Los Angeles Times: Newsom Refuses To Divulge Secret Deal For Coronavirus Masks
Attorneys for Gov. Gavin Newsom’s administration refused Monday to reveal the contents of a $990-million contract for purchasing protective masks from a Chinese electric car manufacturer, even though millions of the masks have already arrived in California to combat the COVID-19 pandemic. In a letter responding to a public records request from the Los Angeles Times, the Governor’s Office of Emergency Services insisted the contract with BYD does not have to be made public, despite similar requests made by members of the Legislature since Newsom announced the deal last month. (Myers, 5/4)

San Jose Mercury News: Inside A California Nursing Home’s Struggle To Contain Its Coronavirus Outbreak
For several days, Lisa Cook had no communication with her 62-year-old husband, who was confined to Chatsworth’s Stoney Point nursing home after a stroke left him paralyzed. When she finally persuaded a nurse to let her FaceTime with him, Cook barely recognized her husband... She feared her husband was not getting proper care and medication. (Grigoryants, 5/5)

Sacramento Bee: Coronavirus Help For Nursing Homes Is Too Slow, Lawmaker Says 
The federal office that sets standards for most nursing homes is moving much too slowly to address rising coronavirus deaths in facilities that treat the elderly, a California congressman argues in a new letter to the Health and Human Services Agency. The oversight agency, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, on April 30 announced it was setting up a commission to “inform efforts to safeguard the health and quality of life of vulnerable Americans as CMS continues to battle COVID-19 as well as preparing for future threats to resident safety and public health. ”There is no set date for the commission to meet, but the agency said in a press release the commission is “expected to meet in late May.” Rep. Josh Harder, D-Turlock, said in a letter to agency Administrator Seema Verma that’s “far too slow.” (Irby, 5/5)

San Francisco Chronicle: Nearly 100 Coronavirus Cases At Bay Area Nursing Home Outbreak In Vallejo 
At least 99 people, including 76 residents and 23 staff members, have tested positive for coronavirus at Windsor Vallejo Nursing and Rehabilitation Center, a skilled senior care facility in Vallejo. Jayleen Richards, the Solano County public health administrator who confirmed the number of infections at the facility, as of Monday morning, did not have an update on the conditions of the infected patients. (Vaziri, 5/4)

Fresno Bee: COVID-19 Cases, Deaths In Tulare, Fresno County Nursing Homes 
Three more patients at skilled nursing facilities in Tulare County have died from coronavirus, health officials said Monday. Fresno County on Monday also announced that its ninth COVID-19 death was a nursing home resident. In addition, another Tulare County nursing home is reporting COVID-19 cases for the first time: Sierra Valley Rehab Center in Porterville. It has 12 residents and one staff member with coronavirus, health officials said. (George, 5/4)

San Jose Mercury News: 6th Inmate With Coronavirus Dies At California Prison
A 58-year-old man diagnosed with COVID-19  and held at a federal prison in San Pedro, who had previously been convicted of illegally reentering the United States, died in a hospital on Monday, May 4. Eduardo Robles-Holguin is at least the sixth inmate held at the Federal Correctional Institution, Terminal Island, to die due to complications associated with the novel coronavirus. (Licas, 5/5)

Bay Area News Group: Top Doc Calls California Plan To Put COVID-19 Patients In Assisted Living Facilities 'Medically Unsound'
Even as senior care centers have been particularly hard hit by the coronavirus — with patient and staff deaths accounting for nearly 40 percent of all COVID-19 deaths across California — the state is calling on assisted living facilities to house infected patients in exchange for money. A letter from the state Department of Social Services sent to licensees of senior and adult care residential facilities on Friday urged them to temporarily take in patients who have tested positive for the virus — for up to $1,000 a day — to make room in hospitals for people who become critically ill and require acute care. (Sciacca and Peele, 5/4)

