Eden Health District COVID-19 Bulletin
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“The lack of a scientific basis for a shared reality—and a willingness to accept that reality—continues to be America’s greatest weakness in this pandemic."
Dr. James Hamblin, staff writer at The Atlantic and lecturer at Yale School of Public Health, 9/21/20
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Since the pandemic began, Village Project founder and director Adrian Williams has been rising at the crack of dawn five days a week and heading to the San Francisco-Marin Food Bank. Village Project is a San Francisco-based nonprofit that serves families and children in underserved communities living in public and subsidized housing.
With each visit, Williams picks up nearly 900 pounds of food for the bargain price of 18 cents per pound. She then stuffs every square inch of her small Jeep with groceries. It’s a process she repeats virtually every afternoon. The groceries are then packed by Williams, working with a handful of others, who then turn all the goods into 2,000 bags of deliverable food each month.
Mostly it all goes to San Francisco seniors, a group Williams really began to worry about at the onset of the coronavirus pandemic.
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“After the shutdown I started thinking my seniors aren’t going to be able to eat,” Williams said. “So that’s what we started bagging [the groceries] up. So I think the first week it was about 50 bags then — now — over a hundred bags a day.”
As the pandemic has dragged on, Williams says she has lost count of just how many locations and individuals she is helping. She has a wish list of things she needs to keep this crucial service going. Number one on that list are new green, heavy-duty, reusable plastic shopping bags. Due to Covid-19 and other concerns, Williams cannot accept bags that have already been used.
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Alameda County: 20,558
Contra Costa County: 16,056
Bay Area: 98,667
California: 786,221
U.S.: 6,823,904
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Alameda County: 374
Contra Costa County: 201
Bay Area: 1,407
California: 15,017
U.S.: 199,636
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East Bay Times, September 20, 2020
Over the past month, the most alarming coronavirus numbers coming out of the Bay Area have been in Alameda County, where double-digit death totals reported on multiple days propelled the region as a whole to break several death records. The nearly 100 deaths reported in Alameda County since Sept. 1 — an influx that made for two of the deadliest COVID-19 weeks in the Bay Area — actually date back as far as Aug. 7, though Alameda County has done nothing to explain that publicly. Last Tuesday, for example, it added 24 deaths to its count — 16 percent of the total for the entire state — without an alert or explanation.
Health and coroner officials were unable to explain exactly why this is happening. This week they said variously that the influx of deaths is either due to the county catching up, snafus with the statewide reporting system, or a flood of cases of Alameda County residents who died elsewhere and whose county of residence has only recently been determined.
SF Chronicle, September 20, 2020
Bay Area hospitals have reported their first cases of influenza, signaling the start of what could be a turbulent flu season with Covid-19 in the mix. Kaiser Permanente, Sutter Health and other major providers began offering flu shot clinics this month and anticipate vaccinating 10% to 15% more people this year than usual. Most people are being advised to find a drive-through vaccination clinic near them, to avoid clustering in doctor offices or other indoor spaces where Covid-19 could spread.
SF Chronicle, September 20, 2020
More than 1,000 people gathered at Civic Center Plaza in San Francisco on Sunday, converging from Catholic parishes throughout the city and then marching to the Cathedral of St. Mary of the Assumption on Gough Street in a protest that demanded the immediate reopening of indoor services. Places of worship were closed in the city for almost six months after the mid-March shelter-in-place order. Even though the state has said San Francisco can reopen churches at 25% capacity, Mayor London Breed announced last week that one person would be allowed inside churches at a time for prayer.
East Bay Times, September 21, 2020
The outdoor dining that has kept many restaurants afloat over the summer won’t last long as winter comes, and Bay Area restaurateurs are insisting it’s safe — and essential for their survival — to dine inside. But state and local authorities still prohibit indoor dining in more than half the state’s counties, even as a summer infection surge subsides.
Santa Cruz is one of the counties in the state’s red reopening tier whose substantial virus outbreaks are manageable enough to allow indoor dining at 25% capacity. Alameda, Contra Costa, San Mateo, Sonoma and Solano counties, which remain in the purple tier for widespread outbreaks, can still only serve takeout or outdoors. And while indoor dining has resumed in other red-tier counties such as Marin and Napa, local authorities in San Francisco and Santa Clara County, also in the red tier, still won’t allow it. San Francisco announced Friday it will allow indoor dining once the county improves to the “orange” tier, which will occur no sooner than the end of the month.
