Latest California Healthline Stories
Daily Edition for Friday, May 1, 2020
Beaches Too Much Of A Temptation, Newsom Decides With Closures In Orange County Areas: State officials pushed to close all beaches and state parks in California to try to prevent overcrowding they feared could spread the coronavirus, but Gov. Gavin Newsom decided Thursday only to temporarily close beaches in Orange County, an administration official said. Newsom said at a news conference he was ordering a “hard close” in Orange County after beaches in Newport Beach and Huntington Beach drew tens of thousands of visitors during a heat wave last weekend. He said he was particularly concerned about the beach activity because Orange County has more coronavirus cases and hospitalizations than many other areas. “People that are congregating there that weren’t practicing physical distancing… may go back to their community outside of Orange County, and may not even know that they’ve contracted the disease,” Newsom said. “Now they put other people at risk, put our hospital system at risk.” Read more from Alexei Koseff and Megan Cassidy of the San Francisco Chronicle; Laurel Rosenhall of CalMatters; and Sophia Bollag of the Sacramento Bee.
Daily Edition for Thursday, April 30, 2020
Newsom Hints At Beach Closures For The Upcoming Weekend: Gov. Gavin Newsom was poised to order beaches to close in an effort to slow the spread of the coronavirus, a source said Wednesday. A memo sent to California police chiefs said the governor intends to make the announcement Thursday. A law enforcement source confirmed that authorities were briefed on the plans and that might also include closure of some parks. Until now, cities and counties up and down the state have been left to make the tricky decision of balancing public health risks while also providing equitable access to the outdoors. Many counties, such as Santa Cruz and Monterey have been doing partial closures but have struggled with overcrowding. Read more from Richard Winton, Rosanna Xia and John Myers of the Los Angeles Times, and Matt Kawahara of the San Francisco Chronicle.
Daily Edition for Wednesday, April 29, 2020
California ‘Weeks Not Months’ Away From Making Meaningful Strides Toward Reopening: California businesses seen as presenting less risk of spreading the coronavirus could open in the near future under a plan Gov. Gavin Newsom unveiled Tuesday, the first of what he suggested were several slow steps toward easing the statewide shutdown order. “We believe we are weeks, not months, away from making meaningful modifications” in the current restrictions, Newsom said. But Newsom’s announcement of a four-phase plan did not come with a guaranteed timetable. He said while current public health indicators such as hospitalizations and testing capacity look promising, additional progress needs to be made toward slowing the spread of the virus. Read more from John Myers, Taryn Luna and Phil Willon of the Los Angeles Times.
Daily Edition for Tuesday, April 28, 2020
LA’s Death Count 58% Higher Than The Next Hardest Hit Urban County: Los Angeles County has had 944 people die from COVID-19, with 315 passing away last week alone. Though a peak in deaths will usually lag behind the peak in infections by one to three weeks, it’s hard to tell whether Los Angeles County has bent the curve on the virus’ spread. There were 7,218 confirmed new cases for the seven-day period that ended Sunday, compared with 3,152 the previous week. But inconsistent testing and backlogs at laboratories often make those numbers unreliable. Another key measure of infection, the number of hospitalizations, remained relatively stable last week, neither rising nor falling. The differing situations across the state are causing some local officials to chafe under Gov. Gavin Newsom’s blanket stay-at-home order, while others are pushing to prolong it. Read more from Rong-Gong Lin II, Joe Mozingo and Melanie Mason of the Los Angeles Times.
Daily Edition for Monday, April 27, 2020
Californians Flock To Beach Even As Leaders Desperately Try To Get Them To Stay At Home: While officials say the public’s adherence to health messaging has shown quantifiable results in “flattening the curve” of new COVID-19 cases, they caution that we are nowhere near the end of this emergency and that we cannot become complacent. Some residents are losing patience, however. Already, small groups of protesters complaining of lockdown fatigue have demanded an end to restrictive health measures, while Ventura and Riverside counties have announced plans to ease stay-at-home restrictions. Read more from Joseph Serna of the Los Angeles Times.
