Latest From California Healthline:
California Healthline Original Stories
Patients Fend for Themselves to Access Highly Touted Covid Antibody Treatments
Months after President Donald Trump credited monoclonal antibody therapy for his quick recovery from covid-19, only a trickle of the product has found its way into regular people. While hundreds of thousands of vials sit unused, sick patients who might benefit from early treatment have been left on their own to vie for access. (JoNel Aleccia, )
On Trump's Last Full Day, Nation Records 400,000 Covid Deaths
On the day before the inauguration of a new president, the country marks a once unthinkable milestone of 400,000 deaths. The winter surge of the pandemic claimed 100,000 Americans in just five weeks. (Will Stone, )
San Francisco Almost Out Of Covid Vaccines: San Francisco’s public health department will run out of covid-19 vaccine Thursday because the city’s allocation dropped substantially from a week ago and doses that had to be discarded were not replaced, city officials said Tuesday. Read more from the Los Angeles Times and SF Gate.
Rapid Covid Tests Available At LAX: Los Angeles International Airport is now offering covid test results in as little as 30 minutes with the addition of rapid antigen tests at the airport’s on-site laboratory, officials said Tuesday. The nasal-swab antigen tests are available only at the Terminal 6 lab location and cost $80. PCR tests remain $125 each. Read more from the LA Daily News.
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
CalMatters:
Despite Gov. Gavin Newsom’s Big Promises, California Still Lags Behind In Vaccinations
The good news is that California finally ramped up its lagging COVID-19 vaccination program last week. The bad news, at least for Gov. Gavin Newsom, is that despite the surge, the state fell well short of the 1 million additional inoculations that he had promised during the 10-day period that ended on Friday. Through Saturday, the state Department of Public Health reported, 1.3 million Californians had received shots of vaccine since the program began in December, roughly 200,000 below the goal Newsom had set. (Walters, 1/20)
Southern California News Group:
Southern California Health Providers Scramble To Isolate Moderna Vaccine Tied To Bad Reactions
Hundreds of health providers all over the state, including some in Southern California, have received doses from a specific lot of Moderna vaccine tied to about six serious reactions in San Diego last week. On the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday, hospitals were scanning their records to determine if they had received doses from the batch tied to those reactions, and, if so, how many doses were already in people’s arms and how many had to be pulled from inventory until more is understood about what happened. Those who’ve already received Moderna shots can check their vaccination cards to see which lot their dose came from. The batch under investigation is Moderna Lot 041L20A, according to California State Epidemiologist Dr. Erica S. Pan. If anyone has problems or questions, they should contact their health care provider, the California Department of Public Health said. (Sforza, 1/19)
LA Daily News:
COVID Vaccine Sign-Ups Began Tuesday For LA County Residents Age 65 And Older
Despite a frustratingly sluggish supply line, the rollout of coronavirus vaccines for people 65 and older in Los Angeles County will begin Wednesday, Jan. 20. Seniors will be able to begin making reservations to get their first shots starting as soon as this afternoon, officials said Tuesday, Jan. 19. Reservations can be made by visiting VaccinateLACounty.com or by calling the new COVID information hotline at (833) 540-0473, from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m., seven days a week. (Carter, 1/19)
Los Angeles Times:
COVID-19 Vaccine Shortages Hit Older L.A. Residents Hard
Severe limits in the supply of COVID-19 vaccine will restrict how many older residents of Los Angeles County get vaccinated in the coming days and weeks, public health officials said Tuesday. Officials said residents ages 65 or older could begin scheduling appointments on Tuesday to receive the COVID-19 vaccine, but slots were limited to about 50,000 this week, largely due to a shortage of doses. The decision to open the vaccine eligibility list to seniors was made to accelerate access to a population that has been disproportionately affected by the virus. But it will take time to vaccinate all 1.3 million residents in the age group, officials said. (Cosgrove and Shalby, 1/19)
Modesto Bee:
Modesto COVID-19 Vaccinations Could Restart By End Of Week
Stanislaus County hopes to reopen its COVID-19 vaccination clinic at Modesto Centre Plaza as well as open a second clinic at Stanislaus State University in Turlock by as soon as the end of this week, according to a county spokeswoman. “We are now thinking by the end of this week, and if not then, then by next week,” said Kamlesh Kaur, spokeswoman for the county Health Services Agency, in a Tuesday phone interview. Kaur said the county wants to ensure it is receiving enough vaccines from the state. Officials hope to provide as many as 2,000 daily vaccinations at each clinic. This phase of the vaccinations is for health-care workers and county residents 65 and older. The vaccinations are free to seniors, but they must bring proof that they live in the county. (Valine, 1/19)