KQED, September 18, 2020
San Franciscans may be able to dine indoors at restaurants as soon as October. That's a part of the city's new reopening plan announced Friday, but there's a catch. The timeline relies on San Francisco being assigned an "orange" level by the state of California under its four-tier, color-coded system to assess each county's risk, San Francisco officials say, which could happen as early as the end of September. San Francisco is now at a red tier, the second-highest risk level. Should the city (which is also a county) be downgraded to an orange tier, city officials said they would then allow restaurants to have indoor dining at 25% capacity, up to 100 people.
SF Chronicle, September 20, 2020
As of Friday, there were 4,983 reported burglaries in San Francisco this year — about 21 a day. That represents a 42% increase over the same period in 2019. At the same time that burglaries are exploding, reports of car break-ins and shoplifting are down by one-third.
East Bay Times, September 21, 2020
Throughout the region, local governments, schools and special districts whose revenue streams have been pinched by the pandemic are dangling a plethora of ballot measures pushing new or extended taxes.
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San Leandro Schools "Mask On" |
We were delighted to provide the San Leandro Unified School District our Mask On poster for each of their schools. See below for further information on how to obtain our posters. |
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LA Times, September 20, 2020
The coronavirus spreads most commonly in the air, through droplets or other tiny respiratory particles that apparently can remain suspended and inhaled, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says in new guidance. The smaller particles, known as aerosols, are produced when an infected person coughs, sneezes, sings, talks or breathes and can be inhaled into someone’s nose, mouth, airways or lungs, according to the CDC, which says that, in general, indoor settings without good ventilation increase the risk of contagion. “This is thought to be the main way the virus spreads,” the CDC has posted on its website. “There is growing evidence that droplets and airborne particles can remain suspended in the air and be breathed in by others and travel distances beyond six feet (for example, during choir practice, in restaurants or in fitness classes).”
9/21/20 Update: The text on the growing evidence of aerosol spread of the virus has been deleted from the CDC website as of this morning. A message language on the CDC website states: "A draft version of proposed changes to these recommendations was posted in error to the agency’s official website. CDC is currently updating its recommendations regarding airborne transmission of SARS-CoV-2 (the virus that causes Covid-19). Once this process has been completed, the update language will be posted."
Washington Post, September 18, 2020
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Friday reversed heavily criticized guidelines on who should be tested for the novel coronavirus after experts inside and outside the agency raised alarms about public confusion over testing and concerns about the country’s ability to control the epidemic. The agency updated its recommendations to call for testing anyone who has been in close contact with anyone found to have the novel coronavirus. The guidance includes testing of those who do not have symptoms of covid-19, the disease caused by the virus.
Washington Post, September 19, 2020
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention investigated 1,600 cases of people who flew while at risk of spreading the coronavirus, identifying nearly 11,000 people who potentially were exposed to the virus on flights. But though the agency says some of those travelers subsequently fell ill, in the face of incomplete contact tracing information and a virus that incubates over several days, it has not been able to confirm a case of transmission on a plane. That does not mean it hasn’t happened, and recent scientific studies have documented likely cases of transmission on flights abroad.
Nature, September 18, 2020
An estimated 19% of SARS-CoV-2 infections in Hong Kong seeded 80% of the local transmission of the virus from one person to another, according to an analysis of the virus’s early spread. The analysis also found that viral spread in social settings caused more infections than spread within family households. In an examination of more than 1,000 coronavirus infections in Hong Kong from late January to late April, Peng Wu at the University of Hong Kong and her colleagues found evidence of multiple ‘superspreading’ events, in which one infected person passed the virus to at least six others.
Musicians who performed at four Hong Kong bars are thought to have triggered the biggest cluster, which led to 106 cases. Another 19 cases were linked to a temple; one monk there had no symptoms but was found to be infected. Nearly 70% of the cases did not transmit to anyone, the team found. The analysis also showed that more downstream cases were linked to spread in social settings such as weddings and restaurants than to household spread.
Lisa Krieger, Mercury News, September 21, 2020
The sickest coronavirus patients can live for weeks with a gripping headache, profound nausea, burning lungs, malaise, cough and waves of pain in their bones. They may be tethered to a breathing machine.
But eight months into the pandemic, fewer are dying.
