SYLMAR, LOS ANGELES (KABC) — A lot of natural gas bills in Southern California are suddenly getting more expensive.
SoCal Gas has already warned customers: “January bills are likely to be shockingly high,”
Lauren Davis is among those shocked customers.
When she opened her family’s gas bill this month, she found it was nearly 25% higher than expected.
“I opened the bill and it was $330 and the first thing was, ‘What’s the temperature in our house?'” Davis said.
After taking a closer look, Davis found out she actually used less gas this year compared to the same time period last year.
But the cost of natural gas supplies nearly doubled, leading to more money out of her pocket.
“For a colder house, less gas used and it’s insane,” Davis said.
When SoCal Gas warned customers of the expected increase on a website message in late December, the company said natural gas market prices in the West more than doubled between December and January.
According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, the reasons behind the price hike of natural gas included the following factors:
Widespread, below-normal temperatures
High natural gas consumption
Reduced natural gas flows
Pipeline constraints, including maintenance in West Texas
Low natural gas storage levels in the Pacific region
SoCalGas announced Friday that it contributed $1 million toward its gas assistance fund, which gives one-time, $100 grants to qualifying applicants.
Davis said she didn’t meet the income requirements. Instead she had to pull from her family’s food budget. She worries for those with less flexibility, like her elderly neighbor.
“I can live in 66 (degrees). She cannot. She’s on oxygen, like, she can’t live in 66 and they’re actually looking to get a roommate. That’s the answer,” Davis said, adding, “to have a 94-year-old get a roommate?”
Among the tips SoCalGas gave to reduce natural gas use were not using it where not necessary, such as with a gas fireplace, bringing down your thermostat three to five degrees and washing clothes with cold water.
The Bay Area was a model of cooperation during the early years of the COVID pandemic, as residents sheltered in place, lined up for vaccines and donned masks in public. Many locals looked on with consternation as health precautions became politicized in other parts of the country.
Yet, even in this conscientious region, vigilance hasn’t lasted. As
another winter COVID surge
grips the region, large numbers of people are
forgoing masks
and
skipping the latest booster
— a vital tool in preventing serious illness as immunity from previous shots or infection wanes.
Since the emergence of vaccines and better COVID treatments — and the lifting of blunt governmental measures such as mask mandates — the public approach to the
coronavirus
has become
more laissez-faire.
Some call this approach the
“figure it out yourself”
era of the pandemic. But individual choices still exact a heavy toll on vulnerable populations, such as older and immunocompromised people, some of whom are retreating again from the public square.
Compounding widespread apathy toward the latest surge is considerable confusion over how to behave at this stage in the crisis. Experts say, in particular, that the rollout of the new bivalent vaccine booster — the first to target both the original coronavirus and the omicron family of variants — has been tepid. Without a strong marketing push and government resources put into distribution, many Americans are unaware of the booster’s benefits, or even its existence.
“The situation is that people are left to decide as individuals,” said Denise Herd, a UC Berkeley behavioral sciences professor in the School of Public Health. “Without a lot of information, without a lot of support for some of these public health measures, we’re going to see what we do now.”
To date, only 20.5% of eligible Californians have received the bivalent vaccine, leaving the majority more vulnerable to severe illness. California’s uptake is higher than the
national average of 14.6%,
but still only a fraction of the 72.5% of people who received the initial two-dose vaccine series. The bivalent vaccine is authorized for Californians
older than 6 months,
depending on
when someone completed their initial two-dose series and when they last received the older “monovalent” booster.
Bay Area counties lead the California average in booster uptake, but the proportion is still relatively low, ranging from 23% to 38% of the eligible population. That may be contributing to the
sharp increase in local COVID cases
in the past month and
rising hospitalizations
that further tax a medical system already straining with outbreaks of flu and respiratory syncytial virus, or RSV.
“Pandemic fatigue fatigue” and confusion
Some fatigue with the pandemic is “natural, expected and real,” said Marin County public health officer Matt Willis. He noted that the term
has been used since 2020.
Perhaps now, “we’re getting pandemic fatigue fatigue,” Willis said.
After all, the ability to self-regulate “is like a muscle that gets tired,” said Benjamin Rosenberg, a psychology professor at Dominican University of California. “Making that risk calculation every time you go out, it’s exhausting,” he said.
A
recent Chronicle survey
found fewer Bay Area residents wearing masks to go to the supermarket, despite the current COVID resurgence. While not a scientific study, comments offered to reporters — people without masks said they “gave up” and wanted to “move on with life” — underscored the public health challenge of encouraging voluntary compliance.
It’s easier to make healthy decisions when people have clear, credible and accessible information, and for the decision itself to be relatively easy to make, said Stanford medicine Professor Kevin Schulman, who researched marketing campaigns for the initial vaccines in 2021. But in the current pandemic landscape, Schulman said, it’s hard to find those attributes.
“This is no longer a scientific undertaking that all of us are following every week,” Schulman said.
Indeed, added Rosenberg, other “big-ticket items replaced COVID at the top of the list of things people are seeking to read about,” whether inflation, layoffs, Ukraine, abortion rights, the Warriors or the weather. And there’s only so much bad news that’s healthy to absorb: psychologists have actually measured
an increase in news-related stress,
according to the American Psychological Association.
“Some people are quite literally turning away from information about COVID. It’s almost like an ‘ignorance is bliss’ instinct,” Rosenberg said.
The waning attention is lessening cooperation with public health efforts. A September poll found, for instance, that
half of the American public
had heard “little or nothing” about the bivalent vaccine.
But lukewarm messaging and the lack of a mass marketing campaign share the blame, Schulman said. “We’re not putting nearly as much effort into this as we put into getting people to vote for somebody,” he said, referring to political ads during the midterm elections.
Information isn’t reaching the people who need it most, added Debbie Toth, CEO of the Pleasant Hill-based nonprofit Choice in Aging. Older people get their information mostly from radio and television news, and sometimes the local newspaper. “I can tell you that older adults are not going to public health websites to look things up,” she said.
Lack of federal funding, mobilization
The White House
has acknowledged the confusion
to some extent. But it has also blamed Congress for failing to authorize additional funding to support the coronavirus response.
