Hundreds of Hospital Workers Out Sick In San Diego: Unprecedented numbers of sick medical staff are causing gridlock in hospitals across San Diego County. Chris Van Gorder, CEO of Scripps Health, said that 14.5% of the health system’s workforce, about 700 workers, were out Tuesday afternoon. “I’ve never seen a staffing issue this serious before,” Van Gorder said. Read more from the San Diego Union-Tribune.
In related news —
L.A. healthcare system hit with widening staffing shortages as workers get coronavirus
Get A Better Mask Than Your Cloth One, Experts Urge: With case rates skyrocketing to all-time pandemic highs in California, health experts say it’s time to ditch your cloth mask. “Cloth masks are least effective right now during omicron,” S.F. Health Officer Dr. Susan Philip said Tuesday, echoing state and federal officials. Bay Area residents should upgrade to N95 or KN95 masks or layer a cloth mask over a surgical mask for increased protection, Philip said. 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
Bay Area News Group:
California Blows Through Record For New Daily Cases As Omicron Surges
The numbers from the holiday weekend are in — and California has broken every record for new coronavirus cases. Obliterated them, actually. The California Department of Public Health reported more than 230,000 new cases on Tuesday, more than twice as many as has been reported in a single day before. The holiday data dump brings California’s closely-watched 7-day average of new daily cases to a record high of 45,466 — nearly doubling the data available the day before. That figure appears poised to soar past 50,000 average daily cases as new data is confirmed and the highly contagious omicron variant continues its head-spinning spread. (Rowan and DeRuy, 1/4)
Los Angeles Daily News:
COVID-Positive Patients Top 2,000 In LA County Hospitals Amid Omicron Wave
The number of COVID-19-positive patients in Los Angeles County surged well above the 2,000 mark on Tuesday, Jan. 4, amid a surge in infections that has seen daily case numbers skyrocket over the past two weeks. According to state figures, there were 2,240 COVID-positive patients in county hospitals as of Tuesday, a jump from 1,994 on Monday. Of those patients, 303 were being treated in intensive care, an increase from 278 a day earlier. (City News Service, 1/4)
Modesto Bee:
Omicron Update: Stanislaus Sees Spike In Coronavirus Cases
Now that holiday gatherings are over, Stanislaus County is seeing a large increase in coronavirus cases. A state data dashboard reported 1,426 new cases for the county. The California Department of Public Health dashboard said it was updated Tuesday morning with data from Monday. COVID-19 case data reported on Mondays usually represent a total for multiple days compiled over the weekend. (Carlson, 1/4)
AP:
COVID Case Counts May Be Losing Importance Amid Omicron
The explosive increase in U.S. coronavirus case counts is raising alarm, but some experts believe the focus should instead be on COVID-19 hospital admissions. And those aren’t climbing as fast. Dr. Anthony Fauci, for one, said Sunday on ABC that with many infections causing few or no symptoms, “it is much more relevant to focus on the hospitalizations as opposed to the total number of cases.” Other experts argue that case counts still have value. (Johnson, 1/5)
San Francisco Chronicle:
Hundreds Of S.F. Employees Are Under Quarantine As Omicron Strains City Services
San Francisco’s dramatic rise in omicron cases is straining the city’s essential services as hundreds of police officers, firefighters and transit operators began the new year under quarantine due to exposure or in isolation due to a positive COVID test. As of Tuesday, 167 San Francisco police officers, 135 Fire Department personnel and 85 employees in the city’s Municipal Transportation Agency were in quarantine due to a COVID exposure — illustrating just how fast the virus variant has spread through San Francisco in recent weeks. At 829, the city’s current 7-day average of new cases is more than double last winter’s deadly peak, city health officials said. (Cano, 1/4)
Fresno Bee:
Omicron COVID Wave Headed To Fresno. It’s Not All Bad News
A new COVID-19 wave is headed our way, and a lot of people in Fresno and the San Joaquin Valley are going to get sick. That much seems unavoidable. But let’s not engage in a collective freak-out, either. Initial indicators suggest omicron, while more contagious than previous coronavirus strains, is also less severe. Emerging research shows omicron may cause milder symptoms than previous versions of the disease, result in less long-term lung damage and less likely to send patients to hospitals. (Warszawski, 1/5)