New data reveals that while patients are still being rushed to intensive care units, a greater proportion are coming out alive. Since the pandemic began, the cumulative death rate for Californians with COVID-19 has fallen by more than half in the past three months. In early June, it was 5.87%; by Sept. 13, it was down to 2.14%.
Here are six major reasons why the death rate is falling:
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More testing, younger patients: When the pandemic first hit, only people with severe symptoms were tested. Now expanded testing is detecting milder and earlier cases, so the prognosis is better.
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Better preparation: Hospitals cite “the four S’s” needed for effective ‘surge’ planning: staff, supplies, space and systems. Managing a patient on a ventilator, in particular, is a labor-intensive and delicate task.
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Improved use of ventilators: Doctors now have a better understanding of how to manage breathing in severely ill patients.
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Other interventions: Clinicians are also more skilled at deploying other tactics. We’ve enlisted “proning,” where a team of caregivers gently roll a patient from their back onto their abdomen.
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New drugs: Use of drugs such as remdesivir and the steroid dexamethasone may be helping.
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Better information-sharing between doctors: Clinicians aren’t waiting to get their news through formal channels; instead, they’re talking to each other.
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LA Times, September 21, 2020
Coronavirus deaths in California topped 15,000 on Sunday, another bleak milestone that puts the state just behind Texas in lives lost to Covid-19. As of Sunday, California had recorded 15,014 deaths — a reminder of the staggering loss even as new cases are falling. Los Angeles County has by far the most deaths from Covid-19 in the state, according to the Los Angeles Times tracker, with at least 6,353 people who have died.
In California, the number of new cases has been leveling out. State and local officials are seeing signs of hope in recent drops in hospitalizations.
Kaiser Health News, September 21, 2020
The first five months of the Covid-19 pandemic in California rank among the deadliest in state history, deadlier than any other consecutive five-month period in at least 20 years. And the grim milestone encompasses thousands of “excess” deaths not accounted for in the state’s official Covid death tally: a loss of life concentrated among Blacks, Asians and Latinos, afflicting people who experts say likely didn’t get preventive medical care amid the far-reaching shutdowns or who were wrongly excluded from the coronavirus death count.
By the end of July, California had logged about 9,200 deaths officially attributed to Covid-19 in county death records. That left about 5,000 “excess” deaths for those months — meaning deaths above the norm not attributed to Covid-19. Deaths tend to increase from year to year as the population grows, but typically not by that much. A closer look at California’s excess deaths during the period reveal a disturbing racial and ethnic variance: All the excess deaths not officially linked to Covid infection were concentrated in minority communities. Latinos make up the vast majority, accounting for 3,350 of those excess deaths, followed by Asians (1,150), Blacks (860) and other Californians of color (350).
CNN, September 21, 2020
It was a long, dizzying week to be a Californian. The Golden State has been trying to contain the surge of coronavirus cases that started in the summer while dozens of wildfires are burning and smoke is making it hard to breathe. Then, as if not enough crises had collided, Southern California was caught in the clutches of yet another hazard -- an earthquake. “We have enough disasters going on right now, I'm like everybody else, I rather not have something else in 2020," Lucy Jones, a seismologist with the California Institute of Technology, said.
Sacramento Bee, September 20, 2020
California will not accept new unemployment claims over the next two weeks while the state’s Employment Development Department adopts new fraud prevention technology and works to clear out a backlog. During the two-week pause, people filing new claims until Oct. 5 will be asked to provide contact information to the state. EDD Director Sharon Hilliard wrote that they will be contacted to file claims when processing resumes. The pause on new claims is not expected to interrupt payments for people already in the system.
LA Times, September 18, 2020
California’s unemployment rate fell to 11.4% last month from 13.5% in July.
What seemed like encouraging news on California’s jobless rate was tempered by the fact that the state’s rate was far worse than the nation’s. U.S. unemployment fell to 8.4% in August from 10.2% in July. California has the nation’s fifth-highest jobless rate, trailing only Nevada, Rhode Island, New York and Hawaii.
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Wall Street Journal, September 21, 2020
The U.S. reported 39,844 new coronavirus cases and was closing in on 200,000 deaths, amid fears that the country was heading for a new wave of infections. Texas led the nation in new cases Sunday, reporting more than 5,000. Eleven states including Texas reported more than 1,000 new cases.
