San Francisco Chronicle: Nearly 80% Of U.S. Counties Have Low Virus Levels
About 77.58% of all U.S. counties have low COVID-19 community levels, according to updated figures from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. That is the largest proportion of people in that tier in nearly nine months. Another 20.34% have medium levels, and 2.08% have high levels. (Vaziri, 2/24)

San Francisco Chronicle: XBB.1.5 Now Makes Up 85% Of U.S. Cases
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that the XBB.1.5 omicron subvariant made up about 85% of U.S. COVID-19 cases in the week through Feb. 25, up from 74.7% of cases sequenced in the week ending Feb. 11. The BQ.1.1 and BQ.1 omicron subvariants together accounted for 12% of new cases, down from 20.4% two weeks ago. (Vaziri, 2/24)

NPR: FDA Authorizes The First At-Home Test For COVID And The Flu
The Food and Drug Administration issued an emergency use authorization on Friday for the first at-home test that can simultaneously detect both COVID-19 and the flu. With a shallow nasal swab, the single-use kit can provide results within 30 minutes indicating whether a person is positive or negative for COVID, as well as influenza A and influenza B, which are two common strains of the flu. (Kim, 2/25)

San Francisco Chronicle: GOP Senator Who Opposed Pandemic Aid Retired Due To Long COVID
Oklahoma lawmaker Jim Inhofe earlier this month told his local newspaper, Tulsa World, that he has retired from the Senate because he is suffering from long COVID, which severely limits his daily activities. The former Republican congressman who voted against multiple coronavirus aid packages at the height of the pandemic, including the Families First Coronavirus Response Act in March 2020 and the American Rescue Plan in March 2021, spent nearly 40 years in the federal government, most frequently as a foil to Democrat Barbara Boxer. (Vaziri, 2/24)

The Wall Street Journal: A Lab Leak In China Most Likely Origin Of Covid Pandemic, Energy Department Says
The shift by the Energy Department, which previously was undecided on how the virus emerged, is noted in an update to a 2021 document by Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines’s office. The new report highlights how different parts of the intelligence community have arrived at disparate judgments about the pandemic’s origin. The Energy Department now joins the Federal Bureau of Investigation in saying the virus likely spread via a mishap at a Chinese laboratory. Four other agencies, along with a national intelligence panel, still judge that it was likely the result of a natural transmission, and two are undecided. (Gordon and Strobel, 2/26)

The New York Times: Lab Leak Most Likely Caused Pandemic, Energy Dept. Says
New intelligence has prompted the Energy Department to conclude that an accidental laboratory leak in China most likely caused the coronavirus pandemic, though U.S. spy agencies remain divided over the origins of the virus, American officials said on Sunday. The conclusion was a change from the department’s earlier position that it was undecided on how the virus emerged. (Barnes, 2/26)

Axios: New COVID Lab Leak Assessment Reignites Furor Over Pandemic Origins
A new U.S. government assessment that COVID-19 likely originated from a lab leak in China has ignited yet another round of political furor around the issue, adding to many Republicans' anger over how the pandemic was handled even as many scientists remain convinced the virus most likely originated naturally. (Reed, Owens and Bettelheim, 2/27)

Fox News: CDC Advisory Group Finds Insufficient Evidence To Recommend More Than One COVID-19 Booster A Year
A US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) advisory group said Friday it isn’t recommending more than one annual coronavirus vaccine booster. The working committee, which is part of the CDC’s Advisory Committee For Immunization Practices, found insufficient evidence that more than one shot a year would benefit older or immunocompromised people. (Stimson, 2/24)

NBC News: Nasal Covid Vaccine Shows Promise In Early Clinical Trial
The vaccine, developed by a startup called Blue Lake Biotechnology Inc., was found to reduce the risk of symptomatic Covid infections by 86% for three months in people who received it as a booster dose. Existing booster shots in the United States reduce symptomatic infections by 43% in people 18 to 49 over one to two months, according to a study published in November by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (Chow, 2/24)

Reuters: Pfizer/BioNTech Apply For Full FDA Approval Of Updated COVID Vaccine 
Pfizer Inc and its German partner BioNTech SE said on Friday they filed an application to the U.S Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for a full approval of their Omicron-adapted COVID-19 vaccine. The companies are seeking approval of the updated vaccine both as a primary course and a booster dose for individuals 12 years of age and above. (2/24)

