Sacramento Bee: COVID-19 Case, Hospital Numbers Slowly Improve In California
The statewide daily case rate fell to 18.3 per 100,000 residents, the California Department of Public Health reported in a weekly update Thursday, down 17% from last week. California’s test positivity rate also dipped, to 10.6% from 10.8% last week. CDPH reported positivity at 11.7% to begin December. (McGough, 12/22)

San Francisco Chronicle: COVID In California: Bay Area Counties Enter CDC’s ‘High’ Community Virus Tier
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Friday updated its nationwide ranking of U.S. coronavirus hotspots and five Bay Area counties — Alameda, Contra Costa, San Francisco, Santa Clara and Solano — moved up from the medium or yellow tier to the highest, or worst tier, designated as red. (Beamish, Hao, Reinhardt and Asimov, 12/22)

Los Angeles Daily News: LA County Falls Out Of ‘High’ COVID Activity Level; Transmission Still High, Officials Caution
Thanks to falling infection numbers, Los Angeles County on Thursday, Dec. 22, moved out of the federal government’s “high” COVID-19 activity category and into the “medium” level, but the county’s health director warned that transmission remains elevated and urged people to exercise caution over the holidays. (12/22)

Los Angeles Times: Weekly L.A. County COVID Deaths Top Summer Surge
Weekly COVID-19 deaths in Los Angeles County are higher than at any point during the summer surge, illustrating the persistent toll the pandemic continues to exact amid concerns that cases could surge again this winter. (Money and Lin II, 12/22)

Times of San Diego: County Health Officials Report New COVID-19 Cases Holding Steady At 4,764
The San Diego County Health and Human Services Agency on Thursday reported 4,764 new COVID-19 cases, a number almost identical to the count recorded the prior week. The recent total, collected through Monday, slipped by just 57 cases from the 4,821 reported through Dec. 12. Those numbers fell more sharply following the significant Thanksgiving spike that officials had expected and have continued warning of as families and loved ones gather to celebrate the season. (12/22)

Bay Area News Group: Is The Winter COVID-19 Surge Sputtering, And Are We Reaching Herd Immunity?
It’s early yet, but there are signs the dreaded holiday surge in COVID-19 cases may be losing steam, with cases and deaths at a fraction of the levels seen around the same time in 2020 and 2021. (Woolfolk, 12/23)

San Francisco Chronicle: Court Upholds Conviction For Woman Who Coughed At Store Clerks, Claiming COVID Infection
A federal appeals court upheld the robbery conviction Thursday of a woman who took items from a Walgreens store in San Francisco, then coughed at the clerks, said she had COVID and walked out without paying. Robbery is defined by law as taking someone else’s property by using force, the threat of force or “fear of injury.” And Carmelita Barela’s “threat to expose Walgreens employees to COVID-19 could have easily put the store clerks in ‘fear of injury,’” said the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. (Egelko, 12/22)

CIDRAP: Some 'Long-COVID' Symptoms Also Occur After Cold, Flu, Pneumonia 
Some conditions considered long-COVID symptoms don't seem to occur more often than after other viral respiratory illnesses (VRIs), but heart palpitations, fatigue, chest pain, and shortness of breath were among the problems unique to SARS-CoV-2, finds a study published yesterday in Open Forum Infectious Diseases. (Van Beusekom, 12/22)

CIDRAP: Molnupiravir Doesn't Cut Omicron Hospitalization, Death But Can Speed Recovery
A randomized, controlled UK trial published today in the Lancet shows that the antiviral drug molnupiravir doesn't prevent COVID-19 hospitalizations or deaths in high-risk, nonhospitalized, vaccinated patients but can speed recovery. (Van Beusekom, 12/22)

Los Angeles Times: Fauci Warns Of 'A Progressively Anti-Science Era' In U.S.
Dr. Anthony Fauci, who turns 82 on Saturday, wants the record to reflect that he is not retiring. Really, he isn’t. It’s just that after 54 years as a government scientist and advisor to seven presidents, he is leaving the National Institutes of Health at the end of the year. (Healy, 12/22)

NBC News: CDC Warns Of A Rise In Severe Strep A Infections Among Children
Group A streptococci are the same bacteria that cause strep throat and scarlet fever, but invasive infections refer to more serious cases in which the bacteria spread to areas of the body that such pathogens normally don't reach, like the bloodstream. The CDC warned in its health advisory that although rare, "these severe and invasive diseases are associated with high mortality rates and require immediate treatment, including appropriate antibiotic therapy." (Planas and Bendix, 12/22)

