COVID-19
breaking news & updates
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Bulletin Publishing Schedule for July
During the month of July, the Bulletin will be published once a week, on Wednesday. Twice a week publication (Monday and Thursday) will resume in August.
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COVID Test Resources
Food Pantries
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Bay Area wastewater surveys suggest COVID surge may be biggest yet
Surveys of coronavirus levels in Bay Area wastewater suggest that the region’s relentless spring COVID surge probably rivals the winter omicron wave in terms of the number of people currently infected — in fact, this surge may be the largest yet in some places. But capturing the scale of disease, and conveying to the public the relative risk of getting sick, is becoming increasingly tricky, health experts say.
The huge winter surge peaked in the Bay Area at more than 20,000 reported COVID cases a day in mid-January. Currently, the region is recording far fewer cases — roughly 3,500 a day as of this week — but experts believe the actual number of infections may be anywhere from 2 to 10 times higher, as so many more people use home tests, the results of which are not reported to county or state public health authorities.
Dr. Nicholas Moss, the health officer for Alameda County, said he uses multiple metrics to get a sense of what’s happening in his community, but he appreciates that many people don’t have the time or interest to pay such close attention. That’s becoming increasingly true as the pandemic drags on and people have other priorities in their lives to distract them from COVID. With that in mind, he said simply relying on social networks to keep tabs on the virus may be the best way for many people to assess their own risk.
“Honestly, I find in some ways the easiest way for people to get a sense of how much COVID is around is just: Are you hearing about lots of people getting COVID? That’s a good sign that for you there’s a lot of COVID around, that there is a risk and you should be careful,” Moss said. “It’s very unscientific, but people really relate to it. If the person across the street has COVID and my aunt has COVID and we heard about a cluster of cases at the local day care — that kind of signal, people should pay attention to it.”
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BART Mask Mandate Lifted
Masks are no longer required on the San Francisco Bay Area's BART system as the mandate requiring them expired on Monday.
BART is strongly encouraging riders to still wear face coverings and on Monday morning most people on the trains still were, KCBS Radio reported.
The research is clear that masks lower the odds of contracting a COVID-19 infection, but the evidence that mandates work is less convincing.
BART conducts surveys on trains four times a month to monitor mask-wearing. In June, BART estimated that 89% of riders wore masks.
BART cars are equipped with "virus-trapping MERV-14 air filters and air in cars is replaced and filtered every 70 seconds," BART said. The EPA says a filter rating of MERV-13 or higher will filter out virus particles like coronavirus. SFGATE Read more
Asian residents more likely to be hospitalized with COVID than others in Bay Area
Asian residents in the Bay Area were more likely to be hospitalized with COVID-19 in 2020 than any other racial or ethnic group, and the heightened risk cannot be fully explained by socioeconomic factors or medical conditions, according to newly published research.
Asians were the only racial or ethnic group among those included in the study — Asian, Black, Hispanic and white residents — for whom factors such as age, income, health insurance status and medical co-morbidities did not fully explain the higher risk of hospitalization, the study published Tuesday in the Journal of Racial and Ethnic Health Disparities found.
Hispanic and Black residents’ higher risk for testing positive and being hospitalized was largely tied to socioeconomic status and health issues such as smoking and diabetes, according to the study, which was co-authored by a UCSF researcher. Conversely, such factors did not fully account for Asians’ higher risk for hospitalization, suggesting other things at play. It’s not clear, though, what those are.
“What is interesting is that even when we count for all socioeconomic factors and health profile, just being Asian alone still conferred excess risk for having severe COVID,” said the study’s co-author, UCSF ophthalmologist Dr. David Hwang. “We don’t fully understand the reasons for that.” SF Chronicle Read more
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COVID Vaccine/Treatment News |
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BA.5 doesn’t care that you just had Covid-19
The omicron subvariant is tuned to evade immunity, even from previous omicron infections.
The pattern has become all too familiar: A new version of the SARS-CoV-2 virus emerges and begins to dominate new Covid-19 cases, until it’s replaced by an even more contagious version of the virus.
