latimes--2020-05-08--What COVID-19 patients young and old can teach us about the coronavirus

They ’ re the cases that stand out , because they don ’ t seem to fit the coronavirus pattern : A 32-year-old nurse died of COVID-19 after spending several days on a ventilator at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center .
A 25-year-old pharmacy technician who had seemed to be in good health had succumbed to COVID-19 in a Riverside County home .
It ’ s enough to make you wonder : Is the coronavirus more dangerous to younger people than scientists initially thought ?
When the outbreak took off in Wuhan , China , there was a distinct trend : The @ @ @ @ @ @ @ risk of death .
And as the virus spread around the world , that trend seemed to hold up .
A study published in the medical journal Lancet that analyzed more than 70,000 cases from January and February found that the fatality rate for COVID-19 patients in their 30s was 0.15 % , compared with 13.4 % for those 80 and older .
But in the U.S. , doctors on the front lines have noted strange and often alarming conditions in younger victims , including patients in their 30s and 40s dying of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Children and teens have ended up in hospital intensive care units with symptoms of a rare inflammatory syndrome called Kawasaki disease that could be related to COVID-19 , according to a bulletin released by the New York City Health Department this week .
For now , cases like these remain disparate pieces of a much larger puzzle .
As scientists dig deeper , they hope to learn more about the role of age as a COVID-19 risk factor and why the disease is so dangerous to the elderly .
But in the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ younger victims are still more the exception than the rule , even in the U.S.
Here ’ s a closer look at what they know so far , and what they ’ re still trying to find out .
Age is a factor in deaths , but not in infections Scientists generally agree that when it comes to age , the coronavirus doesn ’ t appear to discriminate , though pinning down the infection rate will require far more widespread testing than has been done so far .
“ Anyone at any age @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Timothy Brewer , an infectious disease specialist and epidemiologist at UCLA .
“ But we are seeing very different outcomes in what happens after people are infected.
” As the pandemic has grown , the risk of ending up in the hospital or dying has remained markedly higher for those in older age groups — a trend that ’ s become even clearer over time .
Soon after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention began monitoring the coronavirus ’ activity in the U.S. , it found that for the week ending March @ @ @ @ @ @ @ those 65 and older was 10.4 per 100,000 people , compared with 1.9 hospitalizations per 100,000 people ages 18 to 49 .
By May 2 , both figures had risen considerably — to 162.2 hospitalizations per 100,000 senior citizens and 26.2 per 100,000 younger adults — but the large gap remained .
COVID-19 hospitalization rates are lower in California , but they follow the same trend .
The most recent figures from the CDC ’ s COVID-NET surveillance network indicate that 56.9 out of every 100,000 Californians 65 and up had been hospitalized @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of every 100,000 Californians ages 18 to 49 .
In many infectious disease outbreaks , such as seasonal influenza , the very young and the very old face the greatest risk of serious illness and death .
Researchers are still puzzled as to why COVID-19 ’ s pattern is so one-sided , with infected children typically having only mild symptoms of the disease .
One potential explanation is that the immune systems of children are too immature to trigger the massive inflammatory response that can lead to septic shock , organ failure and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ experts say .
Another hypothesis is that there are so many other types of mild coronaviruses circulating among children that they have some kind of partial immunity against the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus , the one that causes COVID-19 .
But Brewer said that so far , there ’ s no solid evidence that that ’ s the case .
If it were , he said , the virus wouldn ’ t be spreading about as easily among children as it has in older adults .
“ This virus is basically spreading like a virus @ @ @ @ @ @ @ said .
“ For the age difference , yes , I think there ’ s some other explanation.
” Once found , he added , it may “ give us important insights into what ’ s going on with this virus.
” The course of a country ’ s outbreak depends on the age of its population The progression of the outbreak and the toll it takes has varied from country to country , said Jennifer Beam Dowd , a demographer and social epidemiologist at Oxford University .
That ’ s due to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the intensity of testing to the timing of lockdown orders and the way the disease first entered a country .
One key factor is the age structure of the population — how many people are old , how many are young and how many fill the categories in between .
Take Italy , a country of just over 60 million people that has suffered close to 30,000 deaths so far ( compared to just over 4,600 deaths in China , home to 1.4 billion people ) .
The odds may have been stacked @ @ @ @ @ @ @ : An estimated 23 % of its citizens are 65 or older , according to United Nations world population data .
In China , by contrast , just 12 % of citizens are seniors ( and in the U.S. , it ’ s almost 17 % ) .
With COVID-19 , assuming that all ages get infected at a similar rate , an older population is likely to mean more deaths , and that seems to have held up in Italy , where more than 95 % of deaths were in patients 60 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Italy ’ s COVID-19 surveillance group .
In a study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences , Dowd and her colleagues used models to explore how countries with similarly sized populations but different age structures would fare in a coronavirus outbreak .
Assuming a constant infection rate and using the age-specific death rates seen in Italy , they predicted that Brazil , where 2 % of the population is at least 80 , would have three times as many deaths as Nigeria , where only 0.2 % of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ has about 210 million residents , only slightly more than Nigeria ’ s 196 million . )
The interactions between people in different age groups may also play a role in who lives and who dies , Dowd said .
For example , in Italy , older adults are more likely to live with their adult children than in other countries — and even if they don ’ t , they often live close enough to share meals on a regular basis , Dowd ’ s Italian colleagues told her .
There appear @ @ @ @ @ @ @ contact in Germany , and the death toll there has been significantly lower : around 7,400 fatalities so far out of more than 169,000 cases .
( This despite the fact that Germany ’ s population is about one-third larger than Italy ’ s . )
“ We do think that could be one of the important differences , ” Dowd said .
In many countries , the coronavirus seems to have circulated undetected among younger people before making the jump to older people and causing enough serious illnesses and deaths to gain @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , because it may be giving the virus a chance to quietly solidify its beachhead .
But if an outbreak can be identified while it ’ s still contained in that younger , less vulnerable population , a separation between generations could serve as a protective buffer .
Strong social ties between generations are a very healthy phenomenon in normal circumstances , Dowd said .
But in pandemics , “ it could be that it puts that [ older ] population at risk.
” Age considerations may inform the way authorities mitigate disease @ @ @ @ @ @ @ also between local areas with very different social and population structures , she said .
When it comes to rolling out more widespread , systemic testing , “ it might be that we really want to target people in living situations that are most at risk , ” she said .
What does ‘ age ’ really mean ?
On a very basic level , age is essentially a decline in the body ’ s ability to regenerate , Brewer said .
“ We can no longer repair ourselves and our cells at @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ re younger , ” he said .
“ Not only does that affect things like our bones and our hearts , it affects our immune system as well.
” It could be that older people ’ s bodies are simply less capable of handling the virus .
But that declining function often comes with a host of common chronic conditions , such as cardiovascular disease , diabetes and hypertension , and these could put a COVID-19 patient at greater risk of serious illness or death , regardless of their age , said @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and biostatistics at UC San Francisco .
“ It ’ s hard to disentangle the two , ” she said .
“ You don ’ t know whether it ’ s the heart disease — or it ’ s being old.
” For instance , people under 60 make up a larger share of COVID-19 deaths in the U.S. than they do in Europe , Bibbins-Domingo pointed out , and “ it may be that we have more people who have heart disease at younger ages than they do in these other places.
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ step in tackling the disease , scientists said .
That ’ s because many of those chronic health conditions are more prevalent in minority and underprivileged communities .
In fact , if a region ’ s hospitalized COVID-19 patients skew slightly younger than expected , it might be a sign to look for these health disparities , Dowd said .
“ That probably is an interesting part of the story here , ” she said .
A Times analysis found that younger black and Latino Californians are dying of COVID-19 at higher rates @ @ @ @ @ @ @ That pattern is repeating itself across state boundaries , public health data shows .
“ We often talk about it as accelerated aging , ” Dowd said .
Deeply disadvantaged people in their 40s might have the same biological profile as more privileged people in their 60s , for example , “ so that ’ s kind of an interesting lens with which to think about this.
” In that way , COVID-19 is bringing the country ’ s racial and socioeconomic health disparities into sharp focus , scientists said .
So does @ @ @ @ @ @ @ older patients muddy these issues — or help clarify them ?
What more detailed age data might reveal A big unknown is which age groups are spreading the virus the most , said Dr. Theo Vos , an epidemiologist at the University of Washington .
Figuring that out could help health officials decide when certain institutions , such as schools and colleges , can safely reopen .
Finding the answer will require more aggressive contact tracing ( to identify patterns in disease transmission ) and far more widespread antibody testing ( to identify @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ) .
It ’ s likely that many younger people who had the disease have gone uncounted because their symptoms were mild , Vos said .
Tracing and testing would address that .
In the U.S. and many other countries , scientists will also need more refined age data on COVID-19 patients , Dowd said .
Sometimes age brackets are narrow ( 65 to 74 ) and sometimes they span several decades ( 18 to 49 ) .
Differences between younger adults and those in midlife are hard to see when they ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ brackets would also make it easier to combine data from different jurisdictions , whose current brackets often aren ’ t a perfect match .
Luckily , scientists are already collaborating to assemble age and other demographic information on COVID-19 patients from many different countries .