Meanwhile, the Centers for Disease Control has delegated much of the pandemic response to state and local public health departments who, in turn, say they’re looking to the CDC for guidance, said Stanford medicine Professor Seema Yasmin, an expert in science communication.
“In the middle of that, you have hundreds of millions of Americans who are like, ‘Who’s in charge of what’s going on, and what should I do?’” Yasmin said.
Resources are “really limited,” with no additional federal funding to do mass vaccination sites or other large campaigns, said San Francisco Health Officer Susan Philip.
Programs such as those that sent teams of people into nursing homes to vaccinate seniors in 2021 have been curtailed or eliminated.
“It’s the people with health insurance, with computers, with transportation options that still can really choose to be vaccinated or not,” said UC Berkeley’s Herd.
Some older and disabled people concerned
The urge to get back to “normal” life
may be stronger
among younger people, but they’re also at lower risk. More than half of confirmed COVID cases in California are among those aged 18 to 49, according to the most recent data from the
state COVID-19 dashboard.
Yet, Californians older than 65 — who are one-sixth of the population — make up nearly three-quarters of confirmed deaths in the state.
Another group at heightened risk of severe illness and hospitalization are people whose immune systems are compromised. As masks come off and precautions melt away, disabled writer, speaker and model Charis Hill, who has the inflammatory disease ankylosing spondylitis, has gone into isolation for self-protection.
“The fatigue of a lot of non-disabled people is that they want to travel again,” Hill said. “My fatigue is I just want autonomy over my own life and daily living activities.”
A return to normal ignores that “normal has never been good for disabled people,” Hill said.
Some jurisdictions are now moving to reinstate limited regulations. Last week, the Oakland City Council
reimposed a mask mandate
inside publicly operated buildings after lobbying from groups such as Senior & Disability Action.
Senior & Disability Action director Jessica Lehman despaired of the mind-set that COVID isn’t serious if mostly older and disabled people are going to the hospital and dying. It reinforces the idea that “seniors and disabled people are less important, less valued in society,” she said.
But most public health officials remain reluctant to enact mask mandates. “We will not be mandating behaviors unless there’s a major change in the virus,” such as a more virulent strain that’s highly infectious, Willis said.
Possible solutions
Short of across-the-board mandates or expensive marketing and incentive campaigns, health experts see ways the general public could be engaged again in helping to slow the virus and protecting themselves.
“You change the environment to make the healthy choice the easy choice,” said Dr. Sara Cody, the public health officer for Santa Clara County.
Simple measures can go a long way: offering free masks at the entrance of buildings, or suggesting patients get the bivalent vaccine when they visit their doctor or go to the pharmacy to pick up a prescription. The key is to grab their attention “at the fleeting moment” they become motivated, said Dominican’s Rosenberg.
It may also involve a rebranding of the vaccine: If part of pandemic fatigue derives from the sense of uncertainty, then “the vaccine itself is actually the remedy because it makes you safer in every way,” said Marin County’s Willis.
Added San Francisco’s Philip, “we need to reinforce the message that … it’s very effective at keeping people out of the hospital.”
Claire Hao is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: claire.hao@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @clairehao_
Singer Kelechi Kalu of West Hollywood rehearses his music in Los Angeles on Aug. 4. He prefers rehearsing in a private space for fear of monkeypox. (Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)
As Kelechi Kalu books gigs as a musician, he wonders whether he is putting himself at risk for monkeypox.
He finds himself second-guessing how close people are getting to him at bars or music venues. He got nervous when his boyfriend said he had scheduled a massage. He has even avoided trying on clothes when out shopping, worried that the virus could spread on contaminated fabric.
“I haven’t necessarily stopped going out,” said Kalu, a queer man living in West Hollywood, “but I’d be lying if I said that monkeypox wasn’t on my mind 24/7.”
For many Californians — especially gay and bisexual men — worries about the disease have transformed the ways they have fun and connect.
Right now, Kalu is not eligible for a vaccine to combat monkeypox, an infectious disease that can cause painful lesions. The scarcity of vaccines to combat the virus, which has disproportionately hit men who have sex with men, has led health agencies to limit who can get the shots as they await more doses.
So gay and bisexual men, transgender people and others worried about their risk are coming up with practical strategies to protect themselves as they wait for vaccinations. The virus can spread through skin-to-skin contact with lesions, scabs or infected fluids, as well as through contaminated clothing or bedding. Health officials say it can also travel through respiratory droplets.
The illness is rarely fatal, but can be excruciatingly painful, leave enduring scars, and force people to isolate for weeks. Dr. Kaiyti Duffy, chief medical officer for the Los Angeles LGBT Center, said some patients have suffered lesions that make it agonizing to sit, stand or have a bowel movement. The need to isolate has also forced some patients to “out themselves” to employers, she said.
“The government needs to produce more vaccine and get it in the arms of people who need it — like now,” said Matthew J. Mimiaga, a professor of epidemiology and psychiatry who directs the UCLA Center for LGBTQ+ Advocacy, Research and Health. “But I don’t think gay and bisexual men will let that be the only prevention opportunity that they take.”
As of Thursday, more than 1,300 monkeypox cases had been reported across California, including more than 450 in the Los Angeles and Long Beach areas.
Alarm over the spread of the virus, which prompted emergency declarations from Gov. Gavin Newsom and the Biden administration last week, has spurred many queer men and transgender people to change how they are socializing, celebrating, and seeking love and sex. Some said they were steering clear of crowds or not seeking out new partners.
Much like COVID-19, “the more contacts you have, the more risk you have — and others have — of getting exposed,” said Dan Wohlfeiler, co-founder of Building Healthy Online Communities, a public-private partnership between dating sites and apps and STD and HIV prevention organizations. His group has encouraged people to ask sexual partners if they have had any recent rashes or sores; to get a phone number or other contact information for any hookups to alert them if they were exposed; and to hold off on sex if they feel unwell, among other guidance.
Sexual expression “is a huge part of gay culture and building gay community,” said Ian W. Holloway, a UCLA professor of social welfare and director of its Gay Sexuality and Social Policy Initiative. But “in the face of a pathogen that’s spreading in a way that we haven’t seen before … it’s not a bad idea to press pause for a period of time. We know the vaccine is on its way.”
