Bay Area School Absences Soar Amid Tripledemic: In San Francisco, roughly 38% of the 49,000 students missed at least one day of school in the first two weeks of December — up from 29% last year and 27% before the pandemic. Read more from the San Francisco Chronicle. Keep scrolling for more covid coverage.
Amid Commotion, LA Council Passes New Mayor’s Homelessness Declaration: The Los Angeles City Council approved Mayor Karen Bass’ declaration of a homelessness emergency at a fraught four-hour meeting Tuesday, giving the new mayor a potentially critical tool for addressing the city’s humanitarian crisis. The vote should have been a simple procedural step, but it was thrown into jeopardy by the tumult at City Hall. Read more from the Los Angeles Times.
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 (Santa Rosa) Press Democrat:
Sonoma County, Bay Area Health Officials Recommend Masking Indoors In Public
Sonoma County Health Officer Dr. Sundari Mase has joined other Bay Area health officials in supporting a forthcoming regional recommendation for people to wear masks in indoor public settings. (Murphy, 12/13)
Bay Area News Group:
Q&A: With COVID Cases Spiking, What New Mandates Are Around The Corner?
It’s been more than nine months since California required face masks indoors in public places to slow the spread of COVID-19. But with cases spiking again during the winter holiday season, is there anything that could trigger a return of the mask mandate? (Woolfolk, 12/13)
Los Angeles Times:
Coronavirus Cases Are Starting To Drop In L.A.
The number of newly reported COVID-19 cases has ticked down in Los Angeles County, a reprieve following weeks of increases. Whatever the wider prognosis for the winter, this dip will almost surely delay the return of a public indoor mask mandate in the nation’s most populous county. (Money, Lin II and Reyes, 12/13)
Sacramento Bee:
Can I Still Cancel My Flight If I Get COVID Or The Flu?
Flying during the holidays can be a gamble — especially with COVID, the flu and other viruses still circulating. Since the pandemic began, most airlines have adjusted their cancellation policies for unexpected travel mishaps. There is no hard and fast rule for cancellation due to illness. You’ll need to work with your airline. If you’re concerned about needing to cancel, most airlines offer trip insurance that protect the cost of the flight. (Pinedo, 12/13)
Sacramento Bee:
California Airport COVID-19 Restrictions 2022: What To Know
California airports have been relaxing their COVID-19 restrictions, as we near three years since the start of the pandemic. For instance, since June, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recalled its requirement that travelers coming into the United States must show documentation of a negative COVID test or recovery, regardless of citizenship or vaccination status. (Truong, 12/13)
Los Angeles Times:
U.S. Death Toll Tied To Long COVID Exceeds 4,000, CDC Report Says
The health challenges that a bout of COVID-19 sometimes leaves in its wake can be troublesome, scary and quite mysterious. New research confirms they can be deadly as well. A study released Wednesday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that between January 2020 and June 2022, long COVID was implicated in at least 3,544 deaths in the United States alone. (Healy, 12/13)
Stat:
Lawmakers Tell Pfizer CEO To 'Back Off' On Covid Vaccine Price Hike
A pair of U.S. lawmakers wrote Pfizer chief executive officer Albert Bourla that he should “back off” from plans to charge Americans up to $130 for the company’s Covid-19 vaccine, a move they described as “pure and deadly greed.” (Silverman, 12/13)
Military.com:
VA Seeing A Resurgence Of COVID-19 Among Patients, Urges Veterans To Get Boosted
COVID cases in the Veterans Affairs health system have nearly doubled in the past month, prompting the department's top doctor to urge veterans to get the most recent coronavirus booster shot. According to data kept by the Department of Veterans Affairs and Military Times, more than 12,156 patients had active cases of COVID-19 as of Tuesday, nearly double the 6,425 it had on Nov. 1. (Kime, 12/13)
San Francisco Chronicle:
New COVID Infections Among US Veterans Have Doubled In 1 Month
New COVID-19 cases in the Veterans Affairs health system have nearly doubled in the past month, according to data from the Department of Veterans Affairs and Military Times. More than 12,156 patients had active cases of COVID-19 as of Tuesday, nearly double the 6,425 on Nov. 1. There have been 267 deaths reported in that time. (Vaziri and Beamish, 12/13)
Bay Area Reporter:
Biden Signs Marriage Bill
President Joe Biden signed the Respect for Marriage Act Tuesday, marking the first significant piece of LGBTQ rights legislation to become law in a decade. ... The signing ceremony included Vice President Kamala Harris, first lady Jill Biden, and second gentleman Doug Emhoff. Gay Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg was in attendance, as were members of Congress.
