States

Latest California Healthline Stories

Need a COVID-19 Nurse? That’ll Be $8,000 a Week

A shortage of nurses has turned hospital staffing into a sort of national bidding war, with hospitals willing to pay exorbitant wages to secure the nurses they need. That threatens to shift the supply of nurses toward more affluent areas.

Surging LA

Eight months after California Healthline’s Heidi de Marco photographed LA under lockdown, she returned to the same iconic spots. Vehicle and foot traffic are up — as are coronavirus cases.

Family Mourns Man With Mental Illness Killed by Police and Calls for Change

Like almost a quarter of the 989 people killed by police in the U.S. in the past 12 months, Ricardo Muñoz had a serious mental illness. “Instead of a cop just being there, there should have been other responders,” his sister says.

People Proving to Be Weakest Link for Apps Tracking COVID Exposure

Contact tracers in many states are stretched thin. Colorado is among the latest states to launch an app that aims to help, based on the COVID contact-tracing tool built by Apple and Google. But there’s a chicken-and-egg problem: More people will use them if they prove to work, but the apps become effective only if more people use them.

States’ Face-Covering Mandates Leave Gaps in Protection

States vary in how they define face coverings in their mandates. But a bandanna or neck gaiter isn’t nearly as effective as a surgical or cloth mask. Public health experts say every state needs more standardization to protect against COVID-19.

As Broad Shutdowns Return, Weary Californians Ask ‘Is This the Best We Can Do?’

California’s ping-ponging approach to managing the pandemic — twice reopening large portions of the service sector economy only to shut them again — has residents and business owners on edge. But experts say the push and pull on businesses may be what success looks like in much of the U.S. for months to come, given COVID-19’s pervasive spread.