Disneyland, Other Theme Parks Allowed To Reopen April 1 — With Conditions: California has announced that theme parks can reopen April 1 under updated guidelines from the state’s health department following a year of coronavirus closures that cost the parks billions. Disneyland, Universal Studios Hollywood and other theme parks can reopen once the counties they are located in reach the red/substantial tier 2 risk status. Theme park attendance will be limited to California residents. Read more from the Orange County Register, CNN and USA Today.
California Vaccinations Hit Milestone: California reached 10 million covid-19 vaccine doses administered on Friday. On Twitter, Gov. Gavin Newsom said California has given out more total doses than any other state in the nation. Read more from the Bay Area News Group.
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 Bakersfield Californian:
COVID-19 Vaccine Appointments For Week Open On MyTurn
COVID-19 vaccine appointments at the Kern County Fairgrounds' Mass Vaccination Clinic and the state's sites in Arvin, Rosamond and Wasco have opened for the week, the county announced Sunday. (3/7)
LA Daily News and Monterey County Herald:
Proposed Legislation Would Authorize VA To Furnish Vaccines To All Vets
Proposed legislation co-sponsored by Rep. Jimmy Panetta, D-Carmel Valley, would open up eligibility for inoculation to all veterans regardless of their status in health care with the Veterans Administration. “Currently, the (Veterans Administration) only has the authority to administer COVID vaccines to those enrolled in its health care system, leaving out millions of veterans who are ineligible to enroll for reasons related to income or non-compensable service injuries,” said Panetta. “Based on my work with Veterans’ Affairs Committee Chairman (Rep. Mark) Takano, the VA Vaccine Act would give local VA leaders the flexibility to use every available vaccine dose. “This bill is just part of my efforts to ensure that that Central Coast veterans have access to the COVID vaccine.” (Herrera, 3/6)
Bay Area News Group:
After Rampant COVID Cases And Mass Vaccines, Is California’s Prison System Nearing ‘Herd Immunity’?
A precipitous decline of coronavirus cases in state prisons has transformed California’s correctional system from a cautionary tale of mass incarceration in the time of a plague to something more unexpected: an intensely monitored field study that could help scientists develop strategies to defeat the pandemic outside prison walls. Highly effective vaccines distributed in the prisons combined with the lack of reinfections among inmates and staff previously diagnosed with COVID-19 appear to have quelled the explosive viral outbreaks that have rocked state prisons during the past year. (Moore, 3/7)
Bay Area News Group:
A User’s Guide To The Coronavirus Variants Emerging In California And Beyond
It seemed like everything was getting better — and then the mutants arrived. Yes, the horror story that is our lives a year into the coronavirus pandemic had already challenged us with plenty of just-when-you-let-your-guard-down twists and turns. And here we are, with case rates and deaths plummeting, businesses reopening and millions of people getting vaccinated in every corner of the country. Things are looking up. But now health officials and infectious disease experts are keeping an eye on something that threatens all this progress: the COVID-19 mutations. You’ve probably heard of these variants by now: the UK, South Africa and Brazilian varieties. There’s even a California and New York version popping up now. What are they? Will the vaccines protect us from them? And how big of a threat are they to our recovery? (DeRuy, 3/7)
San Diego Union-Tribune:
Yes, The Coronavirus Mutates. No, That Doesn’t Spell Doom For Vaccines
From South Africa to Brazil to California, the list of locations linked to new strains of the coronavirus is growing — and so are concerns that viral variants could undo the vaccine rollout. The worries come at a time when most San Diegans still haven’t received a COVID-19 vaccine. That could change by the end of May, when President Joe Biden says there will be enough vaccine for all adults in the U.S. But by then, new and faster-spreading coronavirus strains will likely account for nearly all cases. Does that mean this whole effort is for naught? (Wosen, 3/6)
San Diego Union-Tribune:
New Coronavirus Cases Among Skilled Nursing Facilities Continue Downward Trend
New COVID-19 cases at skilled nursing facilities continued their steady decline this week, and the total number of new cases between residents and health care workers were the lowest they’ve been since early December. During the county’s press briefing Wednesday, Dr. Wilma Wooten said skilled nursing facilities are continuing to see fewer people test positive in both skilled nursing and other congregate living facilities. “If we look at (skilled nursing facilities) and non-SNF congregate settings, we are seeing a reduction in outbreaks in those locations, as well as a reduction in our community settings,” Wooten said. “So all of the numbers are going in the right directions.” (Mapp, 3/6)
Santa Rosa Press Democrat:
Health Authorities At Helm For Sonoma County Say Pandemic Orders Saved Lives
Uncertainty and strife over the duration of government restrictions has been a persistent feature and source of frustration throughout the coronavirus pandemic, as medical experts and officials wrestled with the unknowns of a new disease. Inconsistent messaging by some leaders and policymakers and uneven public adherence to limits meant to keep people safe made predicting the course of the pandemic only more difficult. But the two women at the head of Sonoma County’s response to the crisis say the sometimes painful measures imposed to reduce transmission of the virus did what they were intended to do. (Callahan, 3/6)
Fresno Bee:
Fresno Region Looks To A Post-Pandemic Future
One year ago Saturday, an elderly Madera County resident who had recently returned home with his wife from a cruise became the first confirmed case of novel coronavirus in the central San Joaquin Valley. It was the first sobering dose of reality that a pandemic that was already affecting — and killing — thousands of people worldwide would indeed leave a lasting mark on central California. Even so, when that cruise passenger’s test results came back as positive for the virus on March 6, 2020 — followed the next day by a Fresno County man who also recently returned from the Grand Princess cruise ship — few could have imagined what was in store for the region. (Sheehan, 3/7)
Berkeleyside.com:
Berkeley's Schools Are Closed. Piedmont's Are Open. Why?