Matías Gomez Constenla, a bartender at the Eagle LA, said that people seem to be going out less; some are suggesting leaving shirts on at circuit parties that are normally a bonanza of skin. In San Francisco, writer and activist Race Bannon has noticed that whenever someone comes up and wants a hug, “they’re back to asking me, ‘Are you hugging?'”
At the New Jalisco Bar in downtown Los Angeles, bartender Lorena Garcia lamented that the crowds had dwindled with the latest COVID wave and the added threat of monkeypox. “It has slowed down a bit here at night,” Garcia said in Spanish, as roughly half a dozen men sipped Bud Lights and watched a performer lip-sync to Mexican ballads.
Garcia missed the usual tips, but was glad that the regulars were paying attention. “Everyone is definitely aware of the danger,” the bartender said.
And in Palm Springs, an event planner said monkeypox had stirred up confusion in his industry. “Everyone’s asking, ‘What do we do?’ There’s a fear factor around travel,” said the event planner, who asked not to use his full name to avoid hurting his career. “It’s such a destination valley for the gay community and now people are asking, ‘Do I really want to get in that hot tub?'”
Community advocates have come up with practical guides to help sexually active people reduce their risks.
“There’s never been a better time to dress from top to bottom in latex or leather,” the San Francisco AIDS Foundation advised people headed to a kink and fetish festival. The foundation also encouraged people to “consider skipping the dark, back rooms at parties if they’re super crowded and there’s no way to control who you’re bumping up against and rubbing skin-to-skin with.”
Another guide, titled “Six Ways We Can Have Safer Sex in the Time of Monkeypox,” suggested that “it might be time to hang up the group sex and saunas until we all get shots one and two of the vaccine,” framing it as a stopgap measure until there are adequate supplies of the shots.
That guide, written by investigators with the LGBTQ community-led survey RESPND-MI, also suggested “sex pods” to reduce the risk. Those are the sexual equivalent of the insulated groups that people formed early in the COVID pandemic to keep socializing in smaller circles: groups of people who agree only to have sex with other members, after first checking for symptoms.
Grant Roth, one of the investigators with RESPND-MI, said that the most obvious way to protect oneself is to limit or abstain from sex, “but as we know historically, that does not work for a lot of people.”
“If you can’t get the average American to wear a mask to the grocery store, it’s a little myopic to tell gay men that they need to stay home and not have sex for an indefinite number of months” until the vaccine is rolled out, said Dr. Timothy M. Hall, a health sciences assistant clinical professor in UCLA’s Center for Behavioral and Addiction Medicine.
In Hollywood, marketing consultant Andrew Beaver said he’s not trying to meet new partners online, instead focusing on people he has already met. That makes it easier “to have a conversation about what’s going on,” said Beaver, a 59-year-old gay man. Hooking up with “somebody I just met and meeting in an environment that is darker or there isn’t a lot of pre-conversation … that is something that, because of where we are right now, I have decided not to do.”
After repeated attempts, he recently got his first shot of the vaccine.
One challenge is that condoms go only so far to thwart a disease that can be spread by lesions all over the body, said Duffy of the Los Angeles LGBT Center. So Duffy said the center has urged people to have honest conversations with sexual partners about any possible exposures. If people are meeting through an app, those conversations can happen before they even meet.
“There is a level of responsibility that we have to ourselves and to our partners,” said Jeffrey C. King, founder and executive director of In the Meantime Men’s Group, which aims to enrich and empower Black gay men of all ages. King, who is gay, said someone he phoned recently told him that they had monkeypox.
That kind of openness needs to happen more, King said, but is often thwarted “because of this whole thing around stigma and shame.” Wohlfeiler noted that even the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has gotten unusually frank about ways to reduce sexual risk, including suggesting that sexually active people consider touching themselves at a distance from a partner.
“The things that had given us freedom as a community to be sexual” — prophylactic treatments like PrEP to prevent HIV infection — “are not effective in this instance,” said Troy Masters, publisher of the Los Angeles Blade, an LGBTQ newspaper that recently helped host a forum on monkeypox. “So we’re in an odd space of not really understanding what we can do to have sexual expression — unless we’re just very, very cautious and mindful of the person that we’re with.”
Although the virus can spread during sexual encounters, health agencies and community groups have reminded people that other forms of skin-to-skin contact can also pose a risk. The Sacramento LGBT Community Center, which operates shelters for teens and young adults, has also cautioned them against sharing bedding and clothing.
“If I’m playing basketball, or if I’m in a club dancing” with skin-to-skin contact with someone who has lesions, “then I run the risk of contracting it,” said Alexis Sanchez, director of advocacy and training for the Sacramento center. She added that masks can double as a tool to protect against respiratory droplets for both monkeypox and COVID.
Sanchez, like others, said that health agencies and community groups have been walking a tightrope, trying to highlight that queer communities have been disproportionately hit by the rise of monkeypox and need to be targeted for help, while not stigmatizing them or perpetuating the idea that only gay men can contract the disease.
At Precinct, a downtown bar that caters to a more hirsute gay crowd, Chris Reyes and Bobby Cortez were hanging out on the patio after getting vaccinated the previous week. Cortez was glad that public health officials were prioritizing gay men and others at higher risk for vaccines, but expressed frustration that “they’re making it out to be just a gay thing.”
“My co-worker said, ‘You can’t get it if you’re not gay,'” Cortez said. “That’s a huge mistake, that people can think that.”
Kalu is in a monogamous relationship, but he worries about getting infected in other ways, including social events with friends. For the West Hollywood resident, who got COVID more than two years ago and has suffered enduring conditions, including nerve pain, the rise of monkeypox cases feels like being pulled back to the beginning of the pandemic.
“Two years later, I’m an anxious asthmatic mess and a new girl is here in town and her name is monkeypox and she’s come to get us,” Kalu said. “I don’t understand why we’re treating this as if we didn’t just go through another pandemic.”
Health and community groups have faulted the slow rollout of vaccines. Tyler TerMeer, chief executive of the San Francisco AIDS Foundation, lamented “the lack of urgency when a public health crisis is impacting the men-who-have-sex-with-men community in our country.” For some, the moment has pernicious echoes not only of COVID but of the beginnings of the AIDS epidemic.