They’re the cases that stand out, because they don’t seem to fit the coronavirus pattern: A 32-year-old nurse died of COVID-19 after spending several days on a ventilator at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center. A 25-year-old pharmacy technician who had seemed to be in good health had succumbed to COVID-19 in a Riverside County home.
It’s enough to make you wonder: Is the coronavirus more dangerous to younger people than scientists initially thought?
When the outbreak took off in Wuhan, China, there was a distinct trend: The older the patient, the greater the risk of death. And as the virus spread around the world, that trend seemed to hold up. A study published in the medical journal Lancet that analyzed more than 70,000 cases from January and February found that the fatality rate for COVID-19 patients in their 30s was 0.15%, compared with 13.4% for those 80 and older.
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But in the U.S., doctors on the front lines have noted strange and often alarming conditions in younger victims, including patients in their 30s and 40s dying of strokes after experiencing only mild COVID-19 symptoms. Children and teens have ended up in hospital intensive care units with symptoms of a rare inflammatory syndrome called Kawasaki disease that could be related to COVID-19, according to a bulletin released by the New York City Health Department this week.
For now, cases like these remain disparate pieces of a much larger puzzle. As scientists dig deeper, they hope to learn more about the role of age as a COVID-19 risk factor and why the disease is so dangerous to the elderly.
But in the meantime, they’re seeing that younger victims are still more the exception than the rule, even in the U.S. Here’s a closer look at what they know so far, and what they’re still trying to find out.
Age is a factor in deaths, but not in infections
Scientists generally agree that when it comes to age, the coronavirus doesn’t appear to discriminate, though pinning down the infection rate will require far more widespread testing than has been done so far.
“Anyone at any age can become infected,” said Dr. Timothy Brewer, an infectious disease specialist and epidemiologist at UCLA. “But we are seeing very different outcomes in what happens after people are infected.”
As the pandemic has grown, the risk of ending up in the hospital or dying has remained markedly higher for those in older age groups — a trend that’s become even clearer over time.
Advertisement
Soon after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention began monitoring the coronavirus’ activity in the U.S., it found that for the week ending March 21, the COVID-19 hospitalization rate for those 65 and older was 10.4 per 100,000 people, compared with 1.9 hospitalizations per 100,000 people ages 18 to 49. By May 2, both figures had risen considerably — to 162.2 hospitalizations per 100,000 senior citizens and 26.2 per 100,000 younger adults — but the large gap remained.
COVID-19 hospitalization rates are lower in California, but they follow the same trend. The most recent figures from the CDC’s COVID-NET surveillance network indicate that 56.9 out of every 100,000 Californians 65 and up had been hospitalized for COVID-19, compared with 10.9 out of every 100,000 Californians ages 18 to 49.
In many infectious disease outbreaks, such as seasonal influenza, the very young and the very old face the greatest risk of serious illness and death. Researchers are still puzzled as to why COVID-19’s pattern is so one-sided, with infected children typically having only mild symptoms of the disease.
One potential explanation is that the immune systems of children are too immature to trigger the massive inflammatory response that can lead to septic shock, organ failure and other complications in some COVID-19 patients, experts say.
Another hypothesis is that there are so many other types of mild coronaviruses circulating among children that they have some kind of partial immunity against the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus, the one that causes COVID-19.
But Brewer said that so far, there’s no solid evidence that that’s the case. If it were, he said, the virus wouldn’t be spreading about as easily among children as it has in older adults.
“This virus is basically spreading like a virus that has a susceptible population.” Brewer said. “For the age difference, yes, I think there’s some other explanation.”
Once found, he added, it may “give us important insights into what’s going on with this virus.”
The course of a country’s outbreak depends on the age of its population
The progression of the outbreak and the toll it takes has varied from country to country, said Jennifer Beam Dowd, a demographer and social epidemiologist at Oxford University. That’s due to a wide variety of factors, from the intensity of testing to the timing of lockdown orders and the way the disease first entered a country.
One key factor is the age structure of the population — how many people are old, how many are young and how many fill the categories in between.
Take Italy, a country of just over 60 million people that has suffered close to 30,000 deaths so far (compared to just over 4,600 deaths in China, home to 1.4 billion people).
The odds may have been stacked against Italy because its population skews older: An estimated 23% of its citizens are 65 or older, according to United Nations world population data. In China, by contrast, just 12% of citizens are seniors (and in the U.S., it’s almost 17%). With COVID-19, assuming that all ages get infected at a similar rate, an older population is likely to mean more deaths, and that seems to have held up in Italy, where more than 95% of deaths were in patients 60 and up, according to data from Italy’s COVID-19 surveillance group.
In a study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Dowd and her colleagues used models to explore how countries with similarly sized populations but different age structures would fare in a coronavirus outbreak. Assuming a constant infection rate and using the age-specific death rates seen in Italy, they predicted that Brazil, where 2% of the population is at least 80, would have three times as many deaths as Nigeria, where only 0.2% of the population is over 80. (Brazil has about 210 million residents, only slightly more than Nigeria’s 196 million.)
The interactions between people in different age groups may also play a role in who lives and who dies, Dowd said. For example, in Italy, older adults are more likely to live with their adult children than in other countries — and even if they don’t, they often live close enough to share meals on a regular basis, Dowd’s Italian colleagues told her.
There appear to be fewer such points of intergenerational contact in Germany, and the death toll there has been significantly lower: around 7,400 fatalities so far out of more than 169,000 cases. (This despite the fact that Germany’s population is about one-third larger than Italy’s.)
“We do think that could be one of the important differences,” Dowd said.
In many countries, the coronavirus seems to have circulated undetected among younger people before making the jump to older people and causing enough serious illnesses and deaths to gain notice. That’s a problem, because it may be giving the virus a chance to quietly solidify its beachhead. But if an outbreak can be identified while it’s still contained in that younger, less vulnerable population, a separation between generations could serve as a protective buffer.
Strong social ties between generations are a very healthy phenomenon in normal circumstances, Dowd said. But in pandemics, “it could be that it puts that [older] population at risk.”
Age considerations may inform the way authorities mitigate disease transmission not just across international borders but also between local areas with very different social and population structures, she said.
When it comes to rolling out more widespread, systemic testing, “it might be that we really want to target people in living situations that are most at risk,” she said.
What does ‘age’ really mean?
On a very basic level, age is essentially a decline in the body’s ability to regenerate, Brewer said.
“We can no longer repair ourselves and our cells at a rate that we can when we’re younger,” he said. “Not only does that affect things like our bones and our hearts, it affects our immune system as well.”
It could be that older people’s bodies are simply less capable of handling the virus. But that declining function often comes with a host of common chronic conditions, such as cardiovascular disease, diabetes and hypertension, and these could put a COVID-19 patient at greater risk of serious illness or death, regardless of their age, said Dr. Kirsten Bibbins-Domingo, chair of epidemiology and biostatistics at UC San Francisco.
“It’s hard to disentangle the two,” she said. “You don’t know whether it’s the heart disease — or it’s being old.”
For instance, people under 60 make up a larger share of COVID-19 deaths in the U.S. than they do in Europe, Bibbins-Domingo pointed out, and “it may be that we have more people who have heart disease at younger ages than they do in these other places.”
Separating these factors is an important step in tackling the disease, scientists said. That’s because many of those chronic health conditions are more prevalent in minority and underprivileged communities.
In fact, if a region’s hospitalized COVID-19 patients skew slightly younger than expected, it might be a sign to look for these health disparities, Dowd said.
“That probably is an interesting part of the story here,” she said.
A Times analysis found that younger black and Latino Californians are dying of COVID-19 at higher rates than their white and Asian peers. That pattern is repeating itself across state boundaries, public health data shows.
“We often talk about it as accelerated aging,” Dowd said. Deeply disadvantaged people in their 40s might have the same biological profile as more privileged people in their 60s, for example, “so that’s kind of an interesting lens with which to think about this.”
In that way, COVID-19 is bringing the country’s racial and socioeconomic health disparities into sharp focus, scientists said.
So does the coronavirus’s particular toll on older patients muddy these issues — or help clarify them?
“The answer is both,” Brewer said.
What more detailed age data might reveal
A big unknown is which age groups are spreading the virus the most, said Dr. Theo Vos, an epidemiologist at the University of Washington. Figuring that out could help health officials decide when certain institutions, such as schools and colleges, can safely reopen.
Finding the answer will require more aggressive contact tracing (to identify patterns in disease transmission) and far more widespread antibody testing (to identify people who were infected without realizing it). It’s likely that many younger people who had the disease have gone uncounted because their symptoms were mild, Vos said. Tracing and testing would address that.
In the U.S. and many other countries, scientists will also need more refined age data on COVID-19 patients, Dowd said. Sometimes age brackets are narrow (65 to 74) and sometimes they span several decades (18 to 49). Differences between younger adults and those in midlife are hard to see when they’re all lumped together. Smaller age brackets would also make it easier to combine data from different jurisdictions, whose current brackets often aren’t a perfect match.
Luckily, scientists are already collaborating to assemble age and other demographic information on COVID-19 patients from many different countries.


