Next Tuesday, California is slated to reopen its doors following more than a year of pandemic-related restrictions. The state’s reopening system, known as the Blueprint for a Safer Economy, will dissolve, and businesses and houses of worship will be permitted to open without capacity limits or distancing restrictions. Life will …
Read More »COVID Puts Pregnant Women At Risk Of Childbirth Complications – Virus Update For May 14
More than a year into the COVID-19 pandemic, many basic questions about the virus have been answered, including how it spreads, how it responds to treatment, and how it affects the body. But even those lessons learned apply mostly to generally healthy people and those with the most common pre-existing …
Read More »Lull In COVID-19 Vaccine Interest Leads To Thousands Of Returned Doses – Virus Update For April 23
Soon after COVID-19 vaccines were first developed, health authorities estimated that as much as 40 to 50 percent of the population would be reluctant to get it. However, vaccination clinics in the San Joaquin Valley are already reporting a lull in demand, even though nearly 70 percent of the local …
Read More »For Truckers, Early Pandemic Was Defined By Uncertainty And Chaos – Virus Update For Mar. 26
The early days of the pandemic were challenging for truck drivers. As other workers were told to stay home, truckers kept going, delivering food, clothing and cleaning supplies for stores and hospitals throughout the country. On the road for days or weeks at a time, many were fearful of bringing …
Read More »It’s Been A Year Since COVID-19 Hit The Valley – Virus Update For Mar. 19
Like in so many places across the U.S., the coronavirus pandemic crept up on the San Joaquin Valley. Some of the region’s first official cases were linked to outbreaks on cruise ships that came into port in March, but as we later learned, the virus was already circulating long beforehand. …
Read More »How COVID-19 Has Complicated The Response To Valley Fever – Virus Update For Mar. 12
Even though COVID-19 has been the dominant public health threat for a year, first with a summer surge, then a winter surge, and now with the rollout of much-anticipated vaccines, other public health problems haven’t just disappeared. One long-standing health concern in the San Joaquin Valley is valley fever, a …
Read More »Vaccine Supply Whiplash, Plus The Latest On COVID In Valley Prisons – Virus Update For Feb. 26
Ever since the COVID-19 vaccine rollout began, every week has brought news of extremes, with success stories followed by supply problems and other hiccups in access and distribution. This week was no different, and included supply disruptions due to winter storms as well as an unexpected boost from the governor. …
Read More »COVID-19 Vaccines Not Yet Reaching All Communities Who Need Them – Virus Update For Feb. 19, 2021
Early on in the pandemic, the state of California put an emphasis on equity in its pandemic response, requiring specific levels of testing and outreach in disadvantaged census tracts in order for counties to advance through the state’s reopening blueprint. Now, obstacles to vaccine access have introduced the potential for …
Read More »COVID-19 Is Wreaking Havoc In State Hospitals, Too – Virus Update For Jan. 15
In the months since the pandemic began, COVID-19 has taken a tremendous toll on hospitals, where bedspace is at a minimum and staff are overworked , and prisons, where tight living quarters and mixed enforcement of safety precautions have left incarcerated people vulnerable to soaring infections . But the virus …
Read More »First Vaccines Arrive As COVID-19 Ravages Valley – Virus Update For Dec. 18
The first batches of the COVID-19 vaccine arrived in the Valley this week , and for many of us, the milestone represents a light at the end of a very long and traumatic tunnel. Healthcare workers with high patient exposure will be the first to receive this initial delivery of …
Read More »With Fresno’s African American COVID-19 Coalition, Leaders Aim To Curb Virus And Build Trust
It’s a Tuesday afternoon in downtown Fresno, and a line of cars has wrapped around the block from the Fresno Economic Opportunities Commission to Chukchansi Stadium. A petite karaoke singer belts out George Harrison on the sidewalk, while the drivers, masked and corralled into reserved parking spots, wait for Testing …
Read More »In Many Small Towns, Everyone Seems To Know Someone With COVID-19 – Virus Update For Nov. 13
After many weeks of holding steady, COVID-19 cases are once again on the rise, not just in other parts of the country, but also statewide and here in the Valley. Daily new cases are at the highest they’ve been since early September, case rates and positivity rates are increasing, and …
Read More »COVID-19 Stats Continue To Improve, But Death Data Tell A Darker Story – Virus Update For Oct. 2
When we seek to quantify the toll that COVID-19 is taking on our communities, we typically turn to official statistics like confirmed cases, hospitalization rates and, of course, death counts. But what if that final tally is an undercount, and the death toll is really much higher? An FM89 analysis …
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