COVID-19
breaking news & updates
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Unvaccinated Individuals Should Continue To Mask When Visiting City of Hayward Facilities
The City of Hayward is asking members of the public who are not fully vaccinated against COVID-19 to continue to wear a mask or other face-covering when visiting City Hall, Hayward Public Library and other City facilities. Similarly, the City is requiring unvaccinated City employees to wear a mask or other face-covering whenever at the workplace. In addition, unvaccinated City employees are required to test twice weekly for coronavirus infection. City of Hayward Read more
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San Francisco Drops Vaccination Requirement For Indoor Restaurants, Bars
Starting this Friday, March 11, San Francisco will no longer require people to provide proof of vaccination or a negative COVID test to enter indoor restaurants, bars and gyms, city health officials announced Wednesday. The move will bring an end to a requirement that was first enacted in August, when San Francisco became the first major U.S. jurisdiction to mandate full vaccination to enter these indoor spaces. City health officials enacted the requirement because people in such locales typically remove their masks or breathe heavily. The reversal marks an important symbolic shift in the transition of the coronivirus to endemic status, as San Francisco throughout the pandemic has been one of the most cautious in terms of COVID mitigation policies.
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Confusion Grows As COVID Restrictions Ease In The Bay Area
The COVID-19 threat seems to be easing once again but there also seems to be confusion over whether we should stuff our masks in a drawer or keep them handy. In a recent interview with NBC News, CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky said it's time for most people to put the masks away. “I would say put your masks in a drawer, anticipate you may need them again and hope that we don't,” she said. Dr. Walnesky predicts COVID will turn into a seasonal virus like the flu. NBC Bay Area Read more
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Santa Clara County Relaxes Controversial Booster Mandate For High-Risk Employees
Citing the continued drop in COVID-19 cases, Santa Clara County announced Monday that it would be relaxing a contentious booster mandate that requires all high-risk workers like nurses and correctional officers to get a shot. Employees with exemptions will now be allowed to remain in their current jobs, though they must test weekly. The county had previously barred those with exemptions from remaining in their positions — an approach that was unique compared to every other county in the state and led to hundreds of county workers being disciplined. Mercury News Read more
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COVID Testing And Vaccination Clinics In East And West Oakland
In the continuing effort to expand COVID testing and vaccination services throughout Oakland, Oakland Emergency Management Services Division is working with partners to bring more clinics to Oakland residents. Check the list of available sites with hours of operation and services offered. City of Oakland Read more
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Students Sue Santa Clara University Over COVID-19 Vaccine Booster Mandate
Two students sued Santa Clara University over its COVID-19 vaccine booster shot requirement Monday. The lawsuit said sophomore Harlow Glenn, 20, agreed to get her first Pfizer COVID-19 shot last year to comply with the university’s vaccine mandate, but alleges she suffered numbing in her legs, severe headaches, menstrual cycle disruptions, bloody urine, body pains and hair loss. The university, she said, denied her requests for religious and medical exemptions from the shots.
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Outdoor Dining Likely to Become Permanent At Many Bay Area Restaurants
One impact of the COVID-19 pandemic is obvious as you head into the Bay Area’s many downtown districts: A lot more people are dining outdoors. Outdoor dining was a saving grace for many restaurants during the pandemic, and now those establishments and their patrons are embracing the outside eating experience. For some restaurants, the creation of outdoor dining areas was the only way they could survive. Now, keeping those spaces will give many restaurants a way to serve more customers and make up for lost time. NBC Bay Area Read more
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UC Davis Partners With Pfizer On Two New COVID Vaccine Booster Trials
UC Davis is partnering with Pfizer on two new clinical trials to test the pharmaceutical company’s COVID-19 booster vaccine in healthy adults. The trials will assess the efficacy of different strength booster doses and test possible side effects of a booster shot on the heart. When Pfizer’s mRNA COVID-19 vaccine was approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in August 2021, the recommended course was a two-dose series of the vaccine. Since then, with the emergence of COVID-19 variants like Delta and Omicron, most health experts now recommend a three-dose course of the vaccine. Davis Enterprise Read more
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Pfizer To Begin Testing COVID Pill On Young Children
Pfizer announced Wednesday that it has started a clinical trial testing its COVID-19 antiviral pill in children as young as 6. The drugmaker said it aims to enroll approximately 140 participants in the trial, which will look at whether the drug, called Paxlovid, can safely treat COVID in children who are at risk of becoming severely ill. Paxlovid has already been authorized for people ages 12 and older. The children in the trial will be divided into two groups, based on their weight, which will determine whether they receive the currently authorized dosage or a lower one. NBC News Read more
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COVID-19 Vaccinations Decline To New Lows
Americans have stopped rolling up their sleeves for COVID-19 vaccinations, as data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows daily vaccinations have fallen to their lowest rate in more than a year. The U.S. is averaging approximately 322,000 shots a day, which includes first, second and booster shots. That’s down from a peak of 3.3 million average shots in April, when vaccinations were opened up to all adults, and is the lowest level since January 2021, the vaccination effort's first month when shots were limited to health care workers, essential workers and older adults.