latimes--2020-05-08--Admissions scandal: Charges against Lori Loughlin won't be dismissed, judge rules

A judge declined Friday to dismiss the fraud , bribery and money laundering charges against Lori Loughlin and her co-defendants , ruling that federal agents and prosecutors did not pressure their chief cooperator , William “ Rick ” Singer , to mislead his clients on recorded phone calls and draw out flawed evidence of criminal intent .
Attorneys for Loughlin and 13 other parents charged in the college admissions scandal had asked U.S. District Judge Nathaniel M. Gorton in March to throw out the indictment against them , pointing to a note Singer wrote shortly after he began cooperating in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ line , Singer called dozens of current and former clients and discussed the various schemes they are charged with exploiting to slip their children into such elite universities as Georgetown , USC , UCLA and Yale .
In one note , Singer wrote that the agents were insisting he “ bend the truth ” and get his clients to acknowledge the money they paid him was destined for the pockets of corrupt school employees — not legitimate donations to university coffers , as he told them previously .
Defense attorneys seized on the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ browbeat ” into obtaining evidence he knew to be inaccurate .
Moreover , they argued , federal prosecutors in Boston had violated their obligation to disclose evidence favorable to the accused .
Prosecutors turned over the notes 16 months after they learned of them , and after more than half of the parents charged in the case had pleaded guilty .
William Trach , one of Loughlin ’ s attorneys , said Singer ’ s contemporaneous statement that he had been directed to lie , coupled with the overdue disclosure of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ misconduct ” meriting the rare step of dismissal .
Gorton disagreed .
Questions of whether Singer ’ s clients believed their payments were bribes or donations , or whether Singer described his scheme one way as a conspirator and another as a cooperator , are “ squarely for the jury , ” he wrote .
Singer ’ s instructions to explicitly describe the payments not as donations but bribes were an attempt “ to get Singer to corroborate , not fabricate , evidence , ” Gorton said .
The government had already obtained @ @ @ @ @ @ @ — through wiretaps , search warrants and other cooperators — that his clients had committed crimes .
The recorded calls were intended to “ offer those parents an opportunity either to confirm or deny their participation in the scheme , ” Gorton wrote .
Last month , after Gorton requested a thorough explanation of the notes , Singer told investigators he had pushed back on using the word “ bribe ” because “ that is not how he talks and he hadn ’ t said it before , ” according to an FBI @ @ @ @ @ @ @ interview .
Before he was apprehended and before his lawyer explained the meaning of a quid pro quo , Singer “ understood that what he was doing was wrong , ” the agent wrote , “ but he didn ’ t think it was a crime.
” Gorton declined to throw out the recorded calls , as the defense had requested , or to hold a hearing into the matter .
While he criticized the government as “ irresponsible and misguided ” for disclosing the notes so belatedly , Gorton attributed that not @ @ @ @ @ @ @ imprudent underestimation of the context , relevance and potential exculpatory nature of the notes.
” Still , Gorton noted the missives were handed over eight months before the first scheduled trial date , giving the defense plenty of time to prepare .
Loughlin , her husband , J. Mossimo Giannulli , and five more parents are scheduled to begin trial Oct. 5 .

Lori Loughlin’s attorneys had sought dismissal of fraud, bribery and money laundering charges against her, alleging that William “Rick” Singer had been been pressured by federal agents to mislead clients and draw out criminal intent.
A judge declined Friday to dismiss the fraud, bribery and money laundering charges against Lori Loughlin and her co-defendants, ruling that federal agents and prosecutors did not pressure their chief cooperator, William “Rick” Singer, to mislead his clients on recorded phone calls and draw out flawed evidence of criminal intent.
Attorneys for Loughlin and 13 other parents charged in the college admissions scandal had asked U.S. District Judge Nathaniel M. Gorton in March to throw out the indictment against them, pointing to a note Singer wrote shortly after he began cooperating in September 2018. With investigators recording the line, Singer called dozens of current and former clients and discussed the various schemes they are charged with exploiting to slip their children into such elite universities as Georgetown, USC, UCLA and Yale.
In one note, Singer wrote that the agents were insisting he “bend the truth” and get his clients to acknowledge the money they paid him was destined for the pockets of corrupt school employees — not legitimate donations to university coffers, as he told them previously.
Defense attorneys seized on the notes, arguing they showed Singer was “browbeat” into obtaining evidence he knew to be inaccurate. Moreover, they argued, federal prosecutors in Boston had violated their obligation to disclose evidence favorable to the accused. Prosecutors turned over the notes 16 months after they learned of them, and after more than half of the parents charged in the case had pleaded guilty.
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William Trach, one of Loughlin’s attorneys, said Singer’s contemporaneous statement that he had been directed to lie, coupled with the overdue disclosure of the notes themselves, amounted to “extraordinary misconduct” meriting the rare step of dismissal.
Gorton disagreed. Questions of whether Singer’s clients believed their payments were bribes or donations, or whether Singer described his scheme one way as a conspirator and another as a cooperator, are “squarely for the jury,” he wrote.
Singer’s instructions to explicitly describe the payments not as donations but bribes were an attempt “to get Singer to corroborate, not fabricate, evidence,” Gorton said. The government had already obtained evidence prior to Singer’s cooperation — through wiretaps, search warrants and other cooperators — that his clients had committed crimes. The recorded calls were intended to “offer those parents an opportunity either to confirm or deny their participation in the scheme,” Gorton wrote.
Loughlin’s attorneys didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Last month, after Gorton requested a thorough explanation of the notes, Singer told investigators he had pushed back on using the word “bribe” because “that is not how he talks and he hadn’t said it before,” according to an FBI agent’s report that summarized the interview. Before he was apprehended and before his lawyer explained the meaning of a quid pro quo, Singer “understood that what he was doing was wrong,” the agent wrote, “but he didn’t think it was a crime.”
Gorton declined to throw out the recorded calls, as the defense had requested, or to hold a hearing into the matter. While he criticized the government as “irresponsible and misguided” for disclosing the notes so belatedly, Gorton attributed that not to bad faith but to an “imprudent underestimation of the context, relevance and potential exculpatory nature of the notes.”
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Still, Gorton noted the missives were handed over eight months before the first scheduled trial date, giving the defense plenty of time to prepare. Loughlin, her husband, J. Mossimo Giannulli, and five more parents are scheduled to begin trial Oct. 5.


latimes--2020-05-08--California voters asked to vote by mail in November due to coronavirus fears