City News Service:
UCLA Study Shows Fast Food Workers At High Risk Of Contracting COVID-19
Fast food workers are at higher risk of contracting COVID-19 in addition to facing difficult work conditions during the pandemic, a new UCLA Labor Center study published on Tuesday, Jan. 4, reveals. The report provides an in-depth portrait of COVID-19 safety compliance through the lens of fast food workers’ accounts and testimonies. There are nearly 150,000 restaurant workers in the fast food sector in Los Angeles, according to the study. A vast majority of those workers are women and people of color who have been on the frontline of enforcing COVID-19 protocols. (1/4)
San Francisco Chronicle:
How To Manage Your COVID Quarantine Or Isolation In The Bay Area
With coronavirus infection rates on the rise in the Bay Area, an increasing number of people are isolating or quarantining at home. Although some medical experts are optimistic about the future of the pandemic in the Bay Area, they say the omicron surge is likely to get worse before it gets better. If you’re caught in the thick of it — through infection or exposure — you might need a guide on what to do as you stay home, or recover. Here are the answers to frequently asked questions about isolation and quarantine. (Wu, 1/4)
Orange County Register:
Husband: Kelly Ernby Wasn’t Vaccinated When She Died Of COVID-19 Complications
Deputy District Attorney and GOP activist Kelly Ernby wasn’t vaccinated when she died early this week after contracting COVID-19, according to comments her husband has posted on social media. Despite the news, Republicans leaders who counted 46-year-old Ernby as a friend and who agreed with her opposition of vaccine mandates said Tuesday that their positions haven’t changed. (Staggs, 1/4)
NBC News:
Married California High School Sweethearts Die From Covid Hours Apart
A Latino couple in Southern California died from Covid-19 just hours apart from each other. Alvaro and Sylvia Fernandez, 44 and 42, both died from Covid on Dec. 19. The couple had met in their teens and were married for 25 years. "They were high school sweethearts. They've been together since she was 15," Salvador Fernandez, Alvaro Fernandez's brother, told NBC Los Angeles. "One couldn't live without the other." Family members told NBC Los Angeles the couple were unvaccinated and Alvaro Fernandez had diabetes. They tested positive for the virus days before their deaths, according to the family. (Flores, 1/4)
ABC News:
79th Annual Golden Globes Will Have No Red Carpet, No Audience, No Media Coverage
The upcoming Golden Globes will be a very quiet affair -- a far cry from what used to be known as the rowdiest awards show of the season. The 79th annual Golden Globes will be held Jan. 9 at the Beverly Hilton in Beverly Hills, California -- the same location as usual -- but this year there will be no audience, no red carpet and no media credentials provided for journalists to cover the event. (Iervolino, 1/4)
Los Angeles Times:
Get A Free At-Home COVID Test Kit From L.A. County
With the Omicron coronavirus variant spreading rapidly and COVID-19 infections surging, you might find yourself waiting in a long line to get tested at a clinic or pharmacy, or scouring store shelves and websites for rapid testing kits — which are as hard to find as a newly introduced game console. There is one more option for L.A. County residents (although it won’t help if you need test results right away): The Department of Public Health is offering a free test-by-mail service that can give you results within about four days. The supply of those tests is limited, however. (Garcia and Healey, 1/5)
Sacramento Bee:
Sacramento Libraries Giving Out Free Home Test Kits
The Sacramento Public Library system and Folsom Public Library are now distributing more than 90,000 at-home rapid COVID-19 test kits for free on a first-come first-serve basis, county health officials announced Tuesday. The tests became available Tuesday at all 28 Sacramento Public Library locations and the Folsom Public Library during their normal hours of operation and will be given out at each branch’s main desk or on a curbside pickup basis, the county said in a news release. (McGough, 1/4)