CIDRAP: Experts Challenge The Narrative For This Season's Flu Activity
Danuta Skowronski, MD, the epidemiology lead for influenza and emerging respiratory pathogens at the British Columbia Centre for Disease Control, said she's not yet convinced this year's flu season will be more deadly or lead to a greater number of hospitalizations than typical years. And as for immunity debt, Skowronski said she finds the idea unclear and ultimately unhelpful. "The piper must be paid at some point in nature; kids will get sick, and it has nothing to do with a more compromised immune system," Skowronski said. "It is the cohort effect, the accumulated residual cohort effect, especially [among] older children and teens, who have richer social networks." (Soucheray, 12/22)

The Wall Street Journal: Why Many Cold Medicines Don’t Work To Relieve Congestion
Some of the most widely used decongestants don’t work, several studies have found, prompting doctors and researchers to call for ending sales of the drugs. Versions of Benadryl, Mucinex and Tylenol, which more people are taking now as reports of respiratory infections increase, are among dozens of over-the-counter pills, syrups and liquids that rely on an ingredient called phenylephrine to clear up stuffy noses. The ingredient has proven safe, but at least four studies have found the medicines don’t relieve congestion. (Hopkins, 12/22)

NPR: The Strategic National Stockpile, The Nation's Huge Medicine Cabinet, Explained
It's true. There is a network of warehouses, each the size of several Walmart Supercenters, located in top-secret locations across the country. And while much about the stockpile remains a secret, it continues to play a vital role in the COVID pandemic. (Heyward, 12/23)

AP: Group Urges Feds To Investigate Snapchat Over Fentanyl Sales
As the U.S. deals with its deadliest overdose crisis to date, a national crime-prevention group is calling on the Justice Department to clamp down on social media’s role in the spread of fentanyl, the drug largely driving a troubling spike in overdose deaths among teenagers. The National Crime Prevention Council sent a letter Wednesday to Attorney General Merrick Garland, calling for an investigation. The group known for ads featuring McGruff the Crime Dog is especially concerned about the sale of fake pills laced with fentanyl on Snapchat, a popular platform among teens. (Whitehurst, 12/22)

Bay Area News Group: Fentanyl On Campus: DA Says Alleged Dealer Nicknamed 'Madman' Targeted Los Gatos High Students
A 23 year-old alleged fentanyl peddler was arrested on Thursday and charged with selling fentanyl-laced pills to teenagers in downtown Los Gatos, including at a parking lot and church near Los Gatos High. “This is not a war on drugs, this is a struggle to save lives,” Santa Clara District Attorney Jeff Rosen said in a statement. (Nickerson, 12/22)

AP: Final Tally: Nearly 107,000 US Overdose Deaths Last Year
Nearly 107,000 Americans died of drug overdoses last year, according to final figures released Thursday. The official number was 106,699, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said. That’s nearly 16% higher than the nearly 92,000 overdose deaths in 2020. (Stobbe, 12/22)

ABC News: An Animal Tranquilizer Is Showing Up In The Nation's Illicit Drug Supply
More than 40% of street drug samples tested in Rhode Island contained the animal tranquilizer xylazine, according to a new analysis out of Brown University. It’s the latest sign that the drug, which causes sedation and can lead to skin infections and overdoses, is continuing to spread through the illicit drug supply in the United States. (Wetsman, 12/22)

Stat: Apple Watch Hit With Import Ban But Suspended For Now
In the latest twist in a battle between Apple and medical device company AliveCor, the U.S. International Trade Commission issued a ban preventing Apple from importing all watches that use the hotly contested heart monitoring technology, but said the enforcement of that order will be suspended until appeals over the patents in question have played out. (Aguilar, 12/22)

Reuters: Apple Watches Violate AliveCor Patents But Import Ban On Hold -U.S. ITC
AliveCor accused Apple last year of infringing three patents related to its KardiaBand, an Apple Watch accessory that monitors a user's heart rate, detects irregularities and performs an ECG to identify heart problems like atrial fibrillation. ... Apple Watch Series 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8 have ECG technology. Apple introduced its most recent Series 8 in September. (Brittain, 12/22)

San Francisco Chronicle: ‘Terrible Neighbors’: Bayview Businesses Argue Embattled Homeless Nonprofit Hasn’t Kept Promises
In the summer of 2020, residents and businesses in San Francisco’s Bayview neighborhood learned that the city planned to open a safe sleeping site for homeless people on Jennings Street, a spot where vulnerable residents could get meals, medical services and a spacious tent to sleep in. The logic was simple: The pandemic had increased Bayview’s unhoused population, which was among the highest in the city. (Barned-Smith, 12/23)