Citing public health concerns over millions of Californians showing up at voting locations this fall , Gov .
Gavin Newsom on Friday ordered ballots to be mailed to the state ’ s 20.6 million voters for the November election while insisting there will need to also be new rules for anyone who participates in person .
The decision makes California the first state in the nation to temporarily shift to all-mail voting as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic — prompted , Newsom said , by the likelihood that public health conditions will not have improved to a level at @ @ @ @ @ @ @ on a single day to cast a ballot .
“ There ’ s a lot of excitement around this November ’ s election in terms of making sure that you can conduct yourself in a safe way , and make sure your health is protected , ” Newsom said during a midday event .
The decision to radically rethink the November election comes after a series of urgent requests and proposals made by lawmakers and local elections officials alike .
Since the beginning of the coronavirus , health concerns have been raised in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ with turnout in November expected to be high .
“ People are not going to want to go to an in-person voting site , ” said Joseph Holland , the registrar of voters in Santa Barbara County and president of the California Assn .
of Clerks and Elections Officials .
“ If you send voters a ballot in the mail , they ’ re more likely to vote than if they have to go to a polling place to vote.
” Local officials , who plan for elections months in advance , are @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
The change to mailing every voter a ballot also will include a significant public education effort , especially for those voters who may not realize the documents that arrive are an actual ballot and not sample materials .
“ It ’ s great for public health , it ’ s great for voting rights , it ’ s gon na be great for participation , ” he said .
California currently has a patchwork system for voting in person , one that varies by county .
While the majority of local governments @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , 14 counties already mail a ballot to every voter under provisions of a 2016 law that swaps new “ vote centers ” for traditional neighborhood polling places .
L.A. County , the only place allowed to enact that system without mailing all voters a ballot this year , is already poised to do so for November after the March primary saw widespread problems , including long lines at in-person vote centers that are now being investigated by auditors .
The change in Los Angeles will add 2 million voters to the ranks @ @ @ @ @ @ @ another location .
While elections officials expect that private companies hired to print ballots will be able to meet the demand , they and election advocates remain concerned about the increased cost .
California has often imposed new election mandates — extra days for ballots to arrive in the mail , postage-paid envelopes , additional steps to verify signatures or unsigned absentee envelopes — without providing funding .
“ Elections have been an unfunded mandate and this is going to be an even bigger expense for counties , ” said Kim Alexander , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Legislators had introduced bills to require ballots mailed to all voters prior to Newsom ’ s action on Friday .
His decision to impose the change by executive order expedites the effort by state and local officials .
But his directive leaves a key question unanswered : What provisions will be made for voters who still want or need to vote in person ?
Advocates for disabled voters and communities of color say the state will need to maintain a robust set of options for those who want to vote in person @ @ @ @ @ @ @ election as well as on election day .
“ Reductions to in-person voting raise very real concerns for disenfranchisement , particularly for communities that already face barriers to voting , such as voters with limited-English proficiency , voters with disabilities , and voters who are underrepresented and rely on in-person voting at higher rates , Latino , and young voters , ” Raúl Macías , an attorney for the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law , wrote in a letter to Newsom last month .
Newsom ’ s executive order @ @ @ @ @ @ @ set of rules for in-person voting , but urges state officials to craft a plan by the end of this month .
Holland said it ’ s important for counties to have as much flexibility as possible , given the possibility that new outbreaks in coronavirus cases could develop in the final weeks leading up to the election .
“ We really don ’ t need the Legislature telling us there ’ s a strict formula , when we may not be able to meet it , ” he said .
Assemblyman Marc @ @ @ @ @ @ @ wrote a recently introduced bill to mail a ballot to every voter , said state officials should work closely to address those concerns .
But he said he ’ s “ not comfortable ” with too loose of a statewide standard .
“ I think that we can create a plan for the November election to provide flexibility , ” Berman said .
“ Counties , though , will need to show us that they tried their best to achieve it ” before considering case-by-case issues .
Newsom said Friday that in-person voting @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the November election .
“ We still want to have the appropriate number of physical sites for people to vote as well , ” he said .
Five states have permanent all-mail elections .
While California ’ s change would only be for November , the state is relatively well prepared to implement Newsom ’ s directive .
California has had generous rules for absentee voting since 2002 , allowing voters to opt for permanent voting by mail regardless of the reason .
Remote voting was a key component of the March statewide @ @ @ @ @ @ @ all ballots were cast by mail — a record high .
But a number of counties had much lower absentee voting records , meaning the change will take considerable work to implement .
The cost of mailing everyone a ballot could also be daunting , and locals have often complained that the state has expanded access to voting while not providing sufficient funds for the counties to do the work .
And because voter turnout is traditionally higher in general elections , a temporary shift to all-mail voting could create significant new challenges @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that expanding absentee voting should include a robust effort to encourage voters not to rely on putting their ballots in the mail .
She said the leading reason a ballot isn ’ t counted is that it arrives at a local elections office with a postmark after election day .
“ The best way to return them is a [ local ] drop-off box or in person .
It ’ s not by mail , ” she said .

Citing public health concerns over millions of Californians showing up at voting locations this fall, Gov. Gavin Newsom on Friday ordered ballots to be mailed to the state’s 20.6 million voters for the November election while insisting there will need to also be new rules for anyone who participates in person.
The decision makes California the first state in the nation to temporarily shift to all-mail voting as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic — prompted, Newsom said, by the likelihood that public health conditions will not have improved to a level at which millions of people could show up on a single day to cast a ballot.
“There’s a lot of excitement around this November’s election in terms of making sure that you can conduct yourself in a safe way, and make sure your health is protected,” Newsom said during a midday event.
The decision to radically rethink the November election comes after a series of urgent requests and proposals made by lawmakers and local elections officials alike. Since the beginning of the coronavirus, health concerns have been raised in several states that have conducted in-person voting with turnout in November expected to be high.
“People are not going to want to go to an in-person voting site,” said Joseph Holland, the registrar of voters in Santa Barbara County and president of the California Assn. of Clerks and Elections Officials. “If you send voters a ballot in the mail, they’re more likely to vote than if they have to go to a polling place to vote.”
Local officials, who plan for elections months in advance, are eager to begin making preparations for November. The change to mailing every voter a ballot also will include a significant public education effort, especially for those voters who may not realize the documents that arrive are an actual ballot and not sample materials.
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California Secretary of State Alex Padilla, the state’s chief elections officer, praised Newsom’s decision.
“It’s great for public health, it’s great for voting rights, it’s gonna be great for participation,” he said.
California currently has a patchwork system for voting in person, one that varies by county. While the majority of local governments offer traditional polling places on election day, 14 counties already mail a ballot to every voter under provisions of a 2016 law that swaps new “vote centers” for traditional neighborhood polling places. L.A. County, the only place allowed to enact that system without mailing all voters a ballot this year, is already poised to do so for November after the March primary saw widespread problems, including long lines at in-person vote centers that are now being investigated by auditors.
The change in Los Angeles will add 2 million voters to the ranks of Californians who participate from home or another location. While elections officials expect that private companies hired to print ballots will be able to meet the demand, they and election advocates remain concerned about the increased cost. California has often imposed new election mandates — extra days for ballots to arrive in the mail, postage-paid envelopes, additional steps to verify signatures or unsigned absentee envelopes — without providing funding.
“Elections have been an unfunded mandate and this is going to be an even bigger expense for counties,” said Kim Alexander, president of the nonprofit California Voter Foundation.
Legislators had introduced bills to require ballots mailed to all voters prior to Newsom’s action on Friday. His decision to impose the change by executive order expedites the effort by state and local officials. But his directive leaves a key question unanswered: What provisions will be made for voters who still want or need to vote in person?
Advocates for disabled voters and communities of color say the state will need to maintain a robust set of options for those who want to vote in person in the days leading up to the election as well as on election day.
“Reductions to in-person voting raise very real concerns for disenfranchisement, particularly for communities that already face barriers to voting, such as voters with limited-English proficiency, voters with disabilities, and voters who are underrepresented and rely on in-person voting at higher rates, Latino, and young voters,” Raúl Macías, an attorney for the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law, wrote in a letter to Newsom last month.
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Newsom’s executive order doesn’t lay out a specific set of rules for in-person voting, but urges state officials to craft a plan by the end of this month.
Holland said it’s important for counties to have as much flexibility as possible, given the possibility that new outbreaks in coronavirus cases could develop in the final weeks leading up to the election. “We really don’t need the Legislature telling us there’s a strict formula, when we may not be able to meet it,” he said.
Assemblyman Marc Berman (D-Palo Alto), who wrote a recently introduced bill to mail a ballot to every voter, said state officials should work closely to address those concerns. But he said he’s “not comfortable” with too loose of a statewide standard.
“I think that we can create a plan for the November election to provide flexibility,” Berman said. “Counties, though, will need to show us that they tried their best to achieve it” before considering case-by-case issues.
Newsom said Friday that in-person voting options will remain an important part of the November election.
“We still want to have the appropriate number of physical sites for people to vote as well,” he said.
Five states have permanent all-mail elections. While California’s change would only be for November, the state is relatively well prepared to implement Newsom’s directive. California has had generous rules for absentee voting since 2002, allowing voters to opt for permanent voting by mail regardless of the reason.
Remote voting was a key component of the March statewide primary, during which 72% of all ballots were cast by mail — a record high. But a number of counties had much lower absentee voting records, meaning the change will take considerable work to implement.
The cost of mailing everyone a ballot could also be daunting, and locals have often complained that the state has expanded access to voting while not providing sufficient funds for the counties to do the work. And because voter turnout is traditionally higher in general elections, a temporary shift to all-mail voting could create significant new challenges in funding and logistics.
Alexander said that expanding absentee voting should include a robust effort to encourage voters not to rely on putting their ballots in the mail. She said a leading reason a ballot isn’t counted is that it arrives at a local elections office with a postmark after election day.
“The best way to return them is a [local] drop-off box or in person. It’s not by mail,” she said.


latimes--2020-05-08--Here are the Orange County communities with coronavirus cases

Orange County health officials reported an additional 153 coronavirus infections Friday , the second-most new cases on any one day @ @ @ @ @ The additions pushed the county ’ s cumulative case count to 3,240 .
That total @ @ @ @ @ of which were announced Friday .
As of the latest update , 188 patients were @ @ @ @ @ them were in intensive care , according to the Orange County Health Care Agency .
@ @ @ @ @ tests have been conducted countywide .
Note : The “ other ” category includes unincorporated @ @ @ @ @ cases in the county ’ s jails .
Daily updates are preliminary and subject to @ @ @ @ @ new information .