“I’m from a generation which remembers what the stigma of HIV/AIDS was like in the ’80s and ’90s,” said Dorian Wood, 47, a gender-fluid musician who uses the pronouns she and they. Wood said she was the first person vaccinated against monkeypox at the Los Angeles LGBT Center in Hollywood. She was alarmed by government messaging that she felt was “singling us out,” rather than urging everyone to take precautions to avoid the virus.
“It’s infuriating. I feel like we are left, once again, fending for ourselves and taking care of our own,” Wood said.
Duffy said she hopes that the emergency declarations by Newsom and local officials will translate into more resources. “If there continues to be no funding and no messaging about what an emergency this is for those of us who are caring for the LGBT community, it’s going to spread,” she said.
Roth said that thankfully, there are already vaccines and treatment to combat monkeypox, unlike when HIV began to threaten queer communities. But the long and devastating history of AIDS in this country underscores that “in times of health crisis, the queer community really does step up for themselves,” he said.
Gay men and other queer people at risk have clamored for the vaccines when they can get them: In San Francisco and Los Angeles, people have waited hours to get the shots. An L.A. County public health official said that last month, when the department opened up thousands of additional slots on an online portal for monkeypox vaccinations, they were filled within three hours. At a recent news conference, TerMeer said the wait list for vaccines at the San Francisco AIDS Foundation had surpassed 10,000.
“I don’t know a single person that’s hesitating to get the vaccine,” said Bannon, the San Francisco activist. That too is the legacy of decades of the HIV/AIDS crisis, said Bannon, 68, who is HIV-positive and lost a partner. “Trust me, if anyone I knew back then knew that they could go and get a shot and stop it — they would have done it.”
Times staff writer Grace Toohey contributed to this report.
This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
Millions of California taxpayers will get “inflation relief” payments after lawmakers have reached an agreement on the framework of the 2022-23 budget. The deal also suspends the state’s sales tax on diesel.
“The centerpiece of the agreement, a $17 billion inflation relief package, will offer tax refunds to millions of working Californians,” said a joint statement from Gov. Gavin Newsom, Senate President pro Tempore Toni Atkins and Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon on Sunday night.
The framework includes giving 23 million Californians direct payments of up to $1,050. The payments would be issued via direct deposit refunds or debit cards to tax filers by late October, according to the Newsom administration. The state’s Franchise Tax Board estimates that all would be issued by the end of 2022 or early next year.
Here’s how the direct payments would work: Taxpayers would receive either $350, $250 or $200 based on their income level with an additional payment of the same amount if they have at least one dependent.
Single filers who make less than $75,000 would get $350. Joint filers with an income under $150,000 would receive $700. If they have at least one dependent, they will receive an additional $350.
So for example, that means a married couple earning $100,000 per year with one child would get $1,050.
About 82% of the state’s beneficiaries are in this income level.
Single filers who make $75,001 to $125,000 would get $250. Joint filers with an income between $150,001 and $250,000 would receive $500. If they have at least one dependent, they will receive an additional $250.
About 12% of beneficiaries are in this level.
Single filers who make $125,001 to $250,000 would get $200. Joint filers who make between $250,001 and $500,000 would receive $400. If they have at least one dependent, they will receive an additional $200.
About 6% of beneficiaries are in this level.
Here’s what else is in the deal: Beginning on Oct. 1, the state will suspect the diesel sales tax, which is now 23 cents per gallon, for 12 months.
“The state will provide local governments with the equivalent amount of revenue, estimated at $439 million, so that there will be no impact on local transportation funding projects,” H.D. Palmer with the Department of Finance told KCRA 3.
This comes as the last word on Friday was that a suspension of a gas tax was off the table as Newsom and Democratic leaders refused, arguing it would not guarantee a big enough price drop to benefit drivers.
Sunday’s deal also includes additional funding to help people pay for rent and utility bills.
The release from the governor and legislative leaders also said California would “become the first state to achieve universal access to health care coverage” but does not spell out the details.
And the framework would provide more than $200 million in additional funding for reproductive health care services.
“This budget builds on our unprecedented commitment to transform the resources available in our state, from a $47 billion multi-year infrastructure and transportation package to education and health care, showing the nation what a true pro-life agenda looks like,” the joint statement said.
The deal comes as Californians have struggled with rising gas prices.
On Sunday, the state’s average gallon of regular gas cost $6.321. Although that isn’t as high as the record of $6.438, which was set on June 14. And diesel prices are even higher at $6.973.
More than 360,000 people left California in 2021, in what some are calling “The California Exodus” — many leaving for states like Texas, Arizona and Washington.
And a rising number of former Californians are migrating out of the country altogether and are instead heading south of the border. Many are seeking a more relaxed and affordable lifestyle in Mexico.
California continuously ranks high as one of the country’s most expensive states to live in. The median asking price for a home in California is about $797,470 — only 25% of the state’s households could afford that in the fourth quarter of 2021.
California’s population growth has been declining for more than 30 years now. But thanks to the rise in remote work due to the Covid-19 pandemic, those trends have accelerated. The ability to work anywhere has 62% of Americans considering moving to a new country.
However, there are some setbacks. Many critics argue that Americans are driving up the cost of housing for locals and pricing them out of the market.
Watch the video to learn more about the impact of this migration trend.
The appeal of off-grid homes has grown in part because utilities have become less reliable. As natural disasters linked to climate change have increased, there have been more extended blackouts in California, Texas, Louisiana and other states.
A Critical Year for Electric Vehicles
The popularity of battery-powered cars is soaring worldwide, even as the overall auto market stagnates.
Californians are also upset that electricity rates keep rising and state policymakers have proposed reducing incentives for installing solar panels on homes connected to the grid. Installing off-grid solar and battery systems is expensive, but once the systems are up and running, they typically require modest maintenance and homeowners no longer have an electric bill.
RMI, a research organization formerly known as the Rocky Mountain Institute, has projected that by 2031 most California homeowners will save money by going off the grid as solar and battery costs fall and utility rates increase. That phenomenon will increasingly play out in less sunny regions like the Northeast over the following decades, the group forecasts.