Oaklandside: Memorial Honors Homeless People Who've Died In Alameda County
Equal parts a call to action and an opportunity for catharsis, Alameda County’s annual memorial for people who’ve died while homeless drew some 150 mourners Wednesday. They gathered virtually to honor people whose lives ended on the streets, in cars, and in shelters this year, and to highlight the conditions that cause so much premature loss. (Orenstein, 12/22)

San Francisco Chronicle: S.F. School District’s Emergency Removal Of Toxic Soil Raises Broader Questions
Workers were to begin digging up part of a courtyard and garden at a San Francisco school this week after high levels of lead and arsenic were found under two feet of soil during a routine inspection. The school board approved the costly excavation and removal of the toxic substances as part of an emergency order, but it remains unclear whether students were ever at risk of exposure or whether they could have been in the future had the materials not been discovered. (Tucker, 12/22)

Wired: The Bittersweet Defeat Of Monkeypox 
While one reason is that access to vaccines and testing improved, and another is that mpox is inherently much harder to transmit than Covid, the biggest, most agree, is that the people most at risk took their protection into their own hands in those crucial early weeks when the authorities were flailing. “The success was the community mobilization,” says Joseph Osmundson, a queer activist, molecular microbiologist, and clinical assistant professor at New York University. (Lichfield and McKenna, 12/22)

BuzzFeed News: Why Mpox Cases Dropped This Year And What We Got Right
Overall, there have been 29,646 mpox cases in the US as of Dec. 14, including 20 deaths, and more than 83,000 cases and 66 deaths worldwide (as of Dec. 20), many in countries that historically never had cases of the disease. Most of these cases were identified in gay and bisexual men, with the greatest danger of severe illness posed to those living with certain autoimmune conditions, including HIV. Particularly in the US, Black and Latine men have been disproportionately affected by the current mpox outbreak. Cases are way down and trending in the right direction. The highest single-day case count in the US for mpox was 635 on Aug. 1, and the highest seven-day average was 462 on Aug. 6. Compare those figures to the latest data from the CDC, where there were less than 10 cases most days in early December. Can’t argue with data; the tides seem to have turned. (Waechter, 12/20)

CIDRAP: Experts Debate Mpox Status As A Sexually Transmitted Infection
Today in Clinical Infectious Diseases two opposing commentaries debate whether or not mpox should be considered a sexually transmitted infection (STI).While the 2022 global outbreak has largely been defined by sexual transmission among men who have sex with men (MSM), the disease has historically been defined via household contact, or animal-to-human contact via the ingestion of bushmeat. (Soucheray, 12/22)

Politico: Senate Clears $1.7T Government Funding Bill
The Senate passed a $1.7 trillion government funding bill on Thursday in a 68-29 vote, sending the package to the House for approval on Friday. Before the bill cleared the upper chamber, senators voted to add more than a half-dozen amendments to the bill, including major policy provisions that would expand federal protections for pregnant workers and nursing mothers, in addition to helping 9/11 families. The entire chamber also gave a bipartisan standing ovation to the top two retiring appropriators, Sens. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) and Richard Shelby (R-Ala.), for successfully negotiating one last spending deal to cap off their lengthy careers. (Emma and Carney, 12/22)

Fast Company: Senate Votes On Pregnant Workers Fairness And PUMP Acts
The Senate has voted to include the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act as an amendment to Congress’s 2023 omnibus spending package. The vote on Thursday was 73 to 24, meaning it garnered significant bipartisan support. And in another surprise—also with bipartisan support—the Senate voted to include the Providing Urgent Maternal Protections for Nursing Mothers, or PUMP, Act as an amendment to the package. Both proposals have been championed by workers’ rights advocates as a significant step forward. (Rainey, 12/22)

Forbes: Senate Passes Two Bills For Pregnant And Breastfeeding Moms At Work
The PUMP Act for nursing mothers requires organizations to provide time and space for breastfeeding parents. The Affordable Care Act of 2010 already requires that employers provide reasonable time to express breast milk and provide a place for pumping, other than the bathroom, that is shielded from view and private. But the previous pumping law excluded most salaried employees, and the PUMP Act will extend these rights to all breastfeeding employees for the first year of the baby’s life. In addition, the new bill states, “Further, time spent to express breast milk must be considered hours worked if the employee is also working.” (Elsesser, 12/22)