“I think we have at least one more cycle with this virus heading into the fall and winter,” Scott Gottlieb, a former Food and Drug Administration commissioner, said on CBS’s “Face the Nation” on Sunday. “If you look at what’s happening around the country right now, there’s an unmistakable spike in new infections.” He cited about 30 states where the rate of virus transfer is above one, which indicates “an expanding epidemic.”
CNN, September 21, 2020
The U.S. is closing in on the somber milestone of 200,000 deaths from Covid-19 as more than half of states are reporting a rise in cases. The climb comes after many states had seen case numbers decline following a summer resurgence of infections. Among the states reporting more new cases in the last seven days are Wisconsin, Idaho, South Dakota, Iowa and Kansas, all of which are also reporting test positivity rates above 15%.
Washington Post, September 21, 2020
Six months after the start of the pandemic, a shortage of N95 masks, designed to be thrown away after every patient, persists, leaving health-care workers exposed, patients at risk and public health experts flummoxed over a seemingly simple question: Why is the world’s richest country still struggling to meet the demand for an item that once cost around $1 a piece?
When the country was short of ventilators, the companies that made them shared their trade secrets with other manufacturers. Through the powers of the Defense Production Act, President Trump ordered General Motors to make ventilators. Other companies followed, many supported by the government. But for N95s and other respirators, Trump has used this authority far less, allowing major manufacturers to scale up as they see fit and potential new manufacturers to go untapped and underfunded. The organizations that represent millions of nurses, doctors, hospitals and clinics are pleading for more federal intervention, while the administration maintains that the government has already done enough and that the PPE industry has stepped up on its own.
NPR, September 21, 2020
From empty pizza boxes to Amazon cartons, household trash cans are overflowing with the refuse of our new, stay-at-home era — and cities are struggling to keep up. Residential trash volume spiked as much as 25% this spring, according to the trade group Solid Waste Association of North America. It has shrunk a bit since then but remains well above pre-pandemic levels. The coronavirus pandemic has disrupted all kinds of supply chains, including the one that leads to the landfill. Some sanitation workers have gotten sick or had to quarantine because of sick co-workers.
Wall Street Journal, September 21, 2020
Virginia Tech brings about $1.2 billion in annual income to Blacksburg, or more than half of the town’s economy, according to Anna Brown, a researcher at Emsi, a provider of labor-market analytics. One of every two jobs is supported by the university, its students and visitors, Emsi said. Area hotel rooms remain vacant, and restaurants stay closed days at a time. Some businesses that went into hibernation earlier this year have remained closed, waiting for more signs of life.
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SF Chronicle, September 18, 2020
Thirteen schools and child care facilities in Sonoma County reported coronavirus outbreaks that infected 62 people, including 25 children, health officials said this week. Most of the children who were infected were 6 years old and younger. Ten members of school staff and 27 family members were also infected, according to Sonoma County Public Health Officer Dr. Sundari Mase. Exposure to the virus occurred at the child care centers.
LA Times, September 18, 2020
Like all K-12 schools in Los Angeles County, Anza remains closed by state and county orders. Yet these public school fourth-graders, their siblings and almost 200 other Torrance Unified School District students now attend remote classes from their physical classrooms. The district waived the fees it would usually charge an outside organization, so families can pay just $205 per child per week for this YMCA-run enrichment program — a high price for public education, but a steal in the pandemic’s ever-expanding economy of alternatives.
Similar programs have proliferated across L.A. County as hopes for in-person learning have dimmed. Though some districts plan to bring back small cohorts of homeless children, foster youth, disabled students and English-language learners beginning this month, county Public Health Director Barbara Ferrer said that others would likely not return before November.
CalMatters, September 18, 2020
In addition to prevention measures like mandatory masks, handwashing and social distancing on campus, regular testing of school employees could help prevent new outbreaks if the virus is still circulating in the community, public health experts say.
California public health officials largely have left testing choices to individual counties, suggesting only that school districts work with county health officers to periodically test teachers and staff, depending on community transmission levels and “as lab capacity allows.”
Many questions remain: Should testing be mandatory for teachers and staffers to return to school? Should students be tested? Who will pay for the testing? How often should it take place, if at all?
CalMatters, September 18, 2020
The coronavirus hits keep on coming to the University of California. The global pandemic has gouged UC’s finances, costing the system nearly $2.2 billion and counting in lost revenues and new expenses — an increase of almost $400 million since July.