David Hochschild, chairman of the California Energy Commission, a regulatory agency, said the state’s residents tend to be early adopters, noting that even a former governor, Jerry Brown, lives in an off-grid home. But Mr. Hochschild added that he was not convinced that such an approach made sense for most people. “We build 100,000 new homes a year in California, and I would guess 99.99 percent of them are connected to the grid,” he said.
Some energy experts worry that people who are going off the grid could unwittingly hurt efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. That is because the excess electricity that rooftop solar panels produce will no longer reach the grid, where it can replace power from coal or natural gas plants. “We don’t need everybody to cut the cord and go it alone,” said Mark Dyson, senior principal with the carbon-free electricity unit of RMI.
Solar Panels and a View
Pepe Cancino moved from Santa Monica to Nevada County in 2020 after he and his wife, Diane, lost their jobs during the pandemic. They bought five acres with spectacular views of snow-capped mountains. Mr. Cancino, 42, a former home health care worker, picked up a chain saw and an ax and began learning how to build a house and generate his own power.
When they finish their two-bedroom, two-and-a-half-bathroom home this fall, the family, including their 15-year-old daughter, will generate electricity and use a well for water.
The Omicron variant of the coronavirus is now spreading rapidly across California, fueling big upticks in infections across the state.
At least three California health systems have reported that Omicron appears to account for 50% to 70% of new cases, state health officials said Thursday, and clinical and wastewater data suggest Omicron is now spreading in most parts of California.
However, the full scope of this latest wave remains to be seen.
Cases are expected to spike, perhaps to unprecedented levels. Some hospitals are likely to again come under stress from a renewed influx of COVID-19 patients.
But for now, officials say they can contend with the surge by doubling down on common-sense safety practices and promoting vaccinations and booster shots, rather than resorting to new lockdown orders.
Los Angeles County provided a glimpse of what may be to come. A day after reporting 6,509 new coronavirus cases — which was more than twice the figure from the day before — county health officials reported an even higher infection total Thursday: 8,633.
“These numbers make it crystal clear that we’re headed into a very challenging time over the holiday,” county Public Health Director Barbara Ferrer said. “If our case numbers continue to increase at a rapid pace over this week and next, we could be looking at case numbers we have never seen before.”
What will the next few weeks look like?
As Omicron is still a relatively new arrival — its presence was first confirmed in California just three weeks ago — there are many unanswered questions as to what its impact will be.
One thing that seems certain, though, is that the variant can spread rapidly. Already, Omicron now constitutes 73% of the nation’s coronavirus cases, up from 13% the week before, according to federal estimates.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention say early forecasts suggest a large surge of infections could be reached by early January, and “the peak daily number of new infections could exceed previous peaks.”
“This rapid increase in the proportion of Omicron circulating around the country is similar to what we’ve seen around the world,” CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky said during a briefing. “Although this is a reminder of [the] continued threat of COVID-19 variants, this increase in Omicron proportion is what we anticipated and what we have been preparing for.”
Dr. Anthony Fauci, President Biden’s chief medical adviser, said in an interview on ABC that during this wave, almost everyone is “either going to get infected, particularly the unvaccinated, or be vaccinated.”
“And the vaccinated people, particularly the boosted people … will either be protected from infection, or if they do get infected, they’ll have a relatively mild course of infection,” said Fauci, who expected a peak in Omicron cases soon, within a matter of weeks, followed by “just as dramatic a decline.”
In various television interviews, Fauci has said that family and friends can expect relatively safe and enjoyable Christmas gatherings — without masks — if everyone 5 and older is vaccinated and has received a booster shot if eligible. He also suggested attendees get tested before gathering.
“If tests are available, by all means go the extra step, go the extra mile to get testing, which we’re recommending just to get that extra added cushion of alleviation of concern,” Fauci told NBC.
But, he added, “if you don’t have the availability of the test and you are fully vaccinated and boosted, you should feel comfortable having a holiday meal or gathering with family members who are also vaccinated and boosted.”
One thing appears clear: Omicron will become dominant, and many people will get infected.
A highly influential COVID-19 forecast is projecting that the Omicron surge may result in as many as 400,000 new coronavirus cases a day across the nation — significantly higher than last winter’s record of 250,000 cases a day.
The University of Washington’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation projects that the Omicron surge will continue rising swiftly through December and into January, potentially peaking later next month or in early February. Despite the increase in cases, predictions indicate there will be fewer daily deaths than during last winter’s devastating peak.
The institute also predicts that single-day COVID-19 deaths could climb as high as 2,000 nationally by early February, about the same number reported during the Delta surge but fewer than the nearly 3,500 daily deaths during last winter’s peak.
The forecast for California projects as many as 150 COVID-19 deaths a day by the end of February, a rate similar to the peak of the summer Delta wave. Still, that is far fewer than last winter’s surge, when California was tallying 550 deaths a day.
What are California officials doing?
Seven UC campuses have delayed in-person return to campus, and all UC and Cal State campuses will require boosters for eligible students. The state has also announced that healthcare workers will be required to get COVID-19 vaccine boosters in hopes of protecting both the medical community and the vulnerable populations they serve.
Some cities are taking their own preemptive steps. This week, Oakland moved to join Los Angeles, San Francisco, West Hollywood and Berkeley in requiring proof of vaccination to patronize indoor restaurants and gyms. And in San Jose, the mayor has said he wants to require all city employees to receive booster shots as a condition of employment and anyone who enters city-owned facilities to do the same.
California is also preparing to provide rapid tests for students in K-12 public schools and expand hours at busy screening sites.
“After our kids have enjoyed the holidays … we want to make sure they come back in as good a shape as they left, meaning we want to make sure that we are testing our kids and preparing them to come back,” said Gov. Gavin Newsom.
Newsom emphasized California’s commitment to keeping schools open for in-person instruction — a pledge reiterated in a joint statement his office released Wednesday morning from education-related organizations including the California State Parent Teacher Assn., California Teachers Assn., SEIU California, the state charter schools association and the California School Boards Assn.
Who is most at risk?
Experts say being vaccinated and boosted continues to provide strong protection, especially when it comes to severe disease.
The big fear is for the unvaccinated.