People stroll along the coast in Laguna Beach on Tuesday morning.
Orange County health officials reported an additional 153 coronavirus infections Friday, the second-most new cases on any one day since the outbreak began.
The additions pushed the county’s cumulative case count to 3,240. That total includes 71 deaths — five of which were announced Friday.
As of the latest update, 188 patients were hospitalized countywide and 74 of them were in intensive care, according to the Orange County Health Care Agency.
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To date, 46,372 COVID-19 tests have been conducted countywide.
Age breakdown of cases:
0-17 — 67
18-24 — 319
25-34 — 590
35-44 — 493
45-54 — 591
55-64 — 525
65-74 — 316
75-84 — 204
85+ — 132
Unknown — 3
Tracking coronavirus in Orange County The latest maps and charts on the spread of COVID-19 in Orange County, including cases, deaths, closures and restrictions.
Age breakdown of deaths:
25-34 — 2
35-44 — 4
45-54 — 6
55-64 — 10
65-74 — 12
75-84 — 20
85+ — 17
California Do you know someone who has lost the battle with COVID-19? In our effort to cover this pandemic as thoroughly as possible, we’d like to hear from the loved ones of people who have died from the coronavirus.
Cases by community:
Aliso Viejo — 20
Anaheim — 472
Brea — 27
Buena Park — 104
Costa Mesa — 47
Coto de Caza — 5
Cypress — 47
Dana Point — 22
Fountain Valley — 41
Fullerton — 115
Garden Grove — 169
Huntington Beach — 242
Irvine — 140
La Habra — 61
La Palma — 15
Ladera Ranch — 12
Laguna Beach — 40
Laguna Hills — 25
Laguna Niguel — 33
Laguna Woods — 8
Lake Forest — 33
Los Alamitos — 37
Midway City — 7
Mission Viejo — 53
Newport Beach — 105
Orange — 157
Placentia — 68
Rancho Mission Viejo — 6
Rancho Santa Margarita — 16
San Clemente — 52
San Juan Capistrano — 31
Santa Ana — 456
Seal Beach — 12
Stanton — 33
Trabuco Canyon — 12
Tustin — 51
Villa Park — 5
Westminster — 52
Yorba Linda — 55
Other — 253
Unknown — 101
Note: The “other” category includes unincorporated areas, as well as cases in the county’s jails. Daily updates are preliminary and subject to change as the county receives new information.


latimes--2020-05-08--L.A. County coronavirus cases top 30,000 as some businesses reopen

As the number of new coronavirus-related deaths in Los Angeles County plateaued , officials Friday were easing into an economic recovery plan .
The county reported 883 additional cases of the coronavirus and 51 related deaths , bringing the county ’ s total to more than 30,200 cases and 1,468 COVID-19 fatalities .
Amid the rising numbers , some retailers were being allowed to reopen for curbside pickup Friday , and recreational venues such as golf courses and some trails will reopen Saturday .
Still , public health officials are urging caution , saying the healthcare system could be overwhelmed @ @ @ @ @ @ @ people resume their daily activities without taking the proper precautions .
“ As these places reopen , we do need to remember the new normal , ” Barbara Ferrer , the county ’ s public health director , said Friday .
“ When we ’ re out and about more , we have to behave as if anyone could be infected with COVID-19 , and that we also could be infected.
” The day before , she pointed to a recent study as an example .
The data found that more than 4 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to the virus in their blood , an indication of past exposure .
If 1 million of the county ’ s 10 million residents stop staying home and 5 % of them are infected , that would amount to about 50,000 people infected with the coronavirus who are circulating in the community , Ferrer said .
And if even 5 % of those 50,000 people become seriously ill and need hospitalization , that would result in 2,500 patients .
“ Since on any given day , there ’ s an average of only @ @ @ @ @ @ @ County , it could be pretty quick that 2,500 new cases that need hospitalization may overwhelm or start overwhelming our healthcare system , ” Ferrer said Thursday .
“ These numbers demonstrate that there is a lot at stake as we relax Safer at Home [ orders ] and that reopening our county , even slowly , only works if we are all really committed to being careful.
” She said that it ’ s crucial for people to do everything they can to practice physical distancing , wear face coverings in public @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
People over 65 or with underlying medical conditions should continue to stay home unless it ’ s absolutely necessary , she said .
Under the California ’ s reopening plan , counties can apply for a variance to reopen more quickly than the statewide standard , but Ferrer said she does not expect L.A. County to qualify for an exception anytime soon .
“ If one of the criteria for being able to submit a variance is that you had no deaths in the last 14 days , L.A. County will be @ @ @ @ @ @ @ as will most of the other large counties , ” she said .
“ This may apply much more easily for the very small counties that already have seen a significant decrease or may have had no deaths at all to date , but for the larger counties , we will only be able to apply for a variance under these conditions when the pandemic is over.
” As of Friday , than 214,000 people in L.A. County had been tested and received their results , with about 12 % testing positive .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ has reported 4,755 new cases of the coronavirus and 243 people have died .
The county now accounts for nearly half of all coronavirus cases in California and more than half of all of the state ’ s deaths .
“ This pandemic has not gone away , ” Gov .
Gavin Newsom said Friday .
“ We may be exhausted by it , we may be chomping at the bit to get back to some semblance of normalcy , but we had 1,898 new positive cases yesterday .
... We had 81 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ because of the loss of a loved one.
” Statewide , California has reported more than 62,500 cases of the coronavirus and more than 2,500 related deaths .
The state continues to see a decline in both COVID-19 hospitalizations and intensive care patients , Newsom said Friday .
“ We ’ ve extended for many , many , many weeks a trendline that ’ s increasingly becoming a headline of stability with modest reductions , ” he said , though he noted that some parts of the state have been harder-hit by the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , there were 1,790 COVID-19 patients in L.A. County hospitals , with 29 % in intensive care and 16 % on ventilators .
The hospitalization rate has remained relatively stable for the past week and a half , Ferrer said .
Officials remained concerned about outbreaks in institutional settings .
Public health officials were investigating 356 congregate settings , including skilled nursing homes , correctional facilities , shelters , workplaces and retailers , with at least one confirmed or suspected case .
There were a total of 7,373 coronavirus cases in such settings @ @ @ @ @ @ @ — including 4,633 residents and 2,740 staff members .
The number of institutional residents who died stood at 713 and now represent 49 % of all COVID-19 deaths in L.A. County , officials said Friday .
The vast majority of them were residents in skilled nursing facilities .
Ferrer said that mitigating the spread of the virus in such settings “ is one of our biggest priorities at the moment.
” As of Friday morning , 95 of the county ’ s skilled nursing facilities had been able to test all residents and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Health was working with the remaining facilities to complete testing , she said .
But the effort has faced some barriers , including staffing shortages that make it hard to prioritize both testing and medical care and delays in both receiving test kits and receiving test results , she said .
She said that officials are continuing to conduct routine inspections of skilled nursing facilities and take regular surveys to assess bed capacity , staffing and the availability of personal protective equipment .
The virus ’ death toll continued to shine a light @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a rate of 89 deaths per 100,000 people among native Hawaiian and Pacific Islanders and of 18 per 100,000 people among black people , compared with 15.5 for Latinos , 12 for Asians and 9 for white people , Ferrer said .
“ These rates are significantly higher than the mortality rate for other races and ethnicities , and although some of the numbers are small , they are still very concerning , ” Ferrer said .
People who live in areas with high poverty rates have four times the rate of death @ @ @ @ @ @ @ people , compared with eight per 100,000 people in communities with low poverty rates , she said .
She said that public health officials have been working to address the disparities by opening more testing sites in hard-hit communities , participating in virtual town halls , releasing public service announcements , and ensuring that more racial and ethnic minorities are sampled in a new round of serology testing researchers are undertaking .
“ Systematic injustices including discriminatory policies and institutional racism have led to the unequal distribution of wealth , resources and opportunities @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to the staggering disproportionality we see in the outcomes around COVID-19 , ” Ferrer said .
“ Only through a collaborative approach will we see improvements for our tremendously impacted communities .
”