During her remarks, Harris recalled marrying same-sex couples when she was San Francisco district attorney at City Hall over Valentine's Day weekend in 2004 during the Winter of Love, after then-mayor and now Governor Gavin Newsom ordered city officials to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples. (Laird, 12/13)
The New York Times:
Biden Signs Bill To Protect Same-Sex Marriage Rights
President Biden signed the Respect for Marriage Act into law on Tuesday, mandating federal recognition for same-sex marriages and capping his own personal evolution toward embracing gay rights over the course of a four-decade political career. In an elaborate signing ceremony on the South Lawn, complete with musical performances from Cyndi Lauper and Sam Smith, Mr. Biden told thousands of supporters and lawmakers that the new law represents a rare moment of bipartisanship when Democrats and Republicans came together. (Shear, 12/13)
Los Angeles Times:
Women And Trans Students Fear Harassment And Hate At CSU Campus
The outrage and frustration had been building for years at California State University’s Maritime Academy, an elite training ground for students bound for work on the sea. It reached a peak last year, when student cadets publicly confronted the school’s president, a retired rear admiral. Dozens of cadets gathered on the Quad that day to protest what they said was widespread sexual misconduct, racism and hostility toward women and transgender and non binary students. (Lopez and Shalby, 12/13)
Axios:
Report Details Online Harassment Of Trans Health Care Providers
Anti-transgender campaigns resulted in the online harassment of 24 different hospitals and health care providers in 21 states over a recent four-month period, according to a report from Human Rights Campaign shared first with Axios. (Fried, 12/13)
CIDRAP:
Studies Show Mpox Viral Clearance Time, Impact Of Pre-Exposure Vaccination
A new study based on 77 mpox patients from Spain shows that the time from symptom onset to viral clearance for 90% of cases was likely 41 days in skin lesions and 39 days in semen. The study was published in The Lancet Infectious Diseases. In the first study, participants had the most viral DNA in skin lesion swabs, followed by rectal swabs, whole blood, oropharyngeal swabs, and semen samples. And different body parts had detectable DNA for a range of durations, with blood containing detectable virus DNA for 5 days, compared to 25 days for skin lesions. (Soucheray, 12/13)
San Francisco Chronicle:
Nurses At Alta Bates Summit Plan To Strike, Sutter Officials Say
Nurses at the Alta Bates Summit Medical Center have notified their employer that they intend to strike starting Dec. 24, according to Sutter Health. “The nurses’ union at Alta Bates Summit Medical Center has called a 9-day strike from December 24 - January 2, its third strike of the year,” according to a Sutter, which released a statement on Tuesday night. Alta Bates Summit has hospitals in Oakland and Berkeley. (Parker, 12/13)
San Diego Union-Tribune:
Price Charities Leads $3.5 Million Push To Train More Mental Health Care Workers
A coalition spanning government and private philanthropy took a step toward solving the region’s mental health staffing shortage Tuesday with the unanimous approval of a $3.5 million project that aims to train a broad range of mental health care workers. (Sisson, 12/13)
East Bay Times:
Eye On The Hills: CityHealth Location Coming To Montclair
“I wanted to create a home for health — where everyone could get consistent world-class healthcare in an accessible, respectful, and caring way,” says Parkin. “Our locations are designed to feel like relaxed and inviting spaces that you actually want to visit.” (Prior, 12/14)
Stat and The Markup:
‘Out Of Control’: Dozens Of Telehealth Startups Sent Sensitive Health Information To Big Tech Companies
Open the website of Workit Health, and the path to treatment starts with a simple intake form: Are you in danger of harming yourself or others? If not, what’s your current opioid and alcohol use? How much methadone do you use? Within minutes, patients looking for online treatment for opioid use and other addictions can complete the assessment and book a video visit with a provider licensed to prescribe suboxone and other drugs. But what patients probably don’t know is that Workit was sending their delicate, even intimate, answers about drug use and self-harm to Facebook. (Palmer, Feathers and Fondrie-Teitler, 12/13)
Capital & Main:
Treating Farmworkers On Their Terms
Gloria Merino came to the Salinas Valley from the Mixteca region of Oaxaca, where she’d learned how to help women deliver babies. “My cousin was a curandero [a practitioner of traditional medicine] and he taught me how to heal,” Merino recalls. “The Virgin, God and San Marcos all told me that I would heal people and make a living that way, so I learned to help deliver babies.” In Greenfield, in the Salinas Valley, she became a partera, or midwife, to women who wanted to deliver at home, using methods their communities had depended on for generations. She had to start growing her own herbs, since she couldn’t find them in stores. “Triquis [the Oaxacan indigenous group to which she belongs] began to seek my help in healing or for trouble in their marriage,” she recalls. (Bacon, 12/13)