Nearly a year after shutting their doors last March, schools across the country have taken vastly different approaches to reopening. Some remain closed for in-person instruction, while others offer hybrid learning. The reasons why schools are open in one district and closed in the next can be opaque, fomenting confusion as pressure continues to mount for districts to reopen. Most schools in Marin County, for instance, are open for some sort of in-person instruction, including two high schools that opened for hybrid learning this week. Some Marin elementary schools, such as Ross Elementary, are open five days a week for full instruction. In nearby Piedmont, students from transitional kindergarten to 6th grade are back on campus for hybrid learning. (Markovich, 3/5)
Los Angeles Times:
Montebello Petting Zoo Reopens — Minus The Petting
On a normal day at the Montebello Barnyard Zoo, the Salas children would be petting Burro the donkey and Lula the cow. Instead, they settled for photos with the animals. After months of pandemic-mandated shutdown, the zoo opened again in early February. The Salases waited in socially distanced lines with other masked children, then hopped aboard ponies, both real ones and the perpetually frozen ones on a 1940s carousel. But burrowing into the animals’ fur and getting up close and personal was off-limits. (Campa, 3/8)
Los Angeles Times:
The COVID Conversation You Don't Want Is One You Need Most
As the pandemic’s winter surge overwhelmed hospitals across the country, a team of doctors and social workers at St. Joseph in Orange began an unusual effort designed to ease the burden on COVID-19 patients, their worried families and the healthcare workers ministering to them. Team members began asking the sickest COVID-19 patients when they showed up in the emergency department what they would choose if drastic measures were ever needed to keep them alive. Conversations about a person’s wishes — and what lifesaving care actually entails — do not happen with most patients in most hospitals, let alone when they show up in the emergency room for the first time suffering from COVID-19. (La Ganga, 3/7)
The Bakersfield Californian:
Bakersfield Teen Fighting Cancer Brings 13,000 Into Donor Registry In Search For Possible Match
Jehvan Crompton is a 14-year-old student at West High with a sweet smile and a quiet, unassuming demeanor. He says he's had to grow up faster than most kids his age since he was diagnosed with cancer in 2019. "He’s over it," his mom Kimberly Crompton said. "He says, 'I'm tired of the medication, I'm tired of getting poked.' "But the latest leg on the journey has taken an interesting twist. Just in the last few weeks Jehvan has become the national face of a program that he hopes will finally cure him of chronic myeloid leukemia: the Be The Match Registry, which is part of the National Bone Marrow Registry. He's looking for a genetic match who can help him get a blood stem cell transplant. (Gallegos, 3/6)
Bay Area News Group:
Bay Area Commuters Got Their Lives Back By Working From Home. Are They Willing To Give That Up?
Hartwell is among hundreds of thousands of Bay Area commuters who have reclaimed the huge chunks of their lives they once spent grinding through some of the worst traffic in the nation, after the COVID-19 pandemic spurred a massive shift to remote work. Now, as they approach a year of measuring their work travel in steps rather than hours, and vaccines point to a near future when a safe return to workplaces will be possible, many are weighing whether they are willing to go back to daily commuting, and others contemplate how it will feel to give that time back. (Savidge, 3/7)