As the number of new coronavirus-related deaths in Los Angeles County plateaued, officials Friday were easing into an economic recovery plan.
The county reported 883 additional cases of the coronavirus and 51 related deaths, bringing the county’s total to more than 30,200 cases and 1,468 COVID-19 fatalities.
With hospital bed availability and testing capacity reaching recommended levels, some retailers were being allowed to reopen for curbside pickup Friday. Recreational venues such as golf courses and some trails will reopen Saturday.
“We are not moving beyond COVID-19. We are just learning to live with it,” Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti said Friday evening.
Garcetti said the city has launched a series of “working groups” comprised of leaders in industries such as manufacturing, retail, film and television, and higher education to assist in creating guidelines and advising business owners in operating safely during this transition phase.
Additional staff will monitor hiking trails and other recreational areas, but Garcetti noted that maintaining physical distancing will depend on individuals.
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In the following weeks, officials will continue to monitor key criteria to determine whether Los Angeles can keep moving forward, including the availability of hospital beds, personal protective equipment for healthcare workers and businesses, and contact tracing.
But the positive steps taken this week don’t mean people won’t get sick, Garcetti said.
“We know people will get sick, we just don’t want them to unnecessarily die as a result,” he said.
Public health officials are urging caution, saying the healthcare system could be overwhelmed by a surge of new cases if people resume their daily activities without taking the proper precautions.
“As these places reopen, we do need to remember the new normal,” Barbara Ferrer, the county’s public health director, said Friday. “When we’re out and about more, we have to behave as if anyone could be infected with COVID-19, and that we also could be infected.”
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The day before, she pointed to a recent study as an example. The data found that more than 4% of L.A. County adults have antibodies to the virus in their blood, an indication of past exposure.
If 1 million of the county’s 10 million residents stop staying home and 5% of them are infected, that would amount to about 50,000 people infected with the coronavirus who are circulating in the community, Ferrer said. And if even 5% of those 50,000 people become seriously ill and need hospitalization, that would result in 2,500 patients.
“Since on any given day, there’s an average of only 2,000 available beds in hospitals across L.A. County, it could be pretty quick that 2,500 new cases that need hospitalization may overwhelm or start overwhelming our healthcare system,” Ferrer said Thursday.
“These numbers demonstrate that there is a lot at stake as we relax Safer at Home [orders] and that reopening our county, even slowly, only works if we are all really committed to being careful.”
She said that it’s crucial for people to do everything they can to practice physical distancing, wear face coverings in public and wash or sanitize their hands frequently. People older than 65 or with underlying medical conditions should continue to stay home unless it’s absolutely necessary, she said.
Garcetti encouraged those who don’t live with their mothers to celebrate this Mother’s Day with a phone call instead, and visit hiking trails and outdoor areas on days that are likely to be less crowded.
“If you’re golfing or hiking...bring your own clubs,” he said. “Pre-pay, if you can. Check trails in advance and bring a backpack to pack up any of your trash.”
Under the California’s reopening plan, counties can apply for a variance to reopen more quickly than the statewide standard, but Ferrer said she does not expect L.A. County to qualify for an exception anytime soon.
“This may apply much more easily for the very small counties that already have seen a significant decrease or may have had no deaths at all to date, but for the larger counties, we will only be able to apply for a variance under these conditions when the pandemic is over,” she said.
As of Friday, more than 214,000 people in L.A. County had been tested and received their results, with about 12% testing positive.
So far this week, L.A. County has reported 4,755 new cases of the coronavirus and 243 people have died. Long Beach reported 23 additional cases and two deaths Friday, bringing the county’s total to 30,319 cases and 1,470 deaths.
The county now accounts for nearly half of all coronavirus cases in California and more than half of all of the state’s deaths.
“This pandemic has not gone away,” Gov. Gavin Newsom said Friday. “We may be exhausted by it, we may be chomping at the bit to get back to some semblance of normalcy, but we had 1,898 new positive cases yesterday... We had 81 individuals and families that were torn apart because of the loss of a loved one.”
Statewide, California has reported more than 62,500 cases of the coronavirus and more than 2,500 related deaths.
The state continues to see a decline in both COVID-19 hospitalizations and intensive care patients, Newsom said Friday.
“We’ve extended for many, many, many weeks a trendline that’s increasingly becoming a headline of stability with modest reductions,” he said, though he noted that some parts of the state have been harder-hit by the virus than others.
As of Friday, there were 1,790 COVID-19 patients in L.A. County hospitals, with 29% in intensive care and 16% on ventilators. The hospitalization rate has remained relatively stable for the past week and a half, Ferrer said.
Officials remained concerned about outbreaks in institutional settings. Public health officials were investigating 356 congregate settings, including skilled nursing homes, correctional facilities, shelters, workplaces and retailers, with at least one confirmed or suspected case. There was a total of 7,373 coronavirus cases in such settings — up 325 from the day before — including 4,633 residents and 2,740 staff members.
The number of institutional residents who died stood at 713 and now represent 49% of all COVID-19 deaths in L.A. County, officials said Friday. The vast majority of them were residents in skilled nursing facilities.
Ferrer said that mitigating the spread of the virus in such settings “is one of our biggest priorities at the moment.”
As of Friday morning, 95 of the county’s skilled nursing facilities had been able to test all residents and staff, and the Department of Public Health was working with the remaining facilities to complete testing, she said. But the effort has faced some barriers, including staffing shortages that make it hard to prioritize both testing and medical care and delays in both receiving test kits and receiving test results, she said.
She said that officials are continuing to conduct routine inspections of skilled nursing facilities and take regular surveys to assess bed capacity, staffing and the availability of personal protective equipment.
The virus’ death toll continued to shine a light on racial and economic disparities, with a rate of 89 deaths per 100,000 people among native Hawaiian and Pacific Islanders and of 18 per 100,000 people among black people, compared with 15.5 for Latinos, 12 for Asians and 9 for white people, Ferrer said.
“These rates are significantly higher than the mortality rate for other races and ethnicities, and although some of the numbers are small, they are still very concerning,” Ferrer said.
People who live in areas with high poverty rates have four times the rate of death from COVID-19 — 29 deaths per 100,000 people, compared with eight per 100,000 people in communities with low poverty rates, she said.
She said that public health officials have been working to address the disparities by opening more testing sites in hard-hit communities, participating in virtual town halls, releasing public service announcements, and ensuring that more racial and ethnic minorities are sampled in a new round of serology testing research.
“Systematic injustices including discriminatory policies and institutional racism have led to the unequal distribution of wealth, resources and opportunities, and this is in fact contributing to the staggering disproportionality we see in the outcomes around COVID-19,” Ferrer said. “Only through a collaborative approach will we see improvements for our tremendously impacted communities.”


latimes--2020-05-08--Vast majority of California counties fall short of reopening criteria as coronavirus cases climb