Orange County Register:
Orange County Scrambles To Vaccinate As U.S. Hits 400,000 Coronavirus Deaths
About 109,000 vaccines – 89,000 first doses and 20,000 second doses – had been administered in Orange County by Sunday, a month after the first shots were given by hospitals immunizing their frontline workers, according to OC Health Care Agency data released Tuesday. Of 3.2 million vaccines shipped to the state, at least 1.5 million doses had been administered by Tuesday, said California Health and Human Services Secretary Dr. Mark Ghaly during a news conference. A proportion of the doses on-hand are reserved as second doses to be given a few weeks after a patient’s first dose, he said. (Wheeler, 1/19)
Fresno Bee:
COVID-19: Fresno County Gets Fewer Vaccine Doses From State
Only a week into its schedule of clinics to offer COVID-19 vaccinations to people ages 75 and older, a shortfall in the number of doses being provided to Fresno County is forcing officials to scale how many people can get the shots each day. (Sheehan, 1/19)
The Bakersfield Californian:
Health Department Debuts COVID-19 Vaccination Site At The Fairgrounds — But Awaits More Doses
The Kern County Public Health Services Department has set the stage for its first COVID-19 mass vaccination clinic, but the rate of vaccines will start at a trickle. That’s partially due to the fact that the county just launched its site at the Kern County Fairgrounds, but also because the county isn’t being allotted much of the vaccine just yet. (Gallegos, 1/19)
Modesto Bee:
Vaccine Clinics Could Suffer If County Forced To Take Over Nursing Home Efforts
Stanislaus County officials said a federal government program is not getting coronavirus vaccine to residents and employees in long-term care facilities quickly enough. The county is urging the federal government and its program partners, Omnicare CVS and Walgreens, to speed up the vaccinations for this vulnerable population. If that is not done, it could mean a shift in county energy and resources to long-term care facilities, taking resources away from community vaccine clinics, two top county officials said. (Carlson, 1/20)
San Diego Union-Tribune:
San Diegans Struggle To Know If They Can Get A COVID-19 Vaccine
While the county’s latest COVID-19 numbers fuel further hope that a post-holiday surge is leveling off, San Diegans are still struggling to learn when and where they can get a coronavirus vaccine. The answer, filled with caveats and contradictions, seems to change from day to day — sometimes, within the course of a day. (Wosen, 1/19)
San Francisco Chronicle:
Can Vaccines Keep Up With Coronavirus Mutations? Bay Area Variant Will Be A Test
The discovery of several new variants of the coronavirus that may spread more easily, including a mutation that took hold in the Bay Area in December, makes it even more urgent to fix the nation’s troubled vaccination rollout — before the evolving virus causes another surge or learns to evade vaccines. Throughout the yearlong pandemic, public health experts have advised that beating the virus was a marathon, that it would take many months of commitment to social distancing measures to win. That’s still true. But in many ways the race has intensified in recent weeks: between a virus that is spinning out new mutations that could make it harder to contain and an immunization campaign marked by repeated fumbles. (Allday, 1/19)
Los Angeles Times:
L.A. County Opens 5 COVID Vaccine Sites. Target: 20,000 Daily
Los Angeles County opened five large-scale coronavirus vaccination sites Tuesday morning, with plans to inoculate 20,000 people daily. The sites are at the Forum in Inglewood, Six Flags Magic Mountain in Valencia, Cal State Northridge, the Fairplex in Pomona and the L.A. County Office of Education’s Downey Education Center. Another site run by the city of Los Angeles is at Dodger Stadium. Only front-line healthcare workers, including those working at nursing homes, were eligible to receive the vaccine when the sites opened Tuesday morning, said Kenichi Haskett, a spokesman for L.A. County. That group is part of what’s known as Phase 1A under the state’s vaccination plan. (Seidman, 1/19)
Los Angeles Times:
More Contagious COVID-19 Variants Bring New Uncertainties To California
After a slow start, California is beginning to ramp up distribution of the coronavirus vaccine, which officials see as the best hope of bending the curve and bringing back the battered economy. Limited supply of the vaccine will likely mean many will still have to wait weeks if not months to get their shots, but there is growing hope the incoming Biden administration can accelerate vaccination efforts. But despite these positive developments, officials are expressing growing concerns about new and potentially more contagious variants of the coronavirus that have been detected in California and beyond. One of the new variants is believed to be 50% more transmissible than the conventional variety of the coronavirus, which if it became widespread, would lead to more infections, hospitalizations and deaths. (Lin II and Money, 1/20)