Unvaccinated people are at highest risk of severe illness from any coronavirus infection. The first apparently publicly confirmed Omicron case in the U.S. that has resulted in a death was reported in Harris County, Texas — a man in his 50s who was unvaccinated, had previously survived a coronavirus infection, and had underlying health conditions that placed him at higher risk of severe complications.
“Due to Omicron, we expect a significant rise in cases,” said Jeff Zients, Biden’s COVID-19 task force coordinator. “Fully vaccinated people, particularly those with a boost, are highly protected. But due to Omicron’s highly transmissible nature, we will see fully vaccinated people get COVID. They’ll likely be asymptomatic or feel under the weather for a few days. Let’s be clear: Unvaccinated people are at a higher risk of getting severely ill from COVID, getting hospitalized and dying.”
The CDC has warned that hospitals could be further burdened with many healthcare workers forced to isolate due to their own coronavirus infections, as well as illnesses from other causes, such as flu.
In Los Angeles County, 68% of residents of all ages are fully vaccinated, according to data compiled by The Times. In San Francisco, that share is 81%.
The San Francisco Bay Area has some of the highest vaccination rates in state, and officials there believe that could help slow Omicron. But experts remain especially nervous about places with low vaccination rates, such as the Inland Empire and San Joaquin Valley.
One possibility is that the Bay Area will see a relatively small jump in hospitalizations; L.A. County, a medium jump and the Central Valley the highest jump, said Dr. Peter Chin-Hong, an infectious diseases expert at UC San Francisco.
That pattern would be similar to this year’s Delta surge, where the San Joaquin Valley’s peak summer hospitalization rate was twice as worse as Southern California’s and nearly three times as bad as the Bay Area’s. The San Joaquin Valley’s hospitals have been overwhelmed since the Delta surge began; the Bay Area’s hospitals have not sounded similar alarms.
How should we be looking at the numbers?
The consensus seems to be that cases will continue to rise, perhaps dramatically.
In the coming days, COVID-19 hospitalizations will be a more relevant way to determine actions that local authorities may need to take, said Ali Mokdad, a professor of health metrics sciences at the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation.
That’s because, while Omicron is rapidly spreading, there also will be a relatively high percentage of people infected with the variant who will remain asymptomatic, and a lower percentage of newly infected people who will require hospitalization.
In California, a hopeful scenario would be if Omicron’s disease severity is half of Delta’s and the state can double its booster uptake, raise its vaccination rate to 80% and lower the number of residents’ close contacts for the next month. That would result in a statewide winter peak of 10,000 COVID-19 patients by late January — about half last winter’s surge and 20% worse than the summer Delta wave.
“Although 10,000 hospitalizations … across the state are far more than we ever want to see, it is more manageable than the alternatives,” Ferrer said. “Realistically, to avoid the worst of the scenarios, we need to work right now to increase vaccinations and booster uptake.”
As of Wednesday, 3,622 COVID-19 positive patients were hospitalized statewide. That’s up about 6.5% from two weeks ago.
Does Omicron cause less severe COVID-19 than Delta?
There are some hints of optimism among early data from England, Scotland, Denmark and South Africa, which suggested that an Omicron infection resulted in a 40% to 70% reduced need for hospitalization compared with the Delta variant.
There’s also no evidence that people who are vaccinated and have received a booster shot are getting severely ill with Omicron, unless they have a significantly weakened immune system.
That raises the possibility that this winter in the U.S. won’t be as deadly as last year’s devastating surge.
“However, we must wait to see what happens in our own population, which has its own demographic considerations,” Fauci said.
The U.S. also has other challenges, with a lower rate of vaccination than Britain or Denmark. But while hospitals in Denmark and South Africa are not being overwhelmed, the healthcare system “is having a tough time in England — because they were already working so hard with Delta, kind of like parts of our country,” said Dr. Eric Topol, director of the Scripps Research Translational Institute in La Jolla.
What about hospitals?
The biggest worry is that Omicron could spread so fast that some hospitals could still be overwhelmed. The ultra-contagious nature of Omicron means that an extraordinarily high number of people could get infected simultaneously.
Even if a lower percentage of them need hospital care, if there are so many more people who are suddenly infected, that could result in strained hospital systems and, in some areas, overwhelm them, especially in areas with low vaccination rates.
“If you have a much larger number of individual cases, the fact that you have so many more cases might actually obviate the effect of it being less severe,” Fauci said.
Los Angeles County health officials reported 3,512 new coronavirus cases on Sunday, more than double the number of cases recorded just a few days before.
That tally follows 3,730 new cases reported in LA. County on Saturday — the highest single-day total in months — sparking concerns of another winter surge stoked by holiday festivities. Meanwhile, COVID-19 hospitalizations are on the rise in California as the Omicron variant spreads.
There were 3,557 COVID-19 patients in the state’s hospitals as of Saturday, an increase of roughly 13% from two weeks before, according to The Times’ hospitalization tracker. On Sunday, L.A. County reported that 742 people were hospitalized with COVID-19, and nine people died from the virus.
Businesses in L.A. County are reporting notable outbreaks among workers, including 132 staff members who recently tested positive at SpaceX corporate headquarters in Hawthorne; 85 workers at the FedEx shipping center near Los Angeles International Airport; and 28 staff at Gjelina, a popular Venice restaurant.
California recorded 49 cases of the Omicron variant as of Wednesday, with 38 of those in L.A. County. That’s much lower than the 184,700 identified cases of the Delta variant, which remains the state’s dominant strain.
Health officials expect the number of Omicron cases to rise, as the variant is believed to be more contagious than Delta and better at evading immunity generated by vaccines or previous infections. Experts say vaccines still offer protection against severe illness and death caused by Omicron.
Although there are early indications that Omicron might cause less severe illness than other variants, hospitals could be overwhelmed if enough people are infected, health officials say. That comes as the system already faces multiple challenges, including significant staffing shortages and increased demand for other healthcare services such as flu treatment and procedures that were put on hold earlier in the pandemic.
Orange and Riverside counties on Friday reported their first documented cases of the Omicron variant. In Orange County, the variant was found to have infected a fully vaccinated man who had recently traveled domestically outside California and experienced mild illness, public health authorities said.