CapRadio:
Sacramento County Public Health To Distribute At-Home COVID-19 Test Kits At Libraries
Sacramento County announced Tuesday morning it would distribute more than 91,000 free at-home COVID-19 test kits through public libraries, but by the afternoon many locations were out. In a note on its website, the Sacramento Public Library system said that it hopes to "have a limited supply available tomorrow, January 5 at all locations." (1/4)
KQED:
Keeping Up With California’s COVID Testing Surge
Long COVID test lines and empty shelves where the rapid at-home tests used to be — all signs of another post-holiday pandemic surge. It’s hard to know just how big of a testing deficit we’re in, but with the Omicron variant spreading and a huge spike in demand after the holidays, just how prepared were we for another testing surge? (Cruz Guevarra, Beale and Montecillo, 1/5)
NBC News:
Walmart, Kroger Raise At-Home Covid Test Prices After White House Agreement Expires
Walmart and Kroger raised the price of Abbott's at-home Covid-19 test kit after an agreement with the White House to sell the tests at a reduced price expired, the companies said Tuesday. The BinaxNOW kit, one of the first at-home tests to be authorized by the federal government, was listed on Walmart's website Tuesday for $19.88, up from $14 last month. Kroger listed the tests for $23.99. (Stelloh, 1/4)
The Wall Street Journal:
Find Covid-19 Home Tests Using Online Product Trackers
You don’t have to run all over town hunting for self-test kits. Just be ready to buy when the bot says they are in stock. During the holidays, getting a PlayStation 5 under the tree required patience, luck and an online bot-powered product tracker. Now, the same shopping tools can help people find at-home Covid-19 tests, which have grown scarce as the Omicron variant rages across the country. (Brown, 1/4)
CBS News:
Social Media Users Rack Up Views By Wasting COVID-19 Tests
Some Americans seem determined to throw cold water on the merits of COVID-19 testing — literally. In the latest sign of ongoing public resistance to what is by now conventional medical wisdom about how to detect the disease, social media users are deliberately misusing scarce at-home COVID-19 tests to produce false positive results by running the devices under tap water. (Cerullo, 1/4)
San Francisco Chronicle:
Will A Second Booster Be Needed Against Omicron? Here’s What We Know So Far
The lightning-fast spread of the omicron variant has not only added urgency to the COVID-19 vaccine booster campaign, but has already prompted discussion of whether a second booster will be needed. On Monday, Israel became the first country to offer a fourth shot — meaning two initial doses and then two boosters — of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine. While critics have said not enough data yet exists to justify the second booster, Israeli officials say that as the omicron wave takes over, the move will protect the first group of recipients: people 60 and older, immunocompromised people and health workers. (Hwang, 1/4)
The New York Times:
Covid Vaccinations Do Not Lead To Pre-Term Births, Study Says
Women who received Covid vaccinations while pregnant were at no greater risk of delivering their babies prematurely or of giving birth to unusually small babies than pregnant women who did not get vaccinated, a new study reports. The study, one of the first to examine the health of babies born to women vaccinated during pregnancy, was a reassuring signal. Low-birth-weight babies and infants born early are more likely to experience developmental delays and other health problems. (Rabin, 1/4)
The Washington Post:
Israeli Study Says Second Booster Causes Fivefold Antibody Jump
A fourth shot of the Pfizer-BioNTech coronavirus vaccine generated a fivefold boost in antibodies a week after the jab, according to preliminary results of a study made public by the Israeli government Tuesday. The findings offer one of the first looks at how effective a second booster shot might be at reducing the health impact of the omicron variant spreading rapidly around the globe. (Hendrix, 1/4)
San Francisco Chronicle:
‘Unprecedented’: More Than 600 S.F. Teachers Or Aides Absent, Forcing District Top Brass To Helm Classrooms
