (Choi, 9/2)

NBC News: Monkeypox Cases Are Falling, But Experts Warn That The Outbreak Is Not Over
The number of new monkeypox cases in the United States has fallen by 40% since early August — a signal that the country's outbreak could be abating. According to an NBC News analysis of data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the seven-day average of new reported cases decreased from a daily average of 465 on Aug. 10, to 281 on Aug. 31. (Edwards, Murphy and Kopf, 9/1)

Politico: The Biden Administration Is Gambling That A Little-Studied Vaccine Can Stop Monkeypox
Since monkeypox began its unprecedented spread through the nation in May, more than 352,600 people in the U.S. have placed their trust in a vaccine that has never undergone trials to evaluate how well it fights the virus in humans. The vaccine was designed to prevent smallpox, a related virus, and studies conducted by its Danish manufacturer have shown it works against monkeypox too, in animals. (Mahr, 9/6)

Bloomberg: Monkeypox Vaccine Study Raises Questions About Protection
The monkeypox vaccine that’s become the main method doctors use to try to stop the global scourge may be less potent than hoped, new research shows. (Gale and Muller, 9/2)

Becker's Hospital Review: Monkeypox May Cause Heart Muscle Inflammation, Case Report Finds
A patient with a monkeypox infection in Portugal developed myocarditis, or heart muscle inflammation, a week after the onset of monkeypox symptoms, researchers said in a case report published Sept. 2. (Carbajal, 9/2)

Capitol Weekly: It's A Wrap: Nuke Power, Care For The Mentally Ill, Abortion Rights 
The final curtain fell early Thursday on a legislative session that coursed through a pandemic, bolstered reproductive rights, saw a speaker nearly dispatched by his own caucus and drew the national spotlight to a governor who had survived an effort to recall him from office. Several legislators and staff wore masks during the marathon voting session. Some stood close and whispered in one another’s ear. Arms patted backs, and, as Washington prepared for another round of vaccines, many walked closely together past a sign taped to a Senate desk reminding members about social distancing. The Legislature, like most of the state, was ready to move on. (Shuck, 9/1)

KQED: Legislature Approve Newsom's 'CARE Court' Plan, Clearing Way To Become Law
A controversial bill to overhaul the state's approach to mental health care for people diagnosed with schizophrenia and other psychotic disorders cleared a major hurdle Wednesday — paving its way to become law. The state Senate voted to approve the legislation, known as CARE Court, after it cleared the Assembly on a 62-2 vote Tuesday. The bill, SB 1338, by Democratic Senators Tom Umberg (D-Santa Ana) and Susan Talamantes Eggman (D-Stockton) now heads to the governor for his signature. (Baldassari, 9/1)

CalMatters: Children’s Hearing Aids Program May Expand
A proposal to expand a year-old California program that provides hearing aids to children was approved by the state Legislature in the final days of the session that ended Wednesday. If Gov. Gavin Newsom signs the bills, the expansion will add about 2,000 additional deaf or hard of hearing children who have partial insurance coverage and up to age 21who are not currently eligible for the income-based Hearing Aid Coverage for Children Program. If approved, it will go into effect Jan. 1, 2023. (Aguilera, 9/6)

The Wall Street Journal: CVS Announces Deal To Acquire Home-Healthcare Company Signify 
CVS Health Corp. is betting $8 billion that the house call is the future of healthcare. The drugstore giant’s deal to acquire home-healthcare company Signify Health Inc., announced Monday, will add 10,000 contracted doctors and clinicians and give CVS a hand in coordinating medical care for millions of Americans. CVS, the nation’s biggest healthcare company by revenue, said that it agreed to acquire Signify for $30.50 per share in an all-cash deal, confirming earlier Wall Street Journal reports. (Terlep, 9/5)

The Bakersfield Californian: Dignity Health, Health Net To Provide Free Mammograms 
Dignity Health and Health Net will provide free mammograms to at-risk women from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Sept. 20 at Ramon Garza Elementary School, 2901 Center St. Women must be over the age of 40 and have never had a mammogram or have not had a mammogram in more than 12 months and are uninsured, according to a Dignity Health news release. (9/3)

