Latest From California Healthline:
California Healthline Original Stories
A New Use for Dating Apps: Chasing STDs
For contact tracers of sexually transmitted diseases, telephones and text messages have become ineffective. Dating apps increasingly are their best bet for informing people of their exposure risks. (Darius Tahir, )
Cal State San Marcos Issues Tuberculosis Warning: Cal State San Marcos students and staff are being warned to look for symptoms of tuberculosis infection after someone on campus tested positive for the disease. According to the county health department, anyone on campus from Aug. 30 through Nov. 8 could potentially have been exposed. Read more from The San Diego Union-Tribune.
There Have Been 500 Accidental Overdoses In SF This Year: The death toll from known accidental overdoses in San Francisco surpassed 500 last week as the city struggles to confront a fentanyl-fueled drug crisis that has killed thousands over the past five years. Read more from the San Francisco Chronicle.
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
Los Angeles Times:
New Life Planned For Mothballed LA Landmark General Hospital
Los Angeles County, which owns the former hospital, has launched a multi-year program to reconfigure the H-shaped building into homeless and affordable housing. This will be the centerpiece of a “Healthy Village,” with as many as 1,400 units with beds for housing, and medical and mental health care. Spaces for social services, community activities, arts and retail will be spread over its spacious grounds. (Smith and Campa, 11/27)
San Diego Union-Tribune:
Report: Twice As Many People Became Homeless Than Housed In October
The latest report from the San Diego Regional Task Force on Homeless found the number of people who fall into homelessness continues to outpace the number of people who are housed. Data compiled from October show 1,343 people became homeless for the first time that month, while 647 homeless people found housing. (Warth, 11/26)
Los Angeles Times:
L.A. Caregivers For Elderly, Disabled Push For Higher Pay
In the mornings, Rosa Andresen showers hurriedly before her daughter wakes up, worried the 24-year-old might suffer a seizure or tumble out of the bed while she is still shampooing her hair. Her daughter Amanda Andresen, who does not speak, was born with a condition affecting the part of the brain that bridges its left and right sides. Her walking is unsteady, and she needs to be assisted from the moment she gets up. (Reyes, 11/27)
Sacramento Business Journal:
Adventist Health Earnings Report Shows $637M Loss For First Three Quarters
Adventist Health is the latest health care system to report the impact of rising expenses, unstable investment markets and continuing Covid-19 disruptions on its earnings. (Hamann, 11/24)
San Diego Union-Tribune:
He Walked Out Of The ICU At Paradise Valley Hospital. He Died An Hour Later Outside A National City Taco Shop
Should health care workers have done more to keep Alberto “Albert” Herrera, who was suffering from acute pancreatitis, kidney failure and suspected alcohol withdrawal and was medicated with sedatives? (Sisson, 11/27)
VC Star:
Covered California Expands Coverage Subsidies Thanks To IRS Rule
The “glitch” is gone. Working Ventura County families who previously couldn’t get health insurance subsidies can now receive the aid to shrink their premiums. (Kisken, 11/28)
San Francisco Chronicle:
Interest In Vasectomies Increased After Dobbs Decision, And In States Where Abortion Was A Midterm Issue
Doctors and researchers are tracking increases in internet searches for vasectomies, which they say could indicate an uptick in interest in male birth control following the end of Roe v. Wade and coinciding with abortion rights becoming an election issue during the midterms. Eric Rodriguez, CEO of Innerbody Research, which analyzes health products and services, said his company uses internet search data as a proxy to gauge demand for particular medical procedures. (Bollag, 11/27)
San Francisco Chronicle:
Politics Aren’t The Only Hurdle For Any Potential Federal Abortion Legislation
Now that the Supreme Court has overturned Roe v. Wade, only Congress has the immediate power to restore a nationwide right to abortion. But it’s not clear whether the court that struck down abortion rights would allow a federal law. “There is simply no evidence that this court would allow national abortion protections to hold,” wrote Elie Mystal, legal affairs correspondent for the Nation. “I’m sorry to say that we have a ton of evidence that this court takes a dim view of the government’s power to regulate health and safety.” (Egelko, 11/25)
San Francisco Chronicle:
Parents Of Katie Meyer File Wrongful Death Lawsuit Against Stanford
