LA County Told To Prioritize Oxygen For Those Who Can Survive: Paramedics in Southern California are being told to conserve oxygen and not to bring patients to the hospital who have little chance of survival, as Los Angeles County grapples with a new wave of covid patients. Gov. Gavin Newsom said Monday that the state has devised a five-part strategy for addressing the demand for oxygen. Read more from NPR, the Los Angeles Times, Fox News and LA Daily News.
Newsom Vows To Speed Up Vaccine Rollout: Only about 35% of the COVID-19 vaccine doses that have arrived in California have been administered so far, a rate Gov. Gavin Newsom acknowledged Monday was “not good enough.” He pledged new funding to ramp up the rollout. Read more from the Los Angeles Times, San Francisco Chronicle and 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
Santa Rosa Press Democrat:
Ukiah Valley Med Center Discovers Thawing Vaccine Vials
A refrigerator holding vials of coronavirus vaccine failed at Ukiah Valley Medical Center on Monday, prompting a frantic effort to inoculate hundreds of people in less than three hours before the medicine expired. By the time staff discovered the problem, 830 doses of the Moderna vaccine had been thawing for more than nine hours, Ukiah Valley Medical Center chief medical officer Dr. Bessant Parker said. The medical center had little choice but to distribute the vaccine freely and rapidly, including members of the general public who heard about the emergency and lined up outside the medical center in hopes of getting a shot. (Barber, 1/4)
Los Angeles Times:
Hospital Lost Freezer, Gave Out 600 Vaccine Shots In 2 Hours
About the time Gov. Newsom took to Facebook on Monday to lament the pace of vaccine distribution statewide, one Northern California hospital was injecting local residents at a furious pace — providing an unintentional roadmap for how a mass inoculation program could work. At 11:35 on Monday morning, senior staff at Adventist Health Ukiah Valley Medical Center in Mendocino County were holding their first 2021 executive meeting when the hospital pharmacist interrupted: The compressor on a freezer storing 830 doses of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine had stopped working hours earlier, and the alarm meant to guard against such failure had failed. The doses were quickly thawing. (Chabria, 1/4)
Sacramento Bee:
Dignity Health Seeks Volunteers At Woodland Clinic For Novavax’s COVID-19 Vaccine Trial
Dignity Health announced Monday that its clinics in Yolo County will be enrolling 200 patients in a late-stage clinical trial of the COVID-19 vaccine candidate developed by Novavax. The Maryland-based biotech company won attention from both researchers and Wall Street for the impressive number of antibodies its candidate produced in its early testing. The company also is working with UC Davis Health, which is enrolling 200-300 people in the phase 3 clinical trial for the candidate formally known as NVX-CoV2373. (Anderson, 1/4)
Fresno Bee:
What’s In The COVID Vaccine? Doctors Assure Allergy-Sufferers It’s OK To Get The Shot
With more than 4.5 million Americans injected with their first dose of one of the two available COVID-19 vaccines, allergic reactions continue to prove rare across the nation. As of Dec. 31, there were at least 10 reported cases of allergic reactions to the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine and two cases to the Moderna shot, according to a team of allergists led by doctors at Massachusetts General Hospital. (Camero, 1/4)
Bay Area News Group:
Coronavirus: More Cases Of New UK Virus Strain Discovered In California
Just as California was beginning to see some hopeful signs of an alarming COVID-19 surge ebbing in some regions, Gov. Gavin Newsom announced Monday that more cases of a highly contagious strain of the virus from the United Kingdom have been discovered in Southern California, a sign that it likely has been stealthily circulating across the state. After the first case in California was discovered in San Diego last week, the total known has grown to six statewide — four in San Diego and two in San Bernardino– and one person infected with the mutated strain has been hospitalized, according to Newsom. (Angst and Webeck, 1/4)
KQED:
Even More Contagious? Here’s What We Know About The Mutating Virus Now In California
As California continues to ride its worst wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, public health officials have more unsettling news: Six cases of a worrisome, potentially more infectious new coronavirus variant have been detected in California. The new strain, first detected in the United Kingdom, also has been seen in Colorado and Florida and 33 other countries. Last week, San Diego County reported it had identified the new variant, called B.1.1.7, in a 30-year-old man with no travel history. Gov. Gavin Newsom announced the discovery in a livestreamed event with Dr. Anthony Fauci, a leading national voice in the pandemic. Over the weekend, San Diego County health officials reported three additional cases. (Ibarra and Feder Ostrov, 1/4)
San Francisco Chronicle:
California Cases Jump To Over 70,000 In A Day As State Braces For Post-Holiday Surge. ‘This Week Is Critical’
Gov. Gavin Newsom said to brace for a “surge on top of a surge” of post-holiday coronavirus cases, and on Monday that grim prediction appeared to take shape: California reported more than 70,000 cases, the most in any one day since the pandemic began. The sober tally arrived after a brief lull in the wave that has swept over the state for the past two months. Average daily cases had tapered off for a week or two, but public health officials warned that the respite likely was temporary, and they anticipated a fresh swell of cases from Christmas and New Year’s. (Allday, 1/4)
Sacramento Bee:
California Prisons Offer Employees Saliva Tests For COVID
California prisons are offering COVID-19 saliva tests as an alternative to nasal swabs starting this week, according to corrections department emails. The Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation is allowing the less-invasive saliva tests for the first time since it started requiring periodic testing for all employees in July. Department spokeswoman Elizabeth Gransee said in an email that the tests are available now from MiraDX, the department’s contractor for the tests, and will be rolled out to institutions across the state in the coming weeks. (Venteicher, 1/5)
San Francisco Chronicle:
Indoor Ventilation Is A Key To Curb Coronavirus Spread. Here’s What You Need To Know
Nearly a year into the pandemic, we’ve learned that ventilation in indoor spaces is critical in preventing the spread of COVID-19. Along with mask-wearing, social distancing and hand hygiene, ensuring clean indoor air is an important piece of the pandemic-fighting toolbox — but the one that’s been paid the least amount of attention, experts say. Since the pandemic’s early months, most public health agencies and experts have stated that the coronavirus spreads primarily through respiratory droplets. These particles larger than 5 microns in diameter travel “ballistically” and are pulled to the ground by gravity within a range of around 3 to 5 feet. (Vainshtein, 1/5)
LA Daily News:
Several LA County Hospitals Declare ‘Internal Disasters’ As Pandemic Deepens
With Los Angeles County health officials projecting that January would become the worst month yet of the worsening pandemic, several local hospitals declared “internal disasters” over the weekend. That status can be triggered by extreme conditions that could put patients at risk, such as severe staffing shortages or an overflow of patients during a natural disaster — and can mean hospital doors are closed to all ambulances. So far, however, no local hospital has needed to declare that it was operating under crisis care guidelines, a more severe declaration that can lead to rationing. (Rosenfeld and Grigoryants, 1/4)
LA Daily News:
It’s Official: Community Hospital In Long Beach Reopens For Patients
Long Beach’s Community Hospital reopened on Monday, Jan. 4, and is “ready to accept patients,” the facility’s spokesman, Brandon Dowling, said in a phone interview — though the facility went much, if not all, of its first day without anyone to care for. Officials are managing the reopening process slowly, and Dowling said he expected the hospital’s first patient to arrive either Monday evening or Tuesday morning. The facility opened with 11 intensive care beds and space for 40 other patients as hospitals across the region scrambled to manage the ongoing surge of coronavirus patients. (Munguia and Lee, 1/4)
Los Angeles Times:
Community Hospital Long Beach Reopens Amid COVID-19 Surge
A historic Long Beach hospital reopened Monday to receive patients in an effort to relieve crowding at area hospitals hard hit by the coronavirus. Though Community Hospital Long Beach will not accept COVID-19 patients or other walk-ins, it will provide 11 intensive care unit beds for patients transferring from nursing homes and other local hospitals. The facility has space for 40 additional patients. Southern California has been gripped by a recent surge in coronavirus cases. ICUs are at capacity, and some ambulances have had to wait up to eight hours to offload patients. As of Sunday, the most recent day for which complete data are available, there were 7,898 coronavirus-positive patients hospitalized countywide, with 1,627 of them in intensive care. (Logan, 1/4)
San Diego Union-Tribune:
Palomar's COVID-19 Medical Station Is Up And Running
The federal medical station that is designed to help decompress overwhelmed hospitals across the region is up and running at Palomar Medical Center Escondido, according to a statement Monday from the California Governor’s Office of Emergency Services. Activated on Dec. 23, the installation, which occupies two empty floors of the larger structure, has a 200-bed capacity. (Sisson, 1/4)
San Diego Union-Tribune:
Far From Home: Traveling Nurse Fills The Gaps At Hard-Hit Nursing Home
Traveling nurse Freddie Miller hasn’t been home for more than a month. He spent Thanksgiving working a contract at a Santa Clara County facility. And he provided care to nursing home residents at Escondido Post Acute Rehab on Christmas Day, New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day before his two-week contract ended and his employer — Aya Healthcare, which is a traveling nurse staffing agency — sent him to yet another facility on a new contract. (Mapp, 1/2)
The Bakersfield Californian:
Local Dignity Health Hospitals Join A New Division And Get A New President
Julie Sprenger, previously the president of Dignity Health Southern California, has been named to a new role in the company: President of CommonSpirit Health’s newly expanded Southern California Division. Sprenger oversaw Dignity Health Hospitals in Los Angeles County, San Bernardino County and Clark County, Nevada. Now she will also be overseeing hospitals on the Central Coast and Central California — a total of 21 facilities, which include Memorial Hospital, Mercy Southwest and Mercy Downtown, according to Dignity Health spokesperson Christina Zicklin. (1/4)
The Bakersfield Californian:
Adventist Health Offers Free Childhood Immunizations Throughout January
Adventist Health Bakersfield will be offering free childhood immunizations against vaccine-preventable diseases. (1/4)
Los Angeles Times:
L.A. County's Homeless Coordinator To Step Down
The head of Los Angeles County’s Homeless Initiative, which has coordinated the response to the homelessness crisis and managed the disbursement of hundreds of millions of dollars in taxpayer funds, is stepping down. Phil Ansell is not a household name, but he has played an outsized role in the design and implementation of the Measure H sales tax, which was passed by voters in 2017 and has funded a multitude of services to help homeless people leave the streets. This new source of revenue has allowed for the homeless services system in Los Angeles to expand dramatically, even as the number of people living on the streets and in shelters continues to increase. The money has been used for such things as hiring more outreach workers and funding services at permanent supportive housing units, and starting programs that help clear the criminal records of homeless people. (Oreskes and Smith, 1/4)
San Francisco Chronicle:
S.F. Wants To Cancel Homeless Count Amid COVID-19 Concerns
San Francisco’s Public Health Department wants to cancel this year’s crucial, one-night count of people living on the streets, amid concerns that it cannot be done safely amid the pandemic. The “Point in Time Count” is mandated by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, and takes place every two years in nearly every major community in the country. San Francisco’s count is a massive operation, which requires hundreds of volunteers to fan out across the city one night to count every homeless person they see on the streets, in parks and in cars. (Thadani, 1/4)