The Washington Post: Doctors Who Touted Ivermectin As Covid Fix Now Pushing It For Flu, RSV
First, the group of doctors championed ivermectin as a covid panacea. It failed to live up to the hype. Now, they’re promoting the anti-parasitic to prevent and treat the flu and RSV. The Front Line Covid-19 Critical Care Alliance, formed in 2020 to “prevent and treat covid,” is touting ivermectin for common respiratory infections amid a dramatic drop in prescriptions for the drug as clinical trials undermined claims of its efficacy against covid. (Weber, 2/26)

Axios: Schools Unprepared To Help Asian American Students Navigate Racial Trauma
The first two months of the year have left Asian Americans reeling as they attempt to reconcile their reality with a seemingly unending string of violence — and many are homing in on the lack of mental health care available to some of their most vulnerable. (Chen and Doherty, 2/25)

KQED: SF's Mobile Clinics Made Opioid Treatment More Accessible During The Pandemic. But Will They Stay?
Things at the opiate treatment program at San Francisco General Hospital look a good deal different these days from before the pandemic hit. For starters, there’s now an option to pick up methadone from a mobile clinic stationed in the hospital’s shaded parking lot, rather than in the traditional clinic inside Ward 93. More crucially, patients can now get the dosage level they need, when they need it, and are able to take their medications home with them — allowances that were previously restricted. (Johnson, 2/25)

Fox News: Biden Admin To Limit Telehealth Prescriptions For Some Controlled Drugs
The Biden administration is moving to require patients to be evaluated by a physician in person before receiving prescriptions for some controlled medications, including Adderall and OxyContin. The proposal would reverse a policy enacted during the coronavirus pandemic that allowed doctors to prescribe these medications through telehealth appointments. The move will make it more difficult for Americans to access some drugs used for treating pain and mental health disorders. (Mion, 2/26)

CalMatters: Emerald Triangle: Cannabis Economy Is Tanking
It’s shortly before 8 a.m. and a touch above freezing at the Trinity County Fairgrounds. The food bank’s February distribution won’t begin for another half hour, but the line of cars already stretches into a third row of the parking lot. Joseph Felice, his red Dodge pickup idling with the heat cranked up, arrived around 7 to secure a spot near the front — eighth, to be exact — and ensure that he gets his pick of this month’s harvest: frozen catfish filets, eggplant, winter squash, potatoes, cans of mixed fruit, cartons of milk. Getting here early is crucial, because by the time the final cars roll through some two hours later — 210 families served — all that’s left are a few packages of diapers and noodles. (Koseff, 2/27)

CalMatters: Emerald Triangle: What's Next For Cannabis Workers?
Leann Greene’s rose-colored glasses are scratched, cracked, sitting askew, but still firmly planted on her face during her latest monthly open house for the Humboldt Workforce Coalition. For three hours this Wednesday afternoon in a sunny conference room at the public library, apprehensive cannabis workers, lured by a segment on the community radio station KMUD, trickle through, seeking a potential refuge from their collapsing industry. Greene is their counselor and confidante, a relentless cheerleader promoting new career opportunities. (Koseff, 2/227)

Fortune: Daily Marijuana Users Are More Likely To Take This Health Hit, A New Study Finds
Those who use marijuana daily are about a third more likely to develop coronary artery disease than those who’ve never used the recreational drug, according to a new study. “There are probably certain harms of cannabis use that weren’t recognized before, and people should take that into account,” Dr. Ishan Paranjpe, a physician at Stanford University and lead author, said in a news release about the study, which will be presented in early March at the American College of Cardiology conference. (Prater, 2/24)

Roll Call: FDA Plans Oversight Changes After Critical Tobacco Report
The Food and Drug Administration on Friday announced a series of actions meant to improve its oversight of tobacco and nicotine products, most notably e-cigarettes. FDA Commissioner Robert Califf outlined plans for better communication and transparency on product reviews, increased use of the tobacco advisory committee and intra-agency meetings on enforcement. (Clason, 2/24)

The Desert Sun: Changes Coming To Heart Care With Eisenhower Cardiovascular Institute
Big and potentially lifesaving changes are coming to the Eisenhower Health campus over the next few years when it comes to addressing the Coachella Valley's cardiovascular needs. (Sasic, 2/26)

Sacramento Business Journal: Petrovich Plans Sutter Health-Leased Project In Plumas Lake 
If work begins on schedule, the building should open by spring 2024. (van der Meer, 2/27)

The Hill: Apple Watch Ban: Here's What Happens Next
An extensive legal battle is brewing after the Biden administration declined to veto an International Trade Commission (ITC) import ban on the Apple Watch. The ITC ruled in December that Apple infringed on wearable heart monitoring technology patented by California startup AliveCor. Apple currently uses an electrocardiogram sensor in question in its high-end Apple Watch models.  (Evers-Hillstrom, 2/25)