San Francisco Chronicle:
Federal Officials Fail To Hold Prison Employees Accountable For Sexual Abuse, Senate Report Finds
The U.S. Bureau of Prisons “fails to hold employees accountable” for sexual abuse of female inmates, a bipartisan Senate panel has concluded after an eight-month investigation. Among the 29 federal prisons that have housed women in the last decade, assaults and other abuse have occurred in at least 19, the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations said in a report released Tuesday. The most prominent example is in the Bay Area, at the Federal Correctional Institution in Dublin, where the former warden, Ray Garcia, was convicted last week of eight felony charges involving sexual abuse of three inmates; a former prison chaplain and two guards have pleaded guilty; and another former guard is awaiting trial. (Egelko, 12/13)
Los Angeles Times:
California Could Receive More Than $500 Million From Walgreens Opioid Settlement
California could receive more than $500 million from a $5.7-billion multistate agreement to settle a raft of lawsuits filed against Walgreens over the pharmacy chain’s role in the opioid crisis, officials said. “The settlement will resolve allegations that the company failed to appropriately oversee the dispensing of opioids at its pharmacies,” the California attorney general’s office said Monday in a release. (Martinez, 12/13)
San Francisco Chronicle:
S.F. Supervisors Challenge Mayor Breed Over Supervised Drug Use Sites
San Francisco supervisors are ready for a showdown with Mayor London Breed over supervised drug consumption sites, which are stalled under her administration. Amid an ongoing drug crisis largely driven by the powerful opioid fentanyl, a majority of San Francisco supervisors back a plan to set aside millions of dollars to open “wellness” hubs where people can use drugs under the supervision of staff trained to reverse overdoses. Supervised sites are currently illegal under federal law, although New York City has pushed forward to open two sites. (Moench and Morris, 12/13)
Los Angeles Times:
Former Top Cal Fire Official Charged With Felony Conspiracy And Intent To Sell Illegal Steroids In Nevada
A former Cal Fire division chief has been charged in Nevada with four felonies, including possession of anabolic steroids for sale and conspiracy related to the possession and sale of a controlled substance. (Winton, 12/13)
Stat:
Addiction Treatment Would Stay Easier To Get Under New Rule
Addiction treatment got easier during the Covid-19 pandemic — and the Biden administration wants to keep it that way. Federal regulators on Tuesday announced a proposal to take the emergency policies enacted in 2020, in response to the emerging pandemic, and make them permanent. (Facher, 12/13)
Axios:
Biden Admin Extends Pandemic-Era Flexibilities On Opioid Use Treatments
The Biden administration is moving to make permanent the pandemic rules that allowed take-home drugs to help fight opioid addiction. The proposed rule from HHS would make it easier for patients with opioid use disorder to access drugs like methadone for home use and for providers to prescribe them via telehealth for patients with opioid use disorder. (Moreno and Reed, 12/14)
AP:
US Study: Over Half Of Car Crash Victims Had Drugs In System
A large study by U.S. highway safety regulators found that more than half the people injured or killed in traffic crashes had one or more drugs, or alcohol, in their bloodstreams. Also, just over 54% of injured drivers had drugs or alcohol in their systems, with tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), an active ingredient in marijuana, the most prevalent, followed by alcohol, the study published Tuesday by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration found. (Krisher, 12/13)
San Francisco Chronicle:
Two Homeless Persons Dead In San Jose Due To Cold Exposure, County Officials Say
The Santa Clara County Coroner's Office is investigating the deaths of two homeless persons in San Jose who were exposed to extreme cold weather recently, according to authorities. The deaths occurred in the 95112 area code, the county said, which roughly covers Japantown and the area just east of Downtown San Jose. (Umanzor, 12/13)
Voice Of San Diego:
SDSU Report Spotlights Downtown Restroom Shortcomings
A new analysis by San Diego State researchers documents lacking public restroom access downtown and how it’s impacting the area’s growing unsheltered population. The results: Research by SDSU’s Project for Sanitation Justice found less than half of the city’s permanent restroom facilities could be considered “truly open access” and that just two permanent facilities were available around the clock seven days a week. (Halverstadt, 12/13)