The Bakersfield Californian: U-RISE Grant Brings New Opportunity To CSUB 
“We know that in order to … to tackle the nation's health care system, then we need new methodologies and novel strategies that confront diseases that yet to have a defined etiology or treatment,” Sumaya said. “We need to take an integrative and collaborative approach to be able to tackle these issues coming up. So we need multidisciplinary, multiskilled, diverse teams of young scientists. And that’s what this grant does.” (Smith, 9/5)

San Diego Union-Tribune: San Diego Neurosurgeon Admits Accepting $3.3 Million In Kickbacks 
A San Diego neurosurgeon pleaded guilty last week to accepting $3.3 million in bribes to perform spinal surgeries at a Long Beach hospital as part of a larger kickback scheme and workers’ compensation fraud. (Riggins, 9/5)

Marin Independent Journal: Point Reyes Water Quality Tests Find High Bacteria Levels
New water quality tests conducted at several waterways in the Point Reyes National Seashore found unsafe levels of fecal bacteria, including up to 170 times the state health standard for E. coli at one site. (Houston, 9/6)

San Diego Union-Tribune: Athletes Have New Option For Medical Procedure That Favors Healing Torn ACLs Over Replacement 
For decades surgeons have replaced torn anterior cruciate ligaments with tendons harvested from the kneecap or hamstring, but patients are starting to choose a new method that allows the ACL to heal in place. (Sisson, 9/5)

Modesto Bee: Film, Panel On Diabetes Set For Modesto’s State Theatre
The State Theatre will screen a documentary on diabetes research, preceded by a panel discussion on the disease. “The Human Trial” will be shown Sept. 8 at the downtown Modesto venue. (Clark, 9/5)

Sacramento Bee: Sacramento Mom Sues Online Mattress Seller Over Fiberglass Injuries
A Sacramento mother is suing a mattress company after she and her two children — one of them still an infant — were exposed to fiberglass. And with millions of Zinus mattresses sold in the U.S., Vanessa Gutierrez and her attorney are trying to raise awareness of these potential hazards. Gutierrez said her younger daughter, Annalia, had watery eyes and a rash over much of her small body in the summer of 2019. Gutierrez spent about two and a half months stumped, repeatedly taking the infant to the doctor and thinking maybe Annalia had a mysterious allergy. (Lange, 9/6)

Los Angeles Times: Gang Outreach Workers Are Wrestling With Their Own Trauma
Kevin “Twin” Orange can still recite the names of the ones he couldn’t save, even if time has blurred his memory of when and where they died. For years, whenever his phone rang with news of a shooting in his corner of South Los Angeles, the veteran gang interventionist would race to the scene to comfort grieving relatives and friends, while doing his best to tamp down any talk of retaliation. (Jany, 9/6)

Los Angeles Times: For 'disabled Oracle' Alice Wong, Rest Is A Radical Act
Alice Wong is resting. It’s an unusual pose for an author on the eve of a literary debut. It’s also an unaccustomed posture for the 48-year-old disability rights activist and self-styled “cyborg oracle,” whose work has earned her the ear of American presidents and the trust of tens of thousands of strangers. (Sharp, 9/5)

Reveal: American Rehab: Shadow Workforce
Picture stepping into a drug rehab. You’re looking for treatment, but instead, you get hard work for no pay. For decades, this type of rehab has quietly spread across the country. How are rehabs allowed to do this? Some organizations argue that participants can work without pay as long as they’re provided with housing and treatment. This issue was raised by a cultish organization that recruited dropouts from the hippie movement and had them sew bedazzled designer jean jackets. The clothes became a Hollywood fashion trend, and the unpaid labor propelled a case all the way to the Supreme Court. (Walter, 9/3)

Voice Of San Diego: Whatever Happened To Escondido’s Shelter For Homeless Families?
Nonprofit Interfaith Community Services has been planning to open a permanent, brick-and-mortar family homeless shelter in Escondido for almost two years, aiming to meet a need that they believe is severely overlooked in North County. Interfaith CEO Greg Anglea said the group is now a few months away from accepting unsheltered families into the new, permanent program. (Layne, 9/2)