The family of Katie Meyer on Wednesday filed a wrongful death lawsuit in Santa Clara County Superior Court against Stanford University. The soccer star died by suicide earlier this year. The lawsuit targets the school and several administrators, alleging actions around a disciplinary action caused Meyer “to suffer an acute stress reaction that impulsively led to her suicide.” (Ingemi, 11/24)
San Francisco Chronicle:
Knocking Down Mental Health Taboos In Sports
Warriors guard Klay Thompson is part of a new breed: star athletes who have opened up about their mental health struggles. The COVID-19 pandemic has has both created new mental health challenges for both athletes and fans and spotlighted the opportunity to discuss them in a new way. (11/28)
Berkeleyside:
Commission Wants Berkeley To Decriminalize LSD
A project to decriminalize natural psychedelics that lingered for three years in the Berkeley City Council will come back to life in a few weeks. But unlike other jurisdictions that have taken steps to chip away at the national and state ban on psychedelics, Berkeley is about to consider an even broader proposal: one that could make it the first in the U.S. to decriminalize LSD. (Perez-Burgos, 11/27)
Los Angeles Times:
Inside Months Of Chaos At L.A. County's Juvenile Halls
The desperation pervading Los Angeles County’s juvenile halls can be distilled into a single incident and its aftermath. A veteran probation officer — too afraid of retaliation to reveal their name or gender — was so overwhelmed by the staffing crisis in the facilities that house the county’s most violent young offenders that they begged to be demoted so they wouldn’t have to go back inside. (Queally, 11/28)
Berkeleyside:
‘Bearded Lady’ Tells A Complex Story Of Self-Actualization
In her new memoir, Bearded Lady, Berkeley resident Allison Landa describes her decades of struggle with congenital adrenal hyperplasia, a condition that can result in an abundance of hair, especially on the face, along with male-pattern baldness, irregular periods, infertility and obesity. (Furio, 11/23)
Los Angeles Times:
Stop Touching Your Face! It Could Help You Stay Healthy
Looking for an easy way to reduce your risk of catching the flu or other viral illnesses? Try not touching your face. That’s a step doctors are urging people to take as California faces a “tripledemic” threat — with flu, the coronavirus and respiratory syncytial virus, or RSV, circulating at elevated levels statewide all at once. (Lin II and Money, 11/24)
Los Angeles Times:
Flu Shots Encouraged In Communities Of Color
Since October, California has had 17 flu deaths, according to the state Department of Public Health. For weeks, public health officials have been bracing for a sickly winter that includes the alarming early start of flu season, rising COVID-19 cases and a surge of cases of respiratory syncytial virus, known as RSV. (Evans, 11/26)
Axios:
Anthony Fauci: RSV Cases At "Critical" Point, Hopeful Rates Decline Soon
Spiking cases of respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) among children are currently at a critical juncture in the U.S. but will hopefully begin declining from their peak soon, outgoing NIAID director Anthony Fauci told CBS' "Face the Nation" Sunday. (Saric, 11/27)
Axios:
COVID, Flu And RSV In Kids: Symptoms To Watch And What Parents Need To Know
There's nothing novel about a child coming home from school in November with a runny and stuffy nose or a cough. But for parents, the stakes feel especially high right now: Is it just a cold? The flu? Or are these tell-tale signs of RSV or COVID? (Doherty, 11/25)
Los Angeles Times:
Can California Avoid A 3rd Devastating COVID-19 Winter Wave? Cautious Signs Of Hope
For the last two years, Thanksgiving served as a sobering reminder of the COVID-19 pandemic’s staying power. (Lin II and Money, 11/27)
Bay Area News Group:
Just 1 In 20 People In The U.S. Have Dodged COVID Infection So Far, Study Says
An estimated 94% of people in the U.S. have been infected with the COVID-19 virus at least once, according to according to a new paper from researchers at Harvard’s School of Public Health. The big reason for the surprising surge? The omicron variant’s record-shattering case rates early this year and middling booster rates that fell short of what experts had hoped to see. (Blair Rowan, 11/26)
San Francisco Chronicle:
These COVID Symptoms Are Now The Most Common As Variants Evolve
A mild runny nose, headache or sore throat could now precede a positive test result with one of the many offshoots of omicron. Other indicators commonly reported during earlier phases of the pandemic, such as loss of taste and smell, have dropped down the list. (Vaziri, 11/26)
The New York Times:
Happy Birthday, Omicron