Daily Edition for Friday, April 24, 2020
California’s Deadliest Day: Coronavirus Surpasses Cancer, Heart Disease To Become Leading Cause Of Death In LA County: Gov. Gavin Newsom said 115 people died from complications from the virus Wednesday, the state’s deadliest day since the pandemic began. “It’s a reminder we’re not out of the woods yet,” Gov. Gavin Newsom said Thursday. Deaths in Los Angeles County are approaching 800, enough for the novel coronavirus to surpass fatalities from cancer, flu, emphysema and heart disease.
Daily Edition for Thursday, April 23, 2020
Newsom Won’t Set Date To Re-Open Amid Growing Calls To Ease Restrictions: California reported more than 100 new deaths linked to COVID-19 on Wednesday, including 66 in Los Angeles County, which has seen a surge in fatalities in recent weeks. Though hospitals are not being overwhelmed, they continue to see a steady flow of patients. “I wish I could prescribe a specific date to say, well, we can turn up the light switch and go back to normalcy,” Gov. Gavin Newsom said Wednesday. “We have tried to make it crystal clear that there is no light switch. And there is no date in terms of our capacity to provide the kind of clarity that I know so many of you demand and deserve.” Despite the rising death toll, Los Angeles County health officials offered slightly rosier projections Wednesday about the trajectory of the virus while cautioning that the improved outlook was dependent on residents continuing to practice physical distancing. Read more from Phil Willon, Melanie Mason, Marisa Gerber and Luke Money of the Los Angeles Times.
Daily Edition for Wednesday, April 22, 2020
First Coronavirus Deaths Happened Earlier Than Previously Thought, Suggesting COVID-19 Was Circulating In California Since December: A person who died at home in Santa Clara County on Feb. 6 was infected with the coronavirus at the time of death, a stunning discovery that makes that individual the first recorded COVID-19 fatality in the United States, according to autopsy results released by public health officials late Tuesday. That death — three weeks before the first fatality was reported in the U.S., in Washington state on Feb. 28 — adds to increasing evidence that the virus was in the country far earlier than once thought. “This wasn’t recognized because we were having a severe flu season,” said Dr. Jeff Smith, a physician who is the chief executive of Santa Clara County government. “Symptoms are very much like the flu. If you got a mild case of COVID, you didn’t really notice. You didn’t even go to the doctor. The doctor maybe didn’t even do it because they presumed it was the flu.” Read more from Erin Allday and Matt Kawahara of the San Francisco Chronicle; Matt Hamilton, Paige St. John and Rong-Gong Lin II of the Los Angeles Times; and David Debolt and Kerry Crowley of the Bay Area News Group.
Daily Edition for Tuesday, April 21, 2020
Newsom Stands Firm On Restrictions Amid Pressure From Local Leaders, Protesters: Gov. Gavin Newsom on Monday acknowledged that pressure from Californians and local governments is building to modify the statewide stay-at-home order carried out to stem to spread of the coronavirus, but he said restrictions will remain in place until the threat to public health subsides and adequate testing and other safeguards are implemented. A bipartisan group of elected officials from San Luis Obispo County on Monday asked Newsom to grant them the “authority to implement a phased reopening of our local economy,” a request that comes just days after Ventura County officials modified a stay-at-home order to permit some businesses to reopen and some gatherings to take place.
Daily Edition for Monday, April 20, 2020
California Releases COVID-19 Nursing Home Data, But List Is Plagued By Omissions And Undercounts: For the first time, California Department of Public Health officials have divulged the names of nursing homes across the state with COVID-19 outbreaks and the number of cases at each facility. But list, which officials have promised to update regularly, does not show how many people have died at each facility. It is also plagued by apparent omissions and undercounts. For weeks, the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health has been publishing names of group living facilities with COVID-19 cases, without specifying how many people have tested positive at each place. Some of those homes do not appear on the state list. The state list also does not include data from California’s 7,461 residential care facilities.