This year, subvariants of the omicron variant of the virus have ruled cases in the US. The BA.1 subvariant started the omicron wave. Then in April, BA.2 formed the majority of cases. By May, BA.2.12.1 took over. Now BA.5 is in the lead, triggering a rise in hospitalizations across the country. It may be the most contagious version of the virus to date.
Why does this keep happening?
It’s evolution. The more a virus spreads, the more opportunities it has to mutate, and eventually some of those mutations will confer a transmission advantage to the virus.
Omicron showed that it was adept at causing reinfections among those who were previously exposed to Covid-19. BA.5 appears to have an especially potent mix of mutations that evade protection from the immune system.
The best strategy is to limit the spread of the virus, denying it opportunities to mutate. Getting vaccinated and boosted if eligible remains critical, not just in the US, but around the world. Though vaccinated people can still get infected with BA.5, their chances are lower than those who are not immunized, they are less likely to spread it to others, and most importantly, are far less likely to get dangerously sick. VOX Read more
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People get COVID again and again...and again. Is this the new normal?
Increasingly, experts fear, the answer is yes.
While doctors agree it’s unlikely people will get infected twice with the same variant, it’s probable over the long term that new COVID variants could infect people again due to the lightning-speed evolution of the novel coronavirus.
“I would not be surprised if we see people get infected more than once per year,” Dr. Anthony Fauci, President Joe Biden’s chief medical adviser, told NBC News.
Hybrid immunity — the dual protection afforded by infection plus vaccination — seems to be less protective than it used to be against getting COVID again, although vaccines continue to stave off serious illness. But with many people now having had both omicron and a later subvariant such as BA.2, BA.4 or BA.5, studies show that vaccination coupled with previous exposure still prevents reinfection better than a vaccine or infection alone. SF Chronicle Read more
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CDC panel recommends Novavax Covid-19 vaccine for adults
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s independent advisors recommended Novavax’s two-dose Covid-19 vaccine as a primary series for adults on Tuesday, one of the final steps before pharmacies can start administering the shots.
The CDC committee voted unanimously to recommend the vaccine for people ages 18 and older after reviewing the shots’ safety and effectiveness during an hourslong public meeting Tuesday. CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky could give the greenlight for vaccinations to start as soon as this week.
Novavax stock rose 12% after the CDC panel’s recommendation.
Walensky’s endorsement will complete a two-year journey for Novavax, one of the early participants in the U.S. race to produce a vaccine to protect against Covid-19. The small Maryland biotech company received $1.8 billion of taxpayer money from Operation Warp Speed, but struggled to get its manufacturing base in place and ultimately fell behind Pfizer and Moderna.
Novavax’s vaccine will enter the U.S. at a time when more than three-fourths of U.S. adults, 77%, are now fully vaccinated with Pfizer, Moderna and to a much lesser degree Johnson & Johnson’s shots, according to CDC data.
U.S. health officials and Novavax executives have said the vaccine will provide another option for people who do not want to take Pfizer and Moderna’s shots. CNBC Read more
New COVID Vaccines Will Be Ready This Fall. America Won’t Be.
Respiratory-virus season starts soon, and our autumn vaccine strategy is shaky at best.
Not so long ago, America’s next COVID fall looked almost tidy. Sure, cases might rise as the weather chills and dries, and people flock indoors. But Pfizer and Moderna were already cooking up America’s very first retooled COVID vaccines, better matched to Omicron and its offshoots, and a new inoculation campaign was brewing. Instead of needing to dose up three, four, even five times within short order, perhaps Americans could get just one COVID shot each year, matched roughly to the season’s circulating strains. Fall 2022 seemed “the first opportunity to routinize COVID vaccines,” says Nirav Shah, the director of the Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention, and simultaneously recharge the country’s waning enthusiasm for shots.
Now that fall is officially 10 weeks away, that once-sunny forecast is looking cloudier. The Biden administration could soon offer second booster shots to all adults—an amuse-bouche, apparently, for fall’s Omicron-focused vaccines, which may not debut until October at the earliest, by which time BA.5 may be long gone, and potentially too late to forestall a cold-weather surge. In April, the FDA’s leaders seemed ready to rally around a fall reboot; in a statement last month, Peter Marks, the director of the agency’s Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research, struck a more dispirited tone.