San Francisco Chronicle: ‘Very Encouraging’: Bay Area Coronavirus Hospitalizations Decline, Reflecting Commitment To Shelter In Place 
The number of people in Bay Area hospitals with confirmed cases of COVID-19 has declined steadily for nearly a month, a trend public health experts said reflects the region’s efforts to combat spread of the coronavirus. State data reviewed by The Chronicle show there were 332 confirmed COVID-19 patients in hospitals in the nine Bay Area counties on Sunday, the area’s lowest one-day total in more than a month since the state began reporting that data April 1. (Kawahara, 5/4)

San Francisco Chronicle: Coronavirus Testing In SF’s Mission District Reveals Spike Among Workers 
Low-wage workers who are unable to work from home during shelter in place are at higher risk of contracting the coronavirus, according to preliminary results released Monday by UCSF, which conducted thousands of diagnostic tests in San Francisco’s Mission District neighborhood in April. The findings hint at a grim reality: As local economies begin to reopen and more people go back to work, they may be at higher risk of falling ill. The evidence indicates that low-wage workers who haven’t had the option of working from home have been at particular risk. (Ho, 5/4)

Bay Area News Group: Coronavirus: Stanford Health Care Hospitals Resume Almost All Procedures After Widespread Employee Testing
Previously delayed surgeries, diagnostic tests and other procedures at Stanford Health Care hospitals resumed on Monday after the system tested over 11,000 of its 14,000 employees. The university health care system announced on Tuesday that 99.7 percent of employees without symptoms tested negative following a decision to provide COVID-19 exams for all patient-facing workers. (Toledo, 5/4)

San Francisco Chronicle: Stanford Health Resumes Non-Emergency Care After Widespread Staff Testing Finds Few Coronavirus Cases 
Stanford Health Care is resuming elective surgeries and other non-emergency procedures this week — and is encouraging patients to seek out that care — after finding that less than 1% of its health care staff tested positive for the coronavirus and very few had markers of previous infection. More than 11,000 workers, out of about 14,000 total, have undergone testing for active infection and antibodies, Stanford Health officials said. (Allday, 5/4)

San Francisco Chronicle: SF Makes Coronavirus Testing Available To Those Who Leave Home To Work, Regardless Of Symptoms 
San Francisco is now making making free COVID-19 tests available to any worker who must leave their home and interact with the public — diminishing or eliminating their ability to practice social distancing — while on the job, regardless of whether they present symptoms of a coronavirus infection. The new testing policy, announced by Mayor London Breed and Public Health Director Dr. Grant Colfax on Monday, represents the city’s latest expansion of testing efforts. Free tests had previously been available only to “essential” employees working in San Francisco during the pandemic, like health care professionals, grocery clerks and restaurant cooks, who exhibited symptoms of a coronavirus infection. (Fracassa, 5/4)

Los Angeles Times: How Coronavirus Outbreak Upended The Entire U.S. Food System
Near downtown Los Angeles, a meat processing plant ramped up production even as it worked to keep frontline employees separated from one another. In Salinas, Calif., a lettuce grower hustled to redirect supply after being forced to plow under unused crops. In the Bay Area, a food distributor that previously served restaurants started selling produce boxes directly to consumers. Near the Mexico border, a food bank expanded distribution to meet an explosion of need. And in Hollywood, a nonprofit that has served sit-down meals to homeless people for 33 years shifted to takeout. (Rector, 5/5)

San Francisco Chronicle: Coronavirus: Trader Joe’s Store Workers Test Positive In San Francisco 
At least two Trader Joe’s employees at different San Francisco locations have tested positive for the coronavirus, The Chronicle has learned. An employee at the grocery store’s Nob Hill location tested positive for the coronavirus, according to an email sent to workers April 28 — the day management received notification of the diagnosis. The employee last worked at the store on April 10. (Narayan, 5/4)

San Francisco Chronicle: ‘Truly Complicated’: Reopening California Schools Will Be A Logistical Nightmare 
The wall in Clark Burke’s school district office has turned into a war room, with flow charts and diagrams covered with directional arrows and white boards with potential plans of attack. The career Army officer, now schools superintendent in the San Joaquin County town of Manteca, is mapping out how to reopen schools for the upcoming academic year after a five-month coronavirus closure. (Tucker, 5/4)