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Politico, September 18, 2020
Parents across the nation are skipping kindergarten in droves during the most tumultuous school year in generations. Frustrated by the thought of sticking their 5-year-olds in front of screens during the pivotal first year of school, they are sending their children to extended preschool, forming learning pods or foregoing formal instruction altogether.
Bloomberg, September 21, 2020
Schools have turned into de facto sanitariums: Covid-19 infections are sweeping student populations, though health departments are seeing relatively few hospitalizations or deaths so far. Colleges that tried to hold classes in person have had to send students into seclusion. Last week alone, the New Jersey Institute of Technology quarantined 300 people after the virus was found in their dorm’s wastewater, the University of Wisconsin at River Falls ordered all students to shelter in place after a surge in cases, and Florida State University’s football coach announced he had tested positive. With many schools planning to end their semesters at the holiday, students will disperse across the country, and some will bring the disease with them.
Axios, September 21, 2020
The enthusiasm to forge something resembling a college experience has dissipated as online learning, lockdowns and a diminished social life has set in. Now that the fall semester has started, 51% of students say it was not the right choice for their schools to allow students on campus. Just 3% say their school didn't allow students to return. The dissatisfaction is more acute among those who have had to learn completely remotely, even if they are on campus. For those who have attended in-person classes, 59% say it was the right choice for campus to reopen, compared to just 42% for those who have not. Removing many temptations of campus life has not made it easier to focus: 60% say they are learning less and just 6% say they're learning more.
NY Times, September 21, 2020
New York City’s roughly 1,400 school buildings have sat largely empty for six months, since its school system, the nation’s largest, abruptly shuttered classrooms in mid-March. On Monday, for the first time since then, schools reopened for up to 90,000 pre-K students and children with advanced disabilities. The rest of the city’s 1.1 million students started the school year online and will have the option of returning to classrooms over the next few weeks.
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Coronavirus survivor gives life-saving gift |
Natisha Fudge is a Detroit former nursing assistant who has seen her fair share of patients, especially over the last few months. But this summer, her occupation has had a significant impact on her family.
"In May while I was working a Covid unit," she says. "I was doing 12 hours that night and my mask snapped and within 24 hours, I had full blown Covid."
Her husband Christopher, who already had a multitude of health problems, ended up testing positive for Covid-19 and was admitted to Detroit's St. John
Hospital in need of a new kidney because of virus complications. "They initially told us that he was in Stage 3 kidney disease and now we're dealing with seizures and the Covid," Natisha adds.
On top of that, Natisha's mother-in-law also tested positive for the virus.
"We almost lost him during that time and then his mom, we thought she was about to. So aside from giving her husband the virus, the mother of three is giving him a kidney as well.
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“Finding out that his blood type was O-positive and my blood type was O-negative. I said it was only fate because only O can donate to O,” Natisha said.
However donating an organ isn’t an easy task.
Natisha had to lose weight to be able to do so. So far she’s lost over 40 pounds. “When I started doing it, I realized the weight started coming off,” she proclaimed.
And that really isn’t the half of what this family is going through. Yet somehow, someway… they continue to be strong for one another.
“To know that I’m gonna have my best friend and partner with me even longer in life, it feels amazing,” Natisha concluded.
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Washington Post, September 19, 2020
Mask use was critical in containing a virus spreading through the air, while scientists concentrated on spotting and eliminating clusters of infection. “Covid-19 transmission cannot be sustained without forming clusters,” said Hitoshi Oshitani, a Tohoku University virology professor who has been one of the government’s leading advisers on the pandemic. That simple conclusion shaped Japan’s unique alternative to harsh lockdowns: the notion that the spread of the virus can be controlled if people simply avoid the riskiest settings, what are known as “san mitsu,” or the 3C’s — closed locations with poor ventilation, crowded places, and close-contact settings where conversations are taking place.
CNN, September 20, 2020
After successfully tamping down the first surge of infection and death, Europe is now in the middle of a second coronavirus wave as it moves into winter, raising questions over what went so wrong.
There are trends that may explain the deterioration. The surge comes just after the summer vacation season, as workers return to city centers and children go back to school. The World Health Organization has suggested the increase could be partly down to the relaxation of measures and people dropping their guard, and evidence indicates young people are driving the second surge in Europe. Despite the rising numbers of cases, and recent deaths in Europe, the continent still compares favorably to the United States.
NY Times, September 20, 2020
Around the world, at least 73 countries are seeing surges in newly detected cases, and worries are fast mounting.