More than 600 classrooms in San Francisco were without their teachers or aides Tuesday and with only 157 substitutes available, every district employee with a teaching credential was ordered to take a class, including the superintendent and other high-ranking officials. Even with every qualified individual deployed to schools, there still weren’t enough adults to cover the absences, district officials said. In most of those cases, other teachers at school sites substituted during their preparation times to fill the gaps. (Tucker, 1/4)
Bay Area News Group:
COVID: Tests Find Hundreds Of Bay Area Students Infected Before Return To Class
As thousands of kids around the Bay Area return to class this week following a winter break marred by the coronavirus, COVID-19 tests that schools provided over the holidays are turning up hundreds of infections among Bay Area students and teachers — and keeping them from bringing the virus back to campus. San Jose Unified School District students lined up for PCR tests and headed back to classrooms Tuesday, while school administrators in Oakland and Berkeley, where kids returned the day before, touted the success of rapid at-home tests that prevented hundreds of students and teachers from coming to school sick on Monday. (Jimenez and Woolfolk, 1/4)
San Francisco Chronicle:
California Schools Wait For COVID Tests From State After ‘Unprecedented’ Storms Delay Delivery
Millions of COVID-19 self-tests headed to California schools have been delayed by winter weather, forcing districts to start the new semester without enough to distribute to all their families. Gov. Gavin Newsom vowed to provide the rapid tests to all of the state’s schoolchildren — about 6 million public school students — with about 2 million going to 3,000 of the state’s 10,000 schools before winter break. Millions of additional tests were provided earlier in December. (Tucker, 1/4)
San Diego Union-Tribune:
Delayed COVID Tests, High Student And Staff Absences Complicate Schools’ Return From Winter Break
San Diego County educators said the return to school from winter break has been hectic this week, with delays in COVID test shipments and higher than normal student and teacher absences as the number of COVID cases keeps rising. The San Diego County Office of Education on Tuesday announced it received its first shipment of at-home rapid COVID tests from the state after shipping problems delayed their delivery past the winter break. (Taketa, 1/4)
CapRadio:
Here's How Sacramento County Schools Are Handling COVID-19 Testing And Precautions As Students Return
Over 200,000 students are heading back to Sacramento County schools this January during a record-breaking COVID-19 surge due to the omicron variant, making COVID-19 testing access crucial. But at-home tests are flying off shelves. Shari Richmond, 48, from Sacramento, said she had visited 10 different stores to no avail. When she tried to order one from Amazon, its expected delivery date was Jan 17 — long after her kids’ schools in the Sacramento City Unified School District began classes. (Salanga, 1/4)
Modesto Bee:
What The Omicron Surge Means For California Schools
When California’s 6 million K-12 school students left for winter break in December, the state’s COVID-19 positivity rate was hovering around 5%. Now, after weeks of travel, holiday gatherings and the continued spread of the highly transmissible omicron variant, California’s K-12 students, teachers and staff return to classrooms this month facing a positivity rate of 20.4% – nearly quadruple the rate it was prior to Christmas break. (Korte, 1/5)
The New York Times:
Biden Administration Doubles Order Of Pfizer's Covid Pill
The United States government doubled its order for Pfizer’s Covid pills on Tuesday, a move that will modestly increase the nation’s very limited supply of the treatment in the short term amid a record-setting surge in coronavirus cases. The new order will eventually provide enough pills for an additional 10 million Americans, bringing the government’s total order of the drug to 20 million treatment courses. But they will not all be available right away. Only 35,000 of the additional courses will be delivered this month, and 50,000 more in February, supplementing 350,000 treatment courses that were already expected over the next two months, according to a senior administration official. (Weiland and Robbins, 1/4)
The Hill:
Biden: Schools Should Stay Open Despite Omicron Wave