CalMatters: Overlooked Pacific Islanders Hit Hard By Coronavirus 
Pacific Islander communities in California have long faced economic and health disparities that make them uniquely vulnerable to the novel coronavirus. Often overlooked by public health officials, community leaders are mounting their own response. (Botts, 5/5)

San Francisco Chronicle: ‘Learning On The Run’: Bay Area Doctors Find Ways To Speed Coronavirus Recovery
In late March, Dr. Josiah Child, an emergency room physician at Daly City’s Seton Medical Center, was at his doctor’s office seeking care for COVID-19 when he got some concerning news: A blood test showed he had three times the normal level of D-dimer, a protein fragment released by the body when it tries to dissolve blood clots. At the time, Child and his doctor chalked it up to his body’s overall inflammatory response to the virus. But the next day, Child felt severe rib and chest pain each time he took a breath. He felt nauseous, and the pain cascaded up and down his back as his wife rushed him to the hospital. It turned out a blood clot had traveled from his leg to his lungs. (Ho, 5/5)

Los Angeles Times: Study Reports A Mutant, More Contagious Form Of Coronavirus
Scientists have identified a new strain of the coronavirus that has become dominant worldwide and appears to be more contagious than the versions that spread in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to a new study led by scientists at Los Alamos National Laboratory. The new strain appeared in February in Europe, migrated quickly to the East Coast of the United States and has been the dominant strain across the world since mid-March, the scientists wrote. (Vartabedian, 5/5)

Los Angeles Times: As States Reopen, Some People Reject Coronavirus Masks 
In the bustling college town of Stillwater, Okla., residents are allowed to visit restaurants and retailers — freedoms that most of the country does not currently enjoy in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic. Yet when the city issued an emergency proclamation Friday that required citizens to wear face coverings, store employees were “threatened with physical violence and showered with verbal abuse,” according to a statement released by the city. In response, Stillwater quickly amended its wording to only “encourage” use of masks. (McCollough, 5/4)

Sacramento Bee: Sacramento Mayor Steinberg Wants Masks Required Amid COVID-19 
Sacramento Mayor Darrell Steinberg called on county health officials Tuesday to require residents to wear masks in public when the county allows more businesses to reopen following the coronavirus shut down.“The mask issue has been voluntary in Sacramento County and I understand that,” Steinberg said Tuesday during a Facebook live video. “But as we transition and as we open back up, it is going to be even more important that when we are out in public that we have that extra layer of protection, not just for ourselves but for each other, and wear masks." (Clift, 5/4)

Fresno Bee: Tulare County CA Confirms 14 New Coronavirus Cases
Tulare County added more than a dozen new cases of the coronavirus to its total count on Monday. The county’s health and human services agency added 14 new cases in its daily online update. Countywide, 757 people have now tested positive for the virus since the outbreak started. The number of positive cases has surpassed the number of people who are in self-quarantine and being monitored by the health department. (Tehee, 5/4)

Fresno Bee: Fresno Health Officials: Reopening Some Businesses Considered 
Fresno County health officials on Monday addressed statewide plans to reopen some businesses, along with announcing the county’s ninth coronavirus death, an 89-year-old man and nursing home resident. In addition, people can now register for a COVID-19 test at a new testing site location opened this week at Fresno City College by going to lhi.care/covidtesting. (George, 5/4)

Sacramento Bee: When Will Sacramento CA Restaurants, Bars And Stores Reopen? 
With the coronavirus spread slowing locally, Sacramento County’s health director says he is working on a plan to reopen some businesses faster than elsewhere in the state, taking advantage of new hope offered by Gov. Gavin Newsom Monday for a region-by-region approach to reopening. Dr. Peter Beilenson said his team is drawing up a menu of businesses – including restaurants – that it believes it can announce prospective reopening dates for as early as next week. (Bizjak, 5/5)