On Nov. 26, 2021, the World Health Organization announced that a concerning new variant of the coronavirus, known as Omicron, had been discovered in southern Africa. It soon swept to dominance across the world, causing a record-breaking surge in cases. Now, a year later, Omicron still has biologists scrambling to keep up with its surprising evolutionary turns. The variant is rapidly gaining mutations. But rather than a single lineage, it has exploded into hundreds, each with resistance to our immune defenses and its own alphanumeric name, like XBB, BQ.1.1 and CH.1. (Zimmer, 11/26)
CBS News:
XBB Variant's Arrival Won't Cause A New Deadly COVID Surge, Officials Hope
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention revealed Friday it is now tracking a new COVID-19 variant of concern around the U.S. known as XBB, which has grown to make up an estimated 3.1% of new infections nationwide. (Tin, 11/25)
ABC News:
Latest COVID Vaccine Will Help People 'Move On' From The Pandemic, White House's Jha Says
With the Biden administration urging people to get both a COVID-19 booster and a flu shot as soon as possible, the White House's Dr. Ashish Jha said Sunday that updated vaccinations will help people "move on" from the pandemic. "It's been, obviously, a long two and a half years for Americans, and we understand that people want to move on," Jha, the White House COVID-19 coordinator, told ABC "This Week" co-anchor Martha Raddatz of the virus that has killed more than 1 million people in the U.S. "The good news is people can move on if they keep their immunity up to date." (MacPherson, 11/27
The Washington Post:
Covid Is No Longer Mainly A Pandemic Of The Unvaccinated. Here’s Why.
For the first time, a majority of Americans dying from the coronavirus received at least the primary series of the vaccine. Fifty-eight percent of coronavirus deaths in August were people who were vaccinated or boosted, according to an analysis conducted for The Health 202 by Cynthia Cox, vice president at the Kaiser Family Foundation. (Beard, 11/23)
CIDRAP:
Updated COVID Boosters Add To Benefit Of Single-Strain Doses
A US study of the vaccine effectiveness (VE) of the new bivalent mRNA COVID-19 boosters estimates that they confer 28% to 56% more protection against symptomatic infections than two to four doses of the original mRNA vaccines. (Van Beusekom, 11/23)
CIDRAP:
Study Shows Reinfection Protection For COVID-19 Vaccines
A new study out of Denmark suggests COVID-19 vaccines offer good protection against reinfection in people who had already acquired the virus, sometimes up to 9 months. The study, which looked at protection offered during the Alpha, Delta, and Omicron waves is published in PLOS Medicine. The study population included more than 700,000 people. (Soucheray, 11/23)
SciTechDaily:
Unexpected Result: COVID-19 Vaccination Improves Effectiveness Of Cancer Treatment
Patients with nasopharyngeal cancer are often treated with drugs that activate their immune system against the tumor. Scientists feared that vaccination against COVID-19 could reduce the success of cancer treatment or cause severe side effects—until now. A recent study now gives the all-clear in this regard. According to the study, the cancer drugs actually worked better after vaccination with the Chinese vaccine SinoVac than in unvaccinated patients. (11/25)
The Boston Globe:
The Secret To Longer, Healthier Life? Ambitious New Trial Focuses On ‘Super Agers’ And Seeks Thousands Of Families
Dr. Thomas Perls has for decades studied so-called super agers, people who live deep into their 90s and beyond, essentially unburdened by the typical diseases of old age. He is convinced that the secret to this remarkable longevity is buried in people’s genes and passed down through generations. (Lazar, 11/27)
CNN:
Improve Memory As You Age By Eating More Flavonols, Study Says
Eating more flavonols, antioxidants found in many vegetables, fruits, tea and wine, may slow your rate of memory loss, a new study finds. The cognitive score of people in the study who ate the most flavonols declined 0.4 units per decade more slowly than those who ate the fewest flavonols. The results held even after adjusting for other factors that can affect memory, such as age, sex and smoking, according to the study recently published in Neurology, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology. (LaMotte, 11/28)
The Washington Post:
Can Exercise Keep Parkinson's Disease At Bay?
Retired running coach Bob Sevene, 79, struggled after his 2019 Parkinson’s disease diagnosis. The longtime runner suddenly began leaning to the right and was unable to straighten up. He started wearing a back brace and using a walker. A year ago, Sevene began twice-weekly exercise classes designed for Parkinson’s patients that include high-intensity bouts of noncontact boxing. He also started daily 25-minute speed sessions on a stationary bike and running brief sprints in the hallway outside his apartment. (Cimons, 11/26)