CapRadio: California Tripled Its Spending On Sacramento’s Homelessness Crisis. Here’s Where The Money Went.
The amount of money California sent to the Sacramento region to address its growing homelessness crisis nearly tripled to $191 million between 2019 and 2021, with much of the increase set aside for homeless housing projects, according to a new report. The sharp rise took place at the same time Sacramento County’s unhoused population soared to a record 9,300 early last year, up 67% from 2019. (Nichols, 2/27)

The Washington Post: CDC Issues Warning About Rise In Highly Drug-Resistant Stomach Bug 
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is warning clinicians and public health departments about a sharp rise in serious gastrointestinal infections caused by bacteria that are resistant to common antibiotics. In a health advisory issued Friday, the CDC said the agency has been monitoring an increase in people infected with strains of Shigella bacteria that are highly resistant to available drugs. Shigella infections, known as shigellosis, usually cause diarrhea that can be prolonged and bloody, as well as fever and abdominal cramps. (Sun, 2/25)

Reuters: Analysis: Why Public Health Officials Are Not Panicked About Bird Flu 
The very changes that have allowed the virus to infect wild birds so efficiently likely made it harder to infect human cells, leading disease experts told Reuters. Their views underpin global health officials' assessments that the current outbreak of H5N1 poses low risk to people. The new strain, called H5N1 clade 2.3.4.4b, emerged in 2020 and has spread to many parts of Africa, Asia and Europe as well as North and South America, causing unprecedented numbers of deaths among wild birds and domestic poultry. (Steenhuysen, 2/24)

Reuters: Texas Prosecutors Can't Target Groups That Fund Out-Of-State Abortions, Judge Says
Local prosecutors in Texas cannot use state laws that are more than 60 years old to prosecute organizations that help fund and arrange travel for Texans to obtain abortions in other states where it is legal, a federal judge ruled Friday. U.S. District Judge Robert Pitman in Austin said that 1961 state abortion laws, which were rendered unconstitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court's 1973 ruling in Roe v. Wade establishing a nationwide right to abortion, were not revived when the Supreme Court overturned Roe last June. (Pierson, 2/24)

Stat: A Dozen States Sue The FDA In Hopes Of Easing Abortion Pill Restrictions
In the latest flare up over access to the abortion pill, a dozen states filed a lawsuit to force the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to ease restrictions on how mifepristone is prescribed and made available to patients. At issue is a risk mitigation program, which is used to ensure certain prescription medicines considered to carry significant risks are prescribed and taken safely. (Silverman, 2/24)

Stat: Harris: Abortion Pill Case Could Take Away ‘Constitutional Right'
A looming Texas court decision on abortion pills could impact nationwide access to medication, Vice President Kamala Harris warned Friday, as she described abortion access as a “constitutional right.” (Owermohle, 2/24)

The Washington Post: The Texas Judge Who Could Take Down The Abortion Pill
Matthew Kacsmaryk was a 22-year-old law student when he drove to a small city in west Texas to spend a day with a baby he would probably never see again. He was in Abilene to support his sister, who, pregnant at 17, had fled to a faraway maternity home to avoid the scorn she feared from their Christian community. But holding his nephew in his arms — then leaving the baby with adoptive parents — also solidified Kacsmaryk’s belief that every pregnancy should be treasured, his sister recalled, even those that don’t fit neatly into a family’s future plans. (Kitchener and Marimow, 2/25)

USA Today: Nonalcoholic Fatty Liver Disease Is Rising In Hispanic People, Kids
Two years ago, Allison Grainger went to her doctor after feeling constant fatigue and nausea. A quick trip to the grocery store would exhaust her. The lethargy was so intense, the 26-year-old quit her job working as a spa concierge. Her primary care doctor sent her to a specialist, who found abnormal levels on her liver function tests. A liver biopsy later showed she had nonalcoholic steatohepatitis, or NASH, a more severe form of nonalcoholic fatty liver disease that occurs when there’s too much fat in the liver. (Hassanein, 2/25)

Los Angeles Times: Jimmy Carter’s Final Foe: A Parasitic Worm That Preyed On Millions In Africa And Asia
Just a few hours before President Carter underwent his first radiation treatment for brain cancer, he spoke of his hope, in the time he had left, to purge the world of a parasitic worm disease. That was in 2015. “I’d like the last Guinea worm to die before I do,” the 39th president told reporters at the Carter Center. “We know where all of them are, so obviously that would be my top priority.” (Jarvie, 2/27)