In Riverside County, the variant infected a 41-year-old fully vaccinated man who was tested in L.A. County on Dec. 8, public health officials said.
Outbreaks have forced the postponement of sporting events, including the Los Angeles Rams home game against the Seattle Seahawks scheduled for Sunday, which was moved to Tuesday, and the Anaheim Ducks road game against the Calgary Flames slated for Tuesday, which has not yet been rescheduled.
Nationally, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention forecasts that there could be more than 1 million new coronavirus cases recorded the week of Christmas. By contrast, around Halloween, there were 500,000 new weekly cases.
With nearly half of California residents still not fully immunized against COVID-19 and the highly infectious delta variant in wide circulation, the state could be facing a surge up to two-thirds the size of last summer’s wave of infection despite generally high vaccination rates, health officials said Tuesday.
If such a surge materializes, it almost certainly will be far less deadly and disruptive than what the state endured over the winter, when more than 22,000 Californians died between Thanksgiving and the end of January and the state was largely shut down for several months.
People who are not vaccinated are bearing the vast majority of disease burden, making up over 99% of hospitalizations and deaths, state officials said, and that trend is expected to continue.
New cases have climbed slightly among the vaccinated over the past few weeks, and are now hovering just under 1 case a day per 100,000 vaccinated people. But they’ve spiked among those who are not vaccinated, from a low of roughly 3 cases a day per 100,000 unvaccinated people a month ago to about 5 cases per 100,000 currently.
“We need to really move the dial on vaccinations. That’s still our way out of this pandemic,” said Dr. Erica Pan, the state epidemiologist, during a panel Tuesday hosted by the California Medical Association.
All metrics of the pandemic — including cases, hospitalizations, intensive care admissions and deaths — hit unprecedented lows just before the state reopened June 15, Pan noted. “So we have a lot of runway” to contain the spread now, even as transmission increases statewide, she said.
But the state’s reopening coincided with the introduction of the delta variant in California, which is leading to a faster than expected upswing in cases. Fourth of July gatherings likely contributed to the rapid increase. “Do we think it will be as devastating as last winter? That seems extremely unlikely,” Pan said. “But we could see a half to two-thirds of what we were seeing last summer.”
California is averaging roughly 2,000 cases a day — more than double the caseload from early June. Cases peaked at about 9,600 a day during last summer’s surge. Hospitalizations have increased about 78% over the past month, to just under 1,600 as of Monday. At the summer peak about 7,000 people were hospitalized.
Dr. Erica Pan, state epidemiologist with the California Department of Public Health, in a news conference at Oakland Coliseum on March 11 in Oakland.
Santiago Mejia/The Chronicle
Los Angeles County has reported especially troubling spikes recently, including five consecutive days with more than 1,000 cases. The county hasn’t been consistently over 1,000 cases a day since early March.
San Francisco reported 153 new cases on Tuesday alone, according to Chronicle data tracking, though city officials said that number did not represent the actual total for the day and likely included backdated cases. The city reported about 30 cases a day last week, nearly double the week before.
Several Bay Area counties have seen cases double over the past week or two.
“The numbers out of L.A. are sobering. But the numbers in the Bay Area, especially when we look at counties that have the lower vaccination rates, are sobering too,” said Dr. Kirsten Bibbins-Domingo, vice dean for population health and health equity at UCSF. “It’s hard not to get completely demoralized by it. We’re really just a month out from the full reopening.”
Dr. Nicholas Moss, the Alameda County health officer, said he’d expected cases to increase after the state reopened, but not this quickly. “My largest concern is that it’s going to get worse before it gets better,” he said. “We haven’t peaked yet with this summer wave. But my hope is that we don’t see as much impact of severe illness because of vaccination.”
The climbing cases are triggering renewed urgency to increase the pace of vaccination statewide, especially among younger people who have lower rates than older adults and have generally driven the spread of disease in previous surges. About 80% of adults 50 and older are at least partly vaccinated statewide, compared with only 66% of adults 18 to 49, and just 43% of teens age 12 to 17.
Generally, Black and Latino Californians also have lower vaccination rates, compared to white and Asian residents.
Coaxing people who haven’t yet been vaccinated to get shots now takes more time, effort and patience, public health officials have said. But they’re running out of time to protect those individuals as the delta variant leads to much faster and easier spread of disease.
“The vaccination game right now is slow, but people are still getting vaccinated every day,” Bibbins-Domingo said. “Right now, the urgency of the high cases we’re seeing makes us think through what else is at our disposal.”
Pan and other officials have said that they want to avoid returning to stringent public health restrictions, including another universal mask mandate. Currently people who are not vaccinated are required to wear masks indoors, but the rule is not often enforced.
The state announced this week that it would require masks for all K-12 students, even those who are vaccinated, when they return to class. The decision was made partly in light of the increasing case counts and the delta variant gaining a foothold.
“Certainly in levels of high community transmission, it makes sense to have more universal masking,” Pan said, though she stopped short of suggesting another statewide mandate was on the horizon. “If you’re in a high-risk setting, it’s the safest thing to mask. And it’s pretty easy to do. It’s one of the most effective and least disruptive tools we have.”