The coming autumn would be just a “transitional period,” he said. Which checks out, given the nation’s current timetable. “I see this fall shaping up to be more incremental,” says Jason Schwartz, a vaccine-policy expert at Yale, “rather than that fresh start of let’s begin again.” The Atlantic Read more
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State/National/International News |
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LA County Likely to Reinstate Indoor Mask Mandate
With the coronavirus resurgent and cases and hospitalizations on the rise, Los Angeles is poised to become the first Southern California county to reinstate mandatory public indoor masking.
L.A. County officially entered the high community level Thursday. Should it remain there for the next two weeks, the county will reissue an indoor mask mandate with an effective date of July 29. Besides Los Angeles County, the other counties that on Thursday entered the high COVID-19 community level category for the first time since mid-March are San Diego, Orange, Santa Barbara, Imperial and Tehama.
A renewed mandate for Los Angeles County would apply indoors for those 2 and older at a familiar host of establishments and venues — including shared office space, manufacturing and retail settings, event spaces, restaurants and bars, gyms and yoga studios, educational settings and children’s programs.
Importantly, though, masks would not be required for those using outdoor spaces, as the risk of transmission in those settings is significantly lower than it is indoors.LA Times Read more
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CDC: Omicron BA.5 Makes Up Nearly 78% of COVID variants in US
The BA.5 subvariant of omicron was estimated to make up 77.9% of the circulating coronavirus variants in the United States for the week ended July 16, the U.S.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said on Tuesday.
BA.5, which has shown to be particularly good at evading the immune protection afforded either by vaccination or prior infection, have been driving a surge of new infections globally.
Omicron subvariant BA.4 was estimated to make up 12.8% of the circulating variants in the United States, the data showed. The U.S. health regulator has asked vaccine manufacturers to target those variants for a potential fall season booster dose.
U.S. health officials are also urging people aged 50 or more to get a booster shot, adding that doing so would not prevent them from getting another "bivalent" booster designed to fend off Omicron more specifically later this year. VOA News Read more
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International News
Africa left behind as wealthy nations push 4th COVID booster shots
Institutional racism, greed, and a broken global health system are all working against African nations to ensure that people are dying from COVID in silence, according to a scathing assessment from the co-chair of the African Union's African Vaccine Delivery Alliance, Dr. Ayoade Alakija.
More than two years into the COVID-19 pandemic, wealthy nations like the U.S. are preparing for yet another vaccination campaign.
The Biden administration is examining plans to open up a fourth booster shot to all adults. And the FDA has asked vaccine manufacturers to prepare another set of boosters in the fall for the omicron subvariants that now dominate new cases in the U.S.
On the African continent, however, only one in every five people has received the initial two shots. NPR Read more
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UK faces up to changing waves of Covid
A startling proportion of the UK population will be cooped up in their bedrooms having the strange experience of nursing a fever and sore throat in July as Covid infections continue to soar in the third major wave this year.
For most this will be an unpleasant inconvenience rather than a tragedy. But with a fourth wave expected in the autumn, a fifth potentially kicking off by Christmas and experts saying that Covid may never settle into a seasonal cycle, some are questioning whether this steady grind of illness is sustainable.
Seasonal flu has been a benchmark for Covid since the earliest phase of the pandemic and in the spring a threshold was crossed and Covid became less deadly than seasonal flu for all age groups. This was good news. However, the impact of an illness on society also depends on how many people are infected and how often.
Many had assumed that by this point we might be at least heading towards a more regular pattern of infection with Covid in which we would endure a few tough months during the winter and forget it for the rest of the year. Instead, the reverse appears to be occurring. The Guardian Read more
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Shanghai enforces new COVID testing, some areas in China extend lockdowns
Several large Chinese cities including Shanghai are rolling out new mass testing or extending lockdowns on millions of residents to counter new clusters of COVID-19 infections, with some measures being criticized on the internet.
While the increase in cases in China is small compared with a resurgence in other parts of Asia, China is adamant about implementing its dynamic zero COVID policy of eliminating outbreaks as soon as they emerge. Previously when a flare-up became a major outbreak, local officials had been compelled to take tougher measures such as month-long lockdowns, even at the cost of economic growth.