In India, more than 90,000 new cases are now being detected daily, adding a million cases since the start of this month and sending the country’s total cases soaring past five million.
In Europe, after lockdowns helped smother the crisis in the spring, the virus once again is burning its way across the continent as people proceed with their lives. Israel, with nearly 1,200 deaths attributed to the virus, imposed a second lockdown last week, one of the few nations that has yet done so.
Reuters, September 20, 2020
New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern on Monday lifted all coronavirus restrictions across the country, except in second-wave hotspot Auckland, as the number of new infections slowed to a trickle. Some restrictions were also eased in Auckland to allow gatherings of up to 100 people, but the country’s biggest city needed more time before all curbs could be lifted, Ardern said.
LA Times, September 20, 2020
Since the beginning of the pandemic, economists and health experts have warned about the inevitable secondary pandemic of poverty hitting struggling countries like Mexico, where 8.5 million people lived on less than $2 a day before the economic recession caused by Covid-19. Those living south of the border don’t have access to the same safety nets that keep U.S. families afloat, such as stimulus recovery checks, rent control or food stamps. Mexico also has no federal unemployment insurance, leaving workers at the mercy of nonprofits, the kindness of neighbors and their own entrepreneurship.
Reuters, September 21, 2020
For four decades, Indian Nobel peace laureate Kailash Satyarthi rescued thousands of children from the scourge of slavery and trafficking but he fears all his efforts could reverse as the coronavirus pandemic forces children into labor. “The biggest threat is that millions of children may fall back into slavery, trafficking, child labor, child marriage,” said Satyarthi who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his work to combat child labor and child trafficking in India.
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Julie Bosman, Serge F. Kovaleski and Jacey Fortin, NY Times, September 21, 2020
The coronavirus crisis in the United States has claimed nearly 200,000 lives, the young and the old, those living in dense cities and tiny towns, people who spent their days as nursing home attendants, teachers, farm laborers and retirees.
The loved ones left behind are trapped in an extraordinary state of torment. They have seen their spouses, parents and siblings fall ill from the virus. They have endured the deaths from a distance, through cellphone connections or shaky FaceTime feeds. Now they are left to grieve, in a country still firmly gripped by the coronavirus pandemic, where everywhere they turn is a reminder of their pain. That aftermath has been uniquely complicated, and cruel. In dozens of conversations, people across the United States who have lost family members to the coronavirus described a maelstrom of unsettled frustration, anger and isolation, all of it intensified by the feeling that the pandemic is impossible to shut out.
Dr. James Hamblin, The Atlantic, September 18, 2020
Winter has already hit some places in the Southern Hemisphere hard. South Africa has seen a surge in COVID-19. Melbourne has been locked down due to a winter resurgence. The U.S. fell prey to our sense of exceptionalism in the early stages of this pandemic. We watched idly as the virus spread in China and Iran, South Korea and Italy, and only after it was circulating widely among us did we begin to accept that we were not somehow immune. If we cling to that fiction, we are setting ourselves up to be unprepared once again.
Do not waste your time and emotional energy planning around an imminent game-changing injection or pill in the coming months. A pandemic is not a problem that will be fixed in one move, by any single medication or a sudden vaccine. Instead, the way forward involves small, imperfect preventive measures that can accumulate into very effective interventions.
Erin Brodwin, STAT, September 21, 2020
The battle over misinformation amid the Covid-19 pandemic has pitted health experts, parts of the public, and the leaders of online platforms against one another. So far, one social media giant seems to be winning the fight against falsehoods: Pinterest. The company has taken a hardline strategy against health misinformation, and in particular, vaccine falsehoods.
Pinterest has a zero-tolerance vaccine misinformation policy, a team tasked with enforcing it, and a flexible approach that accounts for emerging intel from health authorities. Pinterest’s strategy appears to run in stark contrast to that of Facebook, which has seen misinformation run rampant. Facebook, which has frequently cited free speech as a reason for leaving potentially harmful posts untouched, has drawn criticism from health experts who say the social network hasn’t done enough to combat it.
Ryan Panchadsaram, STAT, September 21, 2020
Since June, the White House Coronavirus Task Force has been compiling detailed reports on how Covid-19 is spreading. It has put together a massive, granular, timely data set for tracking and containing the pandemic. These reports would be of enormous benefit to local public health officials, educators, employers, and the public. Yet the task force refuses to share them.