Most big California counties are not close to meeting Gov .
Gavin Newsom ’ s strict standards that would allow a wider reopening of the economy , including dine-in restaurants and shopping malls , a Times data analysis found .
Newsom announced Thursday a series of benchmarks each of California ’ s 58 counties would need to reach to significantly reopen faster than the statewide standard .
Can the county show that people have stopped dying from the coronavirus ?
Have new cases fallen to a manageable level ?
Can officials adequately test people ?
Do they have enough detectives @ @ @ @ @ @ @ And do they have enough medical supplies ?
The Times conducted an analysis to see which counties could pass just the first two criteria — whether deaths have stopped in the past 14 days , and whether there is no more than one case per 10,000 residents in that same time period .
Most of California failed that test .
In fact , 95 % of Californians live in counties that don ’ t meet that standard , The Times analysis found .
Not a single county in Southern California nor the San @ @ @ @ @ @ @ The 24 counties that did meet the criteria , for the two-week period that ended on Thursday , are all in Northern California and most are sparsely populated .
The three largest counties meeting both criteria are Placer County , population 380,000 , northeast of Sacramento ; Santa Cruz County , population 274,000 , south of San Jose ; and Butte County , population 227,000 , in the foothills of the northern Sierra Nevada .
With the exception of Santa Cruz County , all 24 counties are located north of the San Francisco @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Valley .
Only 2 million of California ’ s 39.1 million residents live in these counties .
The failure of most California counties to meet the criteria demonstrates just how persistent the coronavirus is in the Golden State ’ s most populous areas .
The Times analysis found that 92 % of Californians live in counties that in the last two weeks have recorded at least one death from COVID-19 , the disease caused by the coronavirus .
The criteria needs only to be met by counties wanting to move faster than the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ entered Phase 2 of Newsom ’ s reopening plan Friday , its effect statewide was limited — only allowing lower-risk businesses to open for curbside pickup , like florists and stores selling books , clothes , music , toys and sporting goods .
The relaxation only applied to counties without stricter local rules .
The new criteria would need to be satisfied for counties less impacted by the coronavirus to open up businesses in the latter part of Phase 2 faster than the rest of the state , giving customers the ability to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ malls .
Newsom suggested Friday that the guidelines would be later modified on a statewide basis , allowing larger counties hit hardest by the outbreak to also reopen more broadly .
“ Over the next few weeks , we ’ ll be making subsequent announcements for the entire state , not just those that meet those more restrictive criteria , ” Newsom said .
California has recorded more than 63,000 cases and more than 2,600 deaths .
Urban areas have seen a greater toll than many smaller communities .
Los Angeles County , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to one-quarter of the state ’ s population , has suffered the highest death toll of any county for the last two weeks .
Its 622 deaths were 61 % of all the deaths recorded in California from COVID-19 during that time period .
Another 51 deaths were reported in L.A. County on Friday .
Riverside County comes up second , recording 92 fatalities in the past two weeks .
Riverside County ’ s health officer , Dr. Cameron Kaiser , has been locked in a contentious standoff with some other county officials @ @ @ @ @ @ @ people to wear facial coverings in public and stay at least six feet away from others .
Nine other counties had death toll in the double digits over the last two weeks : San Diego County , with 65 ; Santa Clara County , 32 ; Orange County , 30 ; San Bernardino County , 31 ; Alameda County , 21 ; San Mateo County , 17 ; Tulare County , 18 ; Stanislaus County , 14 ; and San Francisco , 11 .
In all , there were 26 counties that have @ @ @ @ @ @ @ past two weeks , in counties home to 36 million people .
Eight counties — with a combined population of 1 million — have met the standard of no deaths in the last two weeks , but have rates of new cases higher than the state ’ s cutoff for a speedier reopening .
The worst hit county in this category is Kings County in the San Joaquin Valley , with 13 new cases per 10,000 residents — just above L.A. County ’ s rate of almost 12 cases per 10,000 residents in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is the site of a large coronavirus outbreak at a meat packing plant in Hanford , where at least 138 have been infected , according to the Fresno Bee .
The others with disease rates that exceed the state standard include Mariposa County , home of Yosemite National Park , with eight new cases per 10,000 residents .
Three other counties have between two and three new cases per 10,000 people : Mono County , home to the Mammoth Mountain ski area ; San Luis Obispo County on the Central Coast , and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Newsom said he understood there ’ s a “ deep anxiety ; people are feeling a desire to reopen , ” but that the criteria for counties to reopen at a pace faster than the statewide standard was based on what public health experts advised .
California has recorded an average of 500 deaths a week for the past four weeks .
He said officials need time to make sure authorities build up robust capacity to test people and train a workforce of disease detectives to investigate new cases — and identify @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
It ’ s no small task .
In Silicon Valley , the Santa Clara County health officer , Dr. Sara Cody , this week said she foresees a need to create an expanded disease detective team twice the size of the local public health department .
Cody said officials are looking at having county , city and school district employees do the work , as well as volunteers .
Currently , the Bay Area ’ s most populous county can investigate 25 new cases a day — and that ’ s adequate @ @ @ @ @ @ @ at home .
But once shelter-in-place orders are lifted and people start leaving home more often , Santa Clara County will likely need to investigate 75 cases a day .
In L.A. County , the manpower needed is enormous , where an average of 900 cases a day have been reported in the last week .
Not only do each of those newly infected people need to be contacted , but so do each of their close contacts , which have averaged eight before the stay-at-home order was implemented and now average five @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a higher risk category , Phase 3 — like hair and nail salons , gyms , movie theaters , churches and weddings — could see a reopening in the coming months .
Churches have been demonstrated as a notable site for coronavirus outbreaks worldwide , and Newsom has said a nail salon was the site of California ’ s first confirmed spread of the coronavirus in the community .
“ Phase 3 is not a year away .
It ’ s not six months away .
It ’ s not even three months @ @ @ @ @ @ @ more than a month away .
We just want to make sure that we have a protocol in place to secure customer safety , employee safety and allow the businesses to thrive in a way that is sustainable , ” Newsom said .
As for the rest of Phase 2 , Newsom said he hoped he could move all of California into the next phase , while allowing some regions to be stricter if they decide that ’ s needed .
“ We hope to be making announcements on a consistent basis , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ everybody into this next phase , ” Newsom said .
Times staff writers Phil Willon and Alexandra Wigglesworth contributed to this report .

Most big California counties are not close to meeting Gov. Gavin Newsom’s strict standards that would allow a wider reopening of the economy, including dine-in restaurants and shopping malls, a Times data analysis found.
Newsom announced Thursday a series of benchmarks each of California’s 58 counties would need to reach to significantly reopen faster than the statewide standard. Can the county show that people have stopped dying from the coronavirus? Have new cases fallen to a manageable level? Can officials adequately test people? Do they have enough detectives to track down newly infected people? And do they have enough medical supplies?
The Times conducted an analysis to see which counties could pass just the first two criteria — whether deaths have stopped in the past 14 days, and whether there is no more than one case per 10,000 residents in that same time period. Most of California failed that test.
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In fact, 95% of Californians live in counties that don’t meet that standard, The Times analysis found. Not a single county in Southern California nor the San Francisco Bay Area met the criteria.
The 24 counties that did meet the criteria, for the two-week period that ended Thursday, are all in Northern California and most are sparsely populated.
The three largest counties meeting both criteria are Placer County, population 380,000, northeast of Sacramento; Santa Cruz County, population 274,000, south of San Jose; and Butte County, population 227,000, in the foothills of the northern Sierra Nevada.
With the exception of Santa Cruz County, all 24 counties are north of the San Francisco Bay Area, Sacramento and the Yosemite Valley.
Only 2 million of California’s 39.1 million residents live in these counties.
The failure of most California counties to meet the criteria demonstrates just how persistent the coronavirus is in the Golden State’s most populous areas. The Times analysis found that 92% of Californians live in counties that in the last two weeks have recorded at least one death from COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus.
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The criteria need to be met only by counties wanting to move faster than the statewide pace of reopening. While California entered the first part of Phase 2 of Newsom’s reopening plan Friday, its effect statewide was limited — only allowing lower-risk businesses to open for curbside pickup, like florists and stores selling books, clothes, music, toys and sporting goods. The easing applied only to counties without stricter local rules.
1 / 20 Christina Dagle and her daughter Eleanor Eades, 4, buy flowers from Devynn’s Garden in Seal Beach. Some businesses began reopening Friday under a relaxation of the state’s stay-at-home order. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times) 2 / 20 Manager Ruben Cortez with online orders ready to be picked up at Lovell’s Records in Whittier. (Irfan Khan / Los Angeles Times) 3 / 20 Davon Artis, owner of Cool Kicks, sits with a bottle of hand sanitizer as he awaits customers Friday at his sports shoe and apparel store on Melrose Avenue. Artis said he had only a few curbside customers. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 4 / 20 Jessica Knudsen, a sales associate at Cookies, a street wear clothing store on Melrose Avenue in Los Angeles, gives change and a backpack purchase to customer Jason Green of Tampa, Fla. (Mel Melcon / Los Angeles Times) 5 / 20 Kim Wicker, owner of Monte’s Camera in Whittier, continued to keep his shop closed Friday. (Irfan Khan / Los Angeles Times) 6 / 20 A security guard gets some exercise while keeping watch at the still-closed Apple Store on the Third Street Promenade in Santa Monica on Friday. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times) 7 / 20 Katrina Woerner at her family business, Pour Le Bain in Whittier, which reopened Friday for online order pickup. (Irfan Khan / Los Angeles Times) 8 / 20 Ben, Julia, Luke and Ethan Brenier, from left, help ready their family store, the Wishing Well, for reopening in Whittier. (Dania Maxwell / Los Angeles Times) 9 / 20 Shopper Enid Koffler, left, talks with clothing store owner Holly Boies at her shop on Abbot Kinney Boulevard in Venice. Boies is planning to open her store Friday for curbside pickup.
(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 10 / 20 Ethan Brenier helps his mother prepare to reopen their family store in Whittier.
(Dania Maxwell / Los Angeles Times) 11 / 20 Rebecca Barnes prepares bouquets at a florist in Long Beach, set to open two days before Mother’s Day.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angelels Times) 12 / 20 Customers in San Clemente, without wearing masks or abiding by social distancing guidelines, stand in line at a newly reopened restaurant.
(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times) 13 / 20 Linda McLoughlin Figel, owner of Pages a Bookstore in Manhattan Beach, left, helps customer Michael Leo. (Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times) 14 / 20 A mural decorates a closed business in Long Beach. (Luis Sinco/Los Angeles Times) 15 / 20 A closed thrift shop on Main Street in Santa Monica. Some retail businesses will reopen for curbside pickup Friday.
(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 16 / 20 Kay Kabir, 71, walks down a deserted Third Street Promenade in Santa Monica. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 17 / 20 Debra Consani prepares the Growing Wild florist for reopening in Manhattan Beach.
(Jay L. Clendenin/Los Angeles Times) 18 / 20 Jay Demircift, co-owner of Puzzle Zoo, prepares his shop in Santa Monica, which will be reopening at a later date. (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 19 / 20 A message board tracks the struggles of a shop owner on Main Street in Santa Monica.
(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times) 20 / 20 Alice Lefae cleans up a Long Beach shop’s exterior in preparation for Friday’s reopening.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
Counties that meet the criteria in the latter part of Phase 2 could allow people to dine inside restaurants and head into malls.
Newsom suggested Friday that the guidelines would be later modified on a statewide basis, allowing larger counties hit hardest by the outbreak to also reopen more broadly.
“Over the next few weeks, we’ll be making subsequent announcements for the entire state, not just those that meet those more restrictive criteria,” Newsom said.
California has recorded more than 63,000 cases and more than 2,600 deaths. Urban areas have seen a greater toll than many smaller communities.
Los Angeles County, California’s most populous and home to one-quarter of the state’s population, has suffered the highest death toll of any county for the last two weeks. Its 622 deaths were 61% of all the deaths recorded in California from COVID-19 during that time period. Another 51 deaths were reported in L.A. County on Friday.
Riverside County comes up second, recording 92 fatalities in the past two weeks. Riverside County’s health officer, Dr. Cameron Kaiser, has been locked in a contentious standoff with some other county officials who are demanding he rescind orders requiring people to wear facial coverings in public and stay at least six feet away from others.
Nine other counties had death tolls in the double digits over the last two weeks: San Diego County, with 65; Santa Clara County, 32; Orange County, 30; San Bernardino County, 31; Alameda County, 21; San Mateo County, 17; Tulare County, 18; Stanislaus County, 14; and San Francisco, 11. In all, there were 26 counties that have reported at least one death in the past two weeks, in counties home to 36 million people.
Eight counties — with a combined population of 1 million — have met the standard of no deaths in the last two weeks, but have rates of new cases higher than the state’s cutoff for a speedier reopening. The worst hit county in this category is Kings County in the San Joaquin Valley, with 13 new cases per 10,000 residents — just above L.A. County’s rate of almost 12 cases per 10,000 residents in the past two weeks.
Kings County is the site of a large coronavirus outbreak at a meat packing plant in Hanford, where at least 138 have been infected, according to the Fresno Bee.
The others with disease rates that exceed the state standard include Mariposa County, home of Yosemite National Park, with eight new cases per 10,000 residents. Three other counties have between two and three new cases per 10,000 people: Mono County, home to the Mammoth Mountain ski area; San Luis Obispo County on the Central Coast, and Merced County in the San Joaquin Valley.
Newsom said he understood there’s a “deep anxiety; people are feeling a desire to reopen,” but that the criteria for counties to reopen at a pace faster than the statewide standard was based on what public health experts advised. California has recorded an average of 500 deaths a week for the past four weeks.
He said officials need time to make sure authorities build up robust capacity to test people and train a workforce of disease detectives to investigate new cases — and identify their close contacts — as California reopens.
It’s no small task. In Silicon Valley, the Santa Clara County health officer, Dr. Sara Cody, this week said she foresees a need to create an expanded disease detective team twice the size of the local public health department. Cody said officials are looking at having county, city and school district employees do the work, as well as volunteers.
Currently, the Bay Area’s most populous county can investigate 25 new cases a day — and that’s adequate right now because most people are staying at home. But once shelter-in-place orders are lifted and people start leaving home more often, Santa Clara County will likely need to investigate 75 cases a day.
The manpower needed is enormous in L.A. County, where an average of 900 cases a day have been reported in the last week. Not only do each of those newly infected people need to be contacted, but so do each of their close contacts, which have averaged eight before the stay-at-home order was implemented and now average five.
Newsom said businesses and venues in a higher risk category, Phase 3 — like hair and nail salons, gyms, movie theaters, churches and weddings — could see a reopening in the coming months. Churches have been a notable site for coronavirus outbreaks worldwide, and Newsom has said a nail salon was the site of California’s first confirmed spread of the coronavirus in the community.
“Phase 3 is not a year away. It’s not six months away. It’s not even three months away. It may not even be more than a month away. We just want to make sure that we have a protocol in place to secure customer safety, employee safety and allow the businesses to thrive in a way that is sustainable,” Newsom said.
As for the rest of Phase 2, Newsom said he hoped he could move all of California into the next phase, while allowing some regions to be stricter if they decide that’s needed. “We hope to be making announcements on a consistent basis, over the next few weeks, moving everybody into this next phase,” Newsom said.
Times staff writers Phil Willon and Alexandra Wigglesworth contributed to this report.