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Health Experts Warn Florida's Plan To Recommend Against COVID-19 Vaccine For Healthy Kids Is Irresponsible
After Florida Surgeon General Dr. Joseph Ladapo declared on Monday the state would issue guidance urging parents not to vaccinate their children against COVID-19, health experts and officials were quick to highlight the dangers of such a policy for individuals and for country at large. Dr. Paul Offit, director of the Vaccine Education Center at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, said Ladapo's statement is "wholly irresponsible and completely unsupported." "Although it is true that children are less likely to be infected and it is true that children are less likely to be severely infected, they can still be infected, and they can still be severely infected," Offit told CNN. CNN Read more
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As Virus Cases Go From 1 To 24,000, New Zealand Changes Tack
Back in August, New Zealand’s government put the entire nation on lockdown after a single community case of the coronavirus was detected. On Tuesday, when new daily cases hit a record of nearly 24,000, officials told hospital workers they could help out on understaffed COVID-19 wards even if they were mildly sick themselves. It was the latest sign of just how radically New Zealand’s approach to the virus has shifted, moving from elimination to suppression and now to something approaching acceptance as the Omicron variant has taken hold. AP Read more
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Huge Study Finds Most COVID-19 Vaccine Side Effects Were Mild For Pfizer-BioNTech And Moderna
A new study involving millions of participants has found most side effects from mRNA COVID-19 vaccines were mild and faded substantially after one day. The findings, published Monday in The Lancet Infectious Diseases, should reassure Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna mRNA vaccine recipients that the shots, which were granted U.S. Food and Drug Administration emergency authorization in late 2020, are safe, experts said. "These data are reassuring that reactions to both mRNA vaccines are generally mild and subside after one or two days – confirming reports from clinical trials and post-authorization monitoring," said the Center for Disease Control and Prevention's Tom Shimabukuro, one of the authors of the large-scale study. USA Today Read more
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WHO Lays Out Plan For COVID Vaccines To Tackle New Variants
The World Health Organization (WHO) technical advisory group on COVID-19 vaccines on Tuesday weighed in on potential updates to COVID-19 vaccines in light of emerging variants such as Omicron, outlining different options and what data are needed to guide new strategies. In a statement, the WHO expert group said it strongly recommends the current vaccines and boosters, because they continue to provide high levels of protection against severe disease and death, even against the backdrop of Omicron spread. However, they said to optimize protection in the future, different approaches may be needed, such as monovalent versions that target a specific variant or a polyvalent vaccine that protects against multiple ones. CIDRAP Read more
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State/National/International News |
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California Mask Mandate: Is it Ending Too Soon For Little Children?
Toddlers and preschoolers who have mostly known a school life with tiny masks may be in for a big lifestyle change after Friday, when the state mask mandate for kids ends at midnight. While wearing masks is still strongly recommended, some medical experts worry removing the state mask mandate could be risky for tots. The change shifts the onus of requiring masking to child care and preschool operators, schools and school districts. Schools will no longer be able to bar a student from school for not wearing a face covering. CalMatters Read more
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One California University Has Unified Town And Gown To Fight COVID. Why Haven’t Others?
Once a week, Lori Janich drives down the street from her office and partakes in an ongoing success story. Phone in hand to confirm her appointment, she strolls into the massive Activities and Recreation Center on the University of California-Davis campus, reaches a COVID-19 testing station, swirls water in her mouth, spits into a tube, and leaves. Within a day, she receives her test result. Janich doesn’t live in Davis, but because her job as a licensed dental hygienist brings her there, everything about the COVID testing process is free for her. The same goes for all UC-Davis students, faculty members, and staffers; Davis city residents; local workers; and visitors — almost anyone whose life brings them into town. Santa Cruz Sentinel Read more
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How Did This Many Deaths Become Normal?
The United States reported more deaths from COVID-19 last Friday than deaths from Hurricane Katrina, more on any two recent weekdays than deaths during the 9/11 terrorist attacks, more last month than deaths from flu in a bad season, and more in two years than deaths from HIV during the four decades of the AIDS epidemic. At least 953,000 Americans have died from COVID, and the true toll is likely even higher because many deaths went uncounted. COVID is now the third leading cause of death in the U.S., after only heart disease and cancer, which are both catchall terms for many distinct diseases. The sheer scale of the tragedy strains the moral imagination.