Persistent outbreaks and more closures could add pressure on the world's second-largest economy, which contracted sharply in the second quarter from the first after widespread COVID lockdowns jolted industrial production and consumer spending. Reuters Read more
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India's COVID vaccinations hit 2 billion, new cases at four-month high
The Indian government's COVID-19 vaccinations hit 2 billion on Sunday, with booster doses underway for all adults, as daily infections hit four-month high, official data showed.
Health ministry data shows the COVID death toll at 525,709, with 49 deaths recorded overnight. New cases rose 20,528 over the past 24 hours, the highest since Feb. 20, according to data compiled by Reuters.
The country of 1.35 billion people has lifted most COVID-related restrictions, and international travel has recovered robustly.
Some 80% of the inoculations have been the AstraZeneca (AZN.L) vaccine made domestically, called Covishield. Others include domestically developed Covaxin and Corbevax, and Russia's Sputnik V.
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Total Confirmed Cases
Bay Area: 1,569,899
California: 10,157,114
U.S.: 87,858,093
Alameda County
Primary Vaccine Series Completed: 86.6%
Total Cases: 334,015
Total Deaths: 1,920
Test Positivity (7-day rate): 14.9%
Hospitalized Patients (as of 7/13): 138
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Total Reported Deaths
Bay Area: 8,621
California: 92,386
U.S.: 1,017,880
Contra Costa County
Primary Vaccine Series Completed: 87.0%
Total Cases: 244,271
Total Deaths: 1,356
Test Positivity (7-day rate): 16.6%
Hospitalized Patients (as of 7/13): 102
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A healthy diet lessens chances of getting COVID and the severity if you get it
Here’s more incentive to eat a healthy diet: it’s associated with a reduced risk of developing COVID-19 and its serious complications, according to a study published online Sept. 6, 2021, by the journal Gut. Researchers asked about 593,000 adults (mostly middle-aged and older) what they ate in February 2020, and then followed their health through September.
Scientists found that people who reported eating the most fruits, vegetables, and legumes had a 9% lower risk of getting COVID and a 41% lower risk of developing severe COVID during the study period, compared with people who reported eating the least fruits and vegetables. Researchers also found a link between COVID and a poor diet or socioeconomic disadvantages. "If you could remove just one of those factors — diet or disadvantage — we think nearly a third of the COVID-19 cases could have been prevented," notes Jordi Merino, the study’s lead author and a research associate at the Diabetes Unit and Center for Genomic Medicine at Harvard-affiliated Massachusetts General Hospital.
The study was observational and doesn’t prove conclusively that a healthy diet prevents COVID. Researchers point out that getting vaccinated and wearing a mask in indoor settings are still the most important approaches to ward off the disease. Harvard Health Letter Read more
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- COVID-19 testing is a good idea, but keep in mind, people who test negative can still harbor the virus if they are early in their infection.
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A viral test tells you if you have a current infection.
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An antibody test might tell you if you had a past infection.
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Top 10 Locations of Cases in
Alameda County, cumulative
as of 7/19/2022
Oakland:93,037
Hayward: 39,860
Fremont: 35,197
San Leandro: 19,611
Berkeley: 18,679
Eden MAC: 17.486
Livermore: 15,770
Union City: 14,148
Alameda: 11,915
Castro Valley: 11,525
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Top 10 Locations of Cases in
Contra Costa County, cumulative
as of 7/19/2022
Richmond: 32,695
Antioch: 30,010
Concord: 25,2216
Pittsburg: 19,254
Brentwood: 13,948
San Pablo: 13,796
Walnut Creek: 12,571
San Ramon: 11,658
Oakley: 11,362
Martinez: 8,132
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About Eden Health District |
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The Eden Health District Board of Directors are Chair Mariellen Faria, Vice Chair Pam Russo, Secretary/Treasurer Roxann Lewis, Gordon Galvan and Ed Hernandez. The Chief Executive Officer is Mark Friedman.
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.
We welcome your feedback on our bulletin. Please contact editor Lisa Mahoney.
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