latimes--2020-05-08--L.A. traffic is starting to pick up again, and travel speeds are slowing down

During the first month of California ’ s stay-at-home order , Hollywood writer Jon Hotchkiss went to great lengths to film the vast emptiness of the street grid : walking onto an onramp , lingering on overpasses , even strapping a camera on his car and driving through the sparse traffic in the Sepulveda Pass .
Last week , as cars zipped past him on Ventura Boulevard , he realized that the blissful , eerie period of no traffic was already ending .
“ I ’ m seeing more cars everywhere , ” Hotchkiss said .
“ It ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ all these people going ?
” Like the first tender shoots of spring , or perhaps the proverbial canary in the coal mine , traffic is beginning to reappear in Los Angeles .
Congestion is still far below pre-pandemic levels .
But the number of drivers who are out and about is steadily creeping upward , and travel times are retreating from the white-hot pace of late March , when the 405 Freeway saw speeds of 70 mph at rush hour .
For three straight weeks , trips taken and miles driven in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , according to an analysis performed by Inrix , a traffic data company in Seattle .
Miles driven are now about 54 % of pre-pandemic levels , compared with 43 % a month ago .
“ Traffic took a dive right away , ” said Bob Pishue , an Inrix transportation analyst .
“ We ’ re starting to see it slowly recover.
” Requests for driving directions through Apple Maps have surged , too .
Some residents say they ’ ve started shutting their windows during work calls because traffic is getting @ @ @ @ @ @ @ idling at stops , ahead of schedule .
Pedestrians , who strolled across major boulevards against the light a month ago , are waiting for the walk signal again .
The uptick in traffic comes as California begins its seventh week of stay-at-home orders , and the economic and emotional strain of the shutdown begins to sink in .
“ People are starting to get a little stir crazy , ” Hotchkiss said .
“ The podcasts that I listen to were doing episodes about loneliness and how incredibly debilitating it can be @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , ‘ Oh , yeah .
I ’ m starting to feel that , just a little.
’ ” After a rainy and cool March and April , temperatures are soaring into the 90s .
Staying home in the heat of the afternoon is becoming unbearable for tens of thousands of residents without air conditioning .
“ We drove an hour just to get out of the house , ” said Michelle Miranda , 38 , who loaded her two young children into the car in El Monte and went to the grocery @ @ @ @ @ @ @ car has air conditioning but the house doesn ’ t. ” The Inrix analysis found that driving trips are rising on the weekends .
That could be a cause for concern for California officials , who continue to warn that residents should continue to stay home whenever possible , even as they begin to tentatively reopen small sections of the economy .
“ If we don ’ t adhere to public health orders ... we are not going to get out of this mess , ” Los Angeles County Supervisor Hilda Solis said @ @ @ @ @ @ @ taking stay-at-home orders as seriously as they should .
“ It is going to hurt people , and it is going to hurt the economy.
” In Los Angeles County , some retailers , including florists , toy stores and bookshops , are now open for curbside pickup only .
Golf courses and trails also reopened Friday .
People still must adhere to physical distancing requirements and wear face coverings , health officials said .
Luis Duran , 29 , an urban planner who lives in Hawthorne , opened Instagram this week and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ on major freeways .
He opened Google Maps and took a screenshot of the dark red lines , signifying heavy congestion , on the northbound 405 and the 10 Freeway between downtown and Santa Monica .
“ Why are there so many red lines when we ’ re all supposed to be home ?
” Duran said .
“ The streets should still be empty.
” He posted the screenshot on Instagram with the caption : “ I didn ’ t know all the stay-at-home orders were lifted already ?
” For good @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
So , with freeways fuller , where are people going ?
Trips to grocery stores and pharmacies in Los Angeles County have risen slightly since April , according to data analyzed by Google .
Trips to parks have increased , too , with the number of visits about 40 % lower than usual in May , compared with 80 % lower than usual in April .
Some people , chafing under the requirements of staying home all day , or struggling to work at home with roommates or a spouse , are @ @ @ @ @ @ @ his office in the Equitable Life Building in Koreatown , attorney Matthew Strugar , 41 , has a clear view of Wilshire Boulevard .
Over the last two weeks , he said , traffic has slowly gotten worse , to the point that some drivers don ’ t make it down a block before the light turns red again .
The lobby of his building was a ghost town for weeks .
Now , he said , he sometimes has to wait for the next elevator so he can ride up alone to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ himself