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Why Some People Still Haven't Gotten COVID
When I tested positive for COVID-19 over the winter holidays, I spent a good bit of time puzzling over how and where I was exposed. I was infected just as Omicron was ripping through New York City, so it wasn’t a surprise. But I am also a fairly COVID-cautious health reporter. I wore an N95 in public settings, I’d been working from home, and I was newly boosted. How did I end up with a breakthrough infection and not, say, my husband, who goes into work every day? Why was I the one exposed, and not my unvaccinated preschooler who spends his days in the company of germy 3-year-olds? HuffPost Read more
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Hawaii To Lift Last U.S. State Mask Mandate
The last statewide mask mandate in the U.S. will be lifted by March 26, Hawaii Gov. David Ige announced Tuesday. No states will require masks indoors after 11:59 p.m. March 25. Hawaii is the last to drop the pandemic safety measure, with Washington state’s mask mandate expiring at 11:59 p.m. Friday. Ige said Hawaii’s COVID-19 case counts and hospitalizations are decreasing. The seven-day new case average is about 140, he said, while a week ago it was more than 300. There were 48 patients hospitalized with COVID-19 Tuesday. He said that’s the first time the number has been under 50 since around last summer. KRON4 Read more
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Disease In A Dish: What Mini-Hearts And Other Organs Reveal About Long COVID
The attack of the COVID-19 virus on the human heart is completely hidden from view, revealed only by the damage that’s left behind. But San Francisco scientists have designed a way to witness the assault. In lab-grown globules of throbbing heart cells, they can watch signs of distress, then death. By creating disease in a dish, the Gladstone Institutes team hopes to better understand the mysteries of COVID – not just in the heart, but also in other tissues. They’re part of a growing international effort to study how the virus infects and damages cells . Mercury News Read more
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Even Mild COVID Is Linked To Brain Damage, Scans Show
During at least the first few months following a coronavirus infection, even mild cases of COVID-19 are associated with subtle tissue damage and accelerated losses in brain regions tied to the sense of smell, as well as a small loss in the brain’s overall volume, a new British study finds. Having mild COVID is also associated with a cognitive function deficit. These are the striking findings of the new study led by University of Oxford investigators, one that leading COVID researchers consider particularly important because it is the first study of the disease’s potential impact on the brain that is based on brain scans taken both before and after participants contracted the coronavirus. NBC News Read more
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Congress Considers A Longer Phase-Out Of Looser, COVID-Era Telehealth Policies
Lawmakers are considering extending the more flexible telehealth policies put in place during the pandemic for five months after the end of the formal public health emergency, according to draft text obtained by STAT. The flexibilities, which have transformed the telehealth landscape, allow adults 65 and older to get coverage under Medicare for telehealth visits in their home, access telehealth even if they lived outside of a rural area, and get coverage for some audio-only services. STAT Read more
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The NFL Has Been Using An Unproven Measure To Get Players With COVID Back On The Field Fast
Two months before the Super Bowl, the Omicron surge was decimating NFL rosters as players tested positive for COVID-19. In mid-December, the NFL postponed a game between the Los Angeles Rams and the Seattle Seahawks because the Rams, who would go on to win the Super Bowl, had 29 players out with COVID. The number of NFL employees testing positive per week in December went from about 30 to about 300, most of them players who would have to sit out of practices and games.
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Total Confirmed Cases
Bay Area: 1,277,226
California: 9,022,912
U.S.: 79,392,971
Alameda County
Primary Vaccine Series Completed: 84.9%
Total Cases: 255,000
Total Deaths: 1,781
Test Positivity (7-day rate): 2.0%
Hospitalized Patients (as of 3/9): 95
ICU Beds Available (as of 3/9): 100
As of March 9, cases have decreased recently but are still high. The numbers of hospitalized COVID patients and deaths in the Alameda County area have also fallen. The test positivity rate in Alameda County is relatively low, suggesting that testing capacity is adequate for evaluating COVID-19 spread in the area. NY Times
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Total Reported Deaths
Bay Area: 7,992
California: 86,808
U.S.: 963,189
Contra Costa County
Primary Vaccine Series Completed: 85.5%
Total Cases: 188,971
Total Deaths: 1,256
Test Positivity (7-day rate): 2.7%
Hospitalized Patients (as of 3/9): 49
ICU Beds Available (as of 3/9): 38
As of March 9, cases have decreased recently but are still very high. The number of hospitalized COVID patients has also fallen in the Contra Costa County area. Deaths have remained at about the same level. The test positivity rate in Contra Costa County is relatively low, suggesting that testing capacity is adequate for evaluating COVID-19 spread in the area. NY Times
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How To Cope With No-Mask Anxiety
Now that 70 percent of Americans can stop wearing masks indoors, according to guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), it seems the country is moving in the right direction when it comes to the pandemic. For those who are young and healthy, health professionals say, dropping the mask makes sense right now. But those who are older, have an underlying health condition, or are immunocompromised may need to wear a mask on a regular or sometimes selected basis. Healthline 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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Over the past week, Alameda County has averaged 131 new cases and 2.9 new death per day.
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Over the past week, Contra Costa County has averaged 145 new cases and 3.7 new deaths per day.
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Top 10 Locations of Cases in
Alameda County, cumulative
as of 3/9/2022
Oakland: 74,815
Hayward: 33,300
Fremont: 25,897
San Leandro: 15,602
Eden MAC: 14,517
Berkeley: 13,011
Livermore: 12,824
Union City: 11,249
Castro Valley: 8,724
Alameda: 8,712
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Top 10 Locations of Cases in
Contra Costa County, cumulative
as of 3/9/2022
Richmond: 27,865
Antioch: 25,424
Concord: 20,402
Pittsburg: 16,457
San Pablo: 11,902
Brentwood: 11,346
Oakley: 9,523
Walnut Creek: 9,333
San Ramon: 8,028
Martinez: 6,248
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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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