Erin Allday is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: eallday@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @erinallday
Gov. Newsom urges Californians to curb water use by 15 percent
Updated: 12:47 PM PDT Jul 8, 2021
it goes without saying we’re here with intention and purpose and that is to address the ongoing drought conditions in the state of California. As you may recall in april, we initiated our first proclamation of a state of emergency related to this year’s drought. We are now two years into a drought, having just come out of a five year drought that concluded uh just a few years ago arguably we have been in drought conditions as far back as 2000, not only here in the state of California, but all throughout the west coast of the United States. Some referring to the conditions in the west coast appropriately as a mega drought. These conditions are familiar to many Californians as a consequence, uh We have conservation as a way of life as it relates to being more efficient, more effective in terms of our use and utilization uh and distribution of water resources. However, uh conditions are such, they continue to devolve uh and as a consequence today uh we are doing what we had signaled was likely to happen not only after the initiation of an april proclamation of a state of emergency, but the subsequent state of emergency that we announced in May, we are back today Uh to sign an additional proclamation of a state of emergency, including additional nine counties total. Now, 50 of our 50 8 counties officially are now in uh a order that allows the ability for local water agencies as well as our state partners to be more efficient effective in terms of uh moving uh to draft addressed issues in real time. In essence clearing ole a lot of the hurdles. This fundamental proclamation just simply allows uh for the capacity to do things that otherwise would be laborious and take time to move more effectively inefficiently to address conditions as they take shape in real time. So 50 counties now in total, nine additional, as I noted moment ago, uh those nine includes san luis, Obispo marin county, in yo Monterey county, santa, barbara, santa clara, other counties, all north of the to Hatch appease interestingly. Uh We have now remaining counties primarily south of the Hatch peas, but about 42% of California’s population now are in counties that will fall under the guidelines. Uh And the requirements set forth in this proclamation, there is an additional uh order. We are also signing today, an executive order that executive order specifically will lay out um a framework to encourage voluntary water uh conservation efforts in the state of California. Wanna underscore voluntary water conservation. Here in the state of California. Uh we’re hopeful uh that people will take that mindset that we brought into. People in the state of California will take that mindset they brought into the last drought and extend that forward With a 15 voluntary reduction not only on residences, but industrial, commercial operations and agricultural operations. Uh, we’re encouraging people uh, to do the common sense things like reducing the amount of irrigation water you’re doing um, out on your lawns, for example, reducing uh, perhaps the uh, time uh, that you are in a shower, not eliminating that time. Not here, uh, nanny state, we’re not trying to hear be oppressive Again, these are voluntary standards. We have laid out a list of ideas that include just taking a look at where leaks may be occurring on your property, taking the opportunity to update the efficiency of your shower heads as an example when you’re doing a load of laundry, make sure it’s a full load of laundry. Just helps with water consumption as well as dishwasher. Make sure or just encourage you to take a look and you know have a full load dishwasher by the way you do those things. You also save money. Uh Oh it’s an opportunity not only save water, help us work through these drought conditions, but voluntarily. Uh this is an opportunity to remind you the opportunity to save money as well. Save our water dot com. Save our water dot com lays out a lot of ideas and specific uh strategies that we encourage you to take a look at. Uh So again, save our water dot com to learn more about how you can save money and you can help us through these challenging drought conditions. So that’s the two orders that were signing today proclamation state of emergency and an executive order which are in front of me. They may be in front of all of you with this wind uh in a second. So I’m mindful as I signed them to do so cautiously. But I just want to just highlight my appreciation uh to local water agencies, to local counties, uh and to the 40 million Californians. Uh we again have been through these uh proclamations before uh and we’ve come through them remarkably well because Californians have taken these uhh declarative directions, these voluntary efforts to heart and they’ve taken very, very seriously and just specific to that. I want to note uh that we had mandatory water conservation efforts during the last drought, Interestingly, per capita, we reduced water consumption by roughly 21% in this state Between 2013 and 2016. We brought in that mindset into this drought and this gives us an advantage over the last drought. We are currently Residential use in the state of California, currently is 16% below where we were in 2013 as we go in to this next drought. We also have been more effective and efficient in terms of water recycling storage. Uh and we have made a substantial amount of progress on groundwater strategies from sigma to Safe drinking water commitments, consolidations of small water agencies all up and down the state. And we are committing this year in addition to that, working with the legislature, billion dollar budget specific to drought because of California’s budget surplus, the 80 plus billion dollar operating surplus that we’re enjoying here in the state. We’re in a position to put $5.1 billion to use that will allow us to have emergency opportunities as well as medium and long term investments on water infrastructure all up and down the state of California. And so we are in a position uh that is a little bit more advantageous than the last time we went through uh a multi year drought. But nonetheless, uh sober reality is such uh that here we are again, uh and we will need to proceed with the lessons learned from the last drought, but with the benefits of those lessons now and the resources uh that we have not been afforded in the past, so with
Gov. Newsom urges Californians to curb water use by 15 percent
Updated: 12:47 PM PDT Jul 8, 2021
Gov. Gavin Newsom is urging California residents and businesses to voluntarily curb water use by 15% as the state’s drought conditions worsen. Newsom’s request is not an order, but it demonstrates the growing challenges of a drought that will only deepen throughout the summer and fall and is tied to recent heat waves. Newsom said the voluntary water conservation could include things like taking shorter showers, running dishwashers only when they are full and reducing the frequency of watering lawns. Newsom made the announcement Thursday at Lopez Lake in San Luis Obispo County, a Central Coast lake that’s well below capacity. San Luis Obispo County is among the areas now added to the state’s emergency drought declaration, up to 50 counties from 41 in May.Counties added to the state’s emergency proclamation are: Inyo, Marin, Mono, Monterey, San Luis Obispo, San Mateo, Santa Barbara, Santa Clara and Santa Cruz. The affected counties comprise about 42% of the state’s population, according to Newsom.Counties included in the proclamation are eligible for various state actions, including suspending some environmental regulations.— The Associated Press contributed reporting. This is a developing story. Stay with KCRA 3 for the latest.
SAN LUIS OBISPO, Calif. —
Gov. Gavin Newsom is urging California residents and businesses to voluntarily curb water use by 15% as the state’s drought conditions worsen.
Newsom’s request is not an order, but it demonstrates the growing challenges of a drought that will only deepen throughout the summer and fall and is tied to recent heat waves.
Newsom said the voluntary water conservation could include things like taking shorter showers, running dishwashers only when they are full and reducing the frequency of watering lawns.
Newsom made the announcement Thursday at Lopez Lake in San Luis Obispo County, a Central Coast lake that’s well below capacity.
San Luis Obispo County is among the areas now added to the state’s emergency drought declaration, up to 50 counties from 41 in May.
Counties added to the state’s emergency proclamation are: Inyo, Marin, Mono, Monterey, San Luis Obispo, San Mateo, Santa Barbara, Santa Clara and Santa Cruz. The affected counties comprise about 42% of the state’s population, according to Newsom.
Counties included in the proclamation are eligible for various state actions, including suspending some environmental regulations.
— The Associated Press contributed reporting.
This is a developing story. Stay with KCRA 3 for the latest.