President Biden on Tuesday reiterated his belief that schools in the United States should remain physically open despite the wave of coronavirus cases driven largely by the omicron variant. Biden noted during remarks at the White House that his $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief plan included billions of dollars to help support school reopenings during the coronavirus pandemic. (Chalfant, 1/4)
Politico:
White House Embraces A Manage-Not-Contain Omicron Game Plan
When President Joe Biden took office last January amid a winter Covid-19 surge, he vowed an all-out federal assault aimed at vanquishing the virus. A year later, with the country facing unprecedented levels of disease once again, his administration is now hoping to fight it to a draw. (Cancryn and Cadelago, 1/4)
Politico:
CDC Recommits To Isolation And Quarantine Guidelines Without Tests
After days of criticism over new isolation and quarantine guidelines, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Tuesday doubled down on its policy, pointing to data that it says supports its guidance that Americans who contract Covid-19 or have not been boosted and are exposed to the virus can return to normal life after five days if they wear a mask. (Banco, 1/4)
AP:
CDC Posts Rationale For Shorter Isolation, Quarantine
In laying out the scientific basis for the revisions, the agency said more than 100 studies from 17 countries indicate that most transmission happens early in an infection. The CDC acknowledged the data come from research done when delta and other pre-omicron variants were causing the most infections. But the agency also pointed to limited, early data from the U.S. and South Korea that suggests the time between exposure and the appearance of symptoms may be shorter for omicron than for earlier variants. (Stobbe, 1/4)
San Francisco Chronicle:
Is Hunters Point Sick? Meet The Doctor Screening Residents For Toxins In S.F.’s Biggest Development Battle
Ahimsa Porter Sumchai is a physician, but her Bayview clinic looks more like a detective’s office. She uses brightly colored pins to map other potentially hazardous chemicals that she detects in people who live and work near the shipyard: yellow for uranium, green for cesium, white for strontium and so on. A second map charts illnesses reported by some of her volunteers, from breast cancer to lung disease to brain tumors. (Hepler, 1/5)
KQED:
After Their Son Was Swept Into The Ocean, This Fremont Family Turned Their Grief Into Advocacy
Last January, Sharmistha Chakraborty and Tarun Pruthi lost their 12-year-old son, Arunay Pruthi, after he was swept off the beach by a wave. Since that tragic day, the Fremont couple has funneled their grief into a mission to protect others from living the same tragedy. Their advocacy resulted in the installation of permanent lifesaving stations and ring buoys at three local Bay Area beaches last November. (Tsai, 1/4)
CapRadio:
California Study Shows Racial, Gender Disparities In Police Stops And Searches
Despite the number of traffic and pedestrian stops decreasing in 2020, California police were more likely to stop, search and use force against Black residents than white people, a new state police report shows. The fifth annual report released by the state’s Racial and Identity Profiling Advisory Board analyzed millions of traffic stops in five major California cities in 2020 — Los Angeles, San Diego, Sacramento, San Francisco and San Jose. (Mizes-Tan, 1/4)
Bay Area News Group:
Is Elizabeth Holmes' Guilty Verdict A Silicon Valley Reckoning?
Elizabeth Holmes’ unprecedented conviction on four counts of fraud is sounding alarm bells throughout Silicon Valley, signaling a stark warning to other entrepreneurs making overly ambitious promises about their technology. But is it enough to change the region’s famous “move fast and break things” culture? (Kendall, 1/4)
The Wall Street Journal:
In Elizabeth Holmes Trial, U.S. Gave Patients A Small Stage
Prosecutors proved that Theranos Inc. founder Elizabeth Holmes defrauded big-name investors about the capabilities of her blood-testing startup. But their charges involving lower-profile patients fell flat after the government gave them a smaller stage at the trial. At the heart of the case was the argument that Ms. Holmes attracted hundreds of millions of dollars from investors after launching patient-testing services that she falsely promised were ready for prime time, and she disregarded the chaos its inaccurate results could inflict on patient lives. In the end, Theranos voided tens of thousands of test results under pressure from regulators. (Weaver and Somerville, 1/4)