Each week, it distributes this painstakingly prepared document to the governors of all 50 states and to the District of Columbia with specific recommendations for curtailing the spread of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes Covid-19, along with progress reports on testing and county-by-county assessments of the prevalence of the coronavirus. But to gain access to the information in these reports, the public has had to rely on leaks, investigative journalists, and inquiries by a House subcommittee.
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Widespread (Purple)
- 6.0 New Covid-19 positive cases per day per 100,000 residents
- 5.6 Adjusted case rate
- 3.4% Positivity rate
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Contra Costa County Metrics |
Widespread (Purple)
- 7.1 New Covid-19 positive cases per day per 100,000 residents
- 7.1 Adjusted case rate
- 4.7% Positivity rate
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Every county in California is assigned to a tier based on its test positivity and adjusted case rate. To move forward, a county must meet the next tier’s criteria for two consecutive weeks. If a county’s metrics worsen for two consecutive weeks, it will be assigned a more restrictive tier. For Alameda and Contra Costa Counties to move down to the next tier (red), daily new cases (per 100k) must be between 4-7 and positive tests must be between 5-8% for two consecutive weeks. The data is updated on Tuesdays. |
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Over the last seven days, Alameda County officials have confirmed 567 new cases, which amounts to 34 cases per 100,000 residents.
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Over the last seven days, Contra Costa County officials have confirmed 607 new cases, which amounts to 54 cases per 100,000 residents. |
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Top 8 Locations of Cases in Alameda County, as of 9/20/20. Alameda County does not publish cases per 100,000 in the last 14 days by city.
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Oakland: 8,136
Hayward: 2,975
Fremont: 1,389
Eden MAC: 1,293
San Leandro: 1,112
Livermore: 859
Union City: 741
Castro Valley: 520
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Top 8 Locations of Cases in Contra Costa County plus (in parentheses) cases per 100,000 in last 14 days, as of 9/20/20
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Richmond: 3,097 (232)
Antioch: 2,153 (178)
Concord: 2,118 (148)
Pittsburgh: 1,787 (201)
San Pablo: 1,387 (347)
Bay Point: 845 (397)
Brentwood: 581 (69)
Walnut Creek: 570 (48)
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We are proud to partner with the East Bay Community Foundation in publishing this bulletin. Through donations to its Covid-19 Response Fund, the EBCF provides grants to East Bay nonprofit organizations delivering essential services to those most impacted by the economic fallout from the pandemic.
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Working in collaboration with the Alameda County Public Health Department, the Cities of Hayward and San Leandro, and the Castro Valley and Eden Area Municipal Advisory Councils, the District has printed “Mask On” posters for each city and community in the Eden Health District area. The posters are free and intended for businesses, health clinics, schools, churches, public agencies and nonprofit organizations to display in their entrances.
“Wearing masks in public or any gatherings, including events with friends and extended families, is essential for slowing the spread of the virus,” stated Eden Health District Director Pam Russo. “While we are seeing signs of progress in California, Alameda County remains a Covid-19 'hot spot' in the Bay Area. Please wear a mask to protect yourself while protecting others.”
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The public is welcome to download and print or share “Mask On” posters from the District’s website. Posters are available in English, Spanish and Chinese languages.
Posters may also be retrieved during business hours from the lobby of the Eden Health District office building located at 20400 Lake Chabot Road, Castro Valley. Posters for the City of Hayward are also available from the Hayward Chamber of Commerce located at 22561 Main Street, Hayward.
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Public Education Covid-19 Flyers |
Contra Costa County Health Services has recently published highly informative flyers addressing the risks of becoming infected in certain settings and activities. |
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We have posted information on food pantries and food services in the cities of Hayward and San Leandro and unincorporated Alameda County including Castro Valley and San Lorenzo. You can access the information here on our website. Alameda County has also released an interactive map listing food distributions and other social services.
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Your feedback is welcome. Please share the Bulletin. |
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The Eden Health District is committed to ensuring that policy makers and community members receive accurate and timely information to help make the best policy and personal choices to meet and overcome the challenges posed by the Covid-19 pandemic.
Each bulletin includes a summary of the top health, Bay Area, California, national, education and international news on the pandemic plus links to a diverse range of commentary and analysis. We publish the Bulletin on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, unless the day fall on a public holiday.
We welcome your feedback on our bulletin. Please contact editor Stephen Cassidy.
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