Axios: Senate Passes Protections For Pregnant Workers And New Mothers
It's a major milestone for women's workplace civil rights. Advocates have pushed for protections for pregnant workers for over a decade, arguing that thousands of women lose their jobs each year — either fired or placed on unpaid leave — because employers are under no obligation to offer pregnant workers reasonable accommodations. Those would include things like extra bathroom breaks, the ability to sit while working a cash register or restrictions on how much weight they can lift. (Peck, 12/22)

CBS News: Omnibus Bill Includes Changes To Federal Drug Treatment Programs
A portion of the $1.7 trillion in the federal government's proposed omnibus bill will go to opioid treatment programs, as the U.S. continues to see high rates of substance use and overdose deaths. The bill was passed by the Senate Thursday, and now heads to the House. (Breen, 12/22)

Reuters: U.S. Senate Passes Increased Protections For Pregnant Workers 
President Joe Biden, a Democrat, is expected to sign the spending bill ahead of a midnight Friday deadline if it passes the House. Biden has supported the PWFA, saying last year that many pregnant workers are unfairly forced to choose between their health and their jobs. (Wiessner, 12/22)

The Hill: These Are The Last-Minute Changes The Senate Made To The $1.7 Trillion Omnibus
The Senate voted 73-24 to adopt an amendment brought by Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) to attach the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act to the omnibus. A release from the office of Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.), who has also been pushing for the legislation, said the bill follows a model similar to the Americans with Disabilities Act and would “require employers to make reasonable accommodations to allow pregnant workers to continue working safely, such as additional bathroom breaks, light duty, or a stool to sit on if a worker stands all day.” (Folley, 12/22)

Los Angeles Times: Op-Ed: The Overdose Crisis Persists, But Pain Patients Don't Have To Be Punished For It
The U.S. remains in the midst of an ever-worsening drug overdose crisis. Because prescription opioids drove its earlier phases, the nation responded by drastically reducing access to those drugs — with prescriptions dropping by nearly 50% over the last decade. But it’s now clear that approach was ineffective at combating overdoses, and it left many patients with painful medical conditions stranded. Overdose deaths have continued to soar even as fewer opioids have been prescribed. More dangerous drugs filled the gap: At least two-thirds of overdose deaths are now tied to synthetic opioids, mostly fentanyl, a powerful black market opioid. Meanwhile, physicians have had to balance the risk of criminal prosecution for prescribing opioids against their responsibility to treat patients’ pain. (Joseph Friedman, 12/23)

San Diego Union-Tribune: California's Failure To Mandate Dyslexia Test Is Appalling 
Last year, the state Senate unanimously approved following in the footsteps of 40 other states and requiring first-graders to be screened for dyslexia. Such screening is crucial to determining if cases are mild, moderate or severe, which governs how schools respond. But the measure died when Patrick O’Donnell, D-Long Beach, chair of the Assembly Education Committee, refused to schedule the bill for a vote. (12/22)

CalMatters: Why California Risk Screen For Childhood Trauma Matters 
A recent commentary published by CalMatters raised a concern that screening for Adverse Childhood Experiences, or ACEs, may lead to unwarranted reports of suspected child abuse or neglect to Child Protective Services. (Mikah Owen, 12/21)

East Bay Times: The Intersection Of Oncology And A Biblical Christmas Story
Cancer cells devastate my patients every day: infiltrating lung, liver and brain; filling the belly with unending fluid; trapping the lungs inside growing pools; strangling the bowels; disordering the brain; robbing mobility and even the ability to talk; decimating family; widowing young mothers; attacking the young and the old, the vigorous and the ill. (Tyler Johnson, 12/23)

CalMatters: The Real Cause Of California’s Homelessness
Gov. Gavin Newsom, newly inaugurated Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass and legislative leaders are pledging decisive action on California’s homelessness crisis, which raises a pithy question: Why did it erupt during a period of strong economic growth? (Dan Walters, 12/19)

Voice of OC: As Temperatures Drop, OC Effectively Ends Walk-In Shelters For People Living On The Streets
National Guard leaders confirmed to Voice of OC that they are not currently operating any cold weather shelters in either Santa Ana or Fullerton, as in years past. ... [It's] a stunning failure on all our parts to solve something very fixable in one of the richest places on earth. (Norberto Santana Jr., 12/22)

San Francisco Chronicle: S.F.’s Homeless Sweeps Are Unlawful — And The City Will Pay For It
In September, seven homeless San Franciscans sued the city and Mayor London Breed to end what they allege are unlawful sweeps. Supported by declarations from dozens of other unhoused people, street observers from the nonprofit Coalition on Homelessness, an academic expert and three former city employees, the plaintiffs paint a grim picture of San Francisco’s official response to homelessness. (Jeffrey Selbin, 12/21)