San Francisco Chronicle:
COVID Death Rate Steadily Declining In California, Even Through Recent Surge
Amid a barrage of bad coronavirus pandemic news this week in California, some glimmers of hope have also appeared — among them that the death rate from COVID-19 has been steadily declining in the state. Data shows that the trend observed since May 2020 continued from October through December, even during the worst of the recent surge, as hospitals were overwhelmed and available ICU capacity dwindled to near-zero in many locations. The decline in case fatality ratios occurred across all age groups and was especially notable among those over age 50. (Hwang, 1/19)
Bay Area News Group:
Berkeley Moves Forward With Pandemic Hazard Pay For Grocery Store Workers
The city of Berkeley will move forward with an emergency ordinance that would give grocery store workers in Berkeley an extra $5 per hour during the pandemic. Authored by newly-elected council member Terry Taplin, the emergency ordinance would guarantee grocery store workers hazard pay, effective from when its adopted until the city returns to the yellow tier or 120 days later. (Ruggiero, 1/19)
Bay Area News Group:
As COVID Cases Have Surged, Oakland Extends Law To Provide Paid Sick Leave
As cases of COVID-19 have continued to surge almost a year into the pandemic, Oakland is extending an ordinance it enacted last spring that requires businesses to provide 80 hours of paid sick leave to workers affected by coronavirus. (Sciacca, 1/20)
The Bakersfield Californian:
As Doctors Get Scarce, Kern Medical Receives Funding To Train The Next Generation
With a looming doctor shortage, Kern Medical has received around $1.2 million to improve three of its postgraduate training programs. The hospital hopes to use the funds to not only attract future doctors from around the country to Bakersfield, but also to better develop a talent pipeline to turn local high school students into medical professionals who stay in town after they graduate. (Morgen, 1/19)
San Diego Union-Tribune:
New San Diego Initiative Aims To Reduce Pollution In Low-Income Areas, Boost Access To Exercise, Healthy Food
San Diego is launching a new environmental justice initiative to reduce pollution in low-income neighborhoods and boost access to healthy food, opportunities for exercise and sanitary housing there. City officials will gather community input and examine surveys like the California Healthy Places Index to determine which neighborhoods suffer most from industrial pollution, poor air quality and lack of stores with fresh produce. (Garrick, 1/19)
Bay Area News Group:
San Francisco Proposal Would Create Non-Police Response To Homelessness
In a proposal that would shake up the city’s day-to-day response to its homelessness crisis, San Francisco community leaders on Tuesday unveiled a plan to take police out of the equation. Under the new framework, police would no longer respond to complaints about encampments or aggressive panhandling, reports of an unhoused person trespassing and other non-emergency calls involving homeless San Franciscans. Instead, those calls and more would be rerouted to civilian members of a new Compassionate Alternate Response Team, known as CART. The proposal is another step in San Francisco’s ongoing police reform effort, and comes as cities throughout the Bay Area and around the country are grappling with demands to “defund” their police departments and reinvest in alternative programs. (Kendall, 1/19)
Sacramento Bee:
Sacramento City Council Adopts Ordinance For Homeless Camps
The city of Sacramento will allow small sanctioned homeless encampments to open in vacant lots across the city, where up to 80 people can sleep in tents, vehicles or tiny homes. The Sacramento City Council on Tuesday voted to create a temporary emergency ordinance to allow so-called “Safe Grounds” — a lower-cost shelter model homeless activists have been demanding for years. Sacramento Mayor Darrell Steinberg said he wants the city to open 63 tiny homes within 50 days, including 33 within the first 30 days — a slightly slower timeframe than he announced last week. The council is expected to consider that “addendum” to the ordinance at a meeting Jan. 26. If the council approves, city staff will order the tiny homes after that vote, said Steinberg spokeswoman Mary Lynne Vellinga. (Clift, 1/19)
Sacramento Bee:
Sacramento Moves On Eliminating Single-Family Housing Zones
The Sacramento City Council took a step Tuesday toward becoming one of the first cities in the country to eliminate traditional single-family zoning. The change, for which the council unanimously signaled support, would allow houses across the city to contain up to four dwelling units. City officials said the proposal would help the city alleviate its housing crisis, as well as achieve equity goals, by making neighborhoods with high-performing schools, pristine parks and other amenities accessible for families who cannot afford the rising price tags to buy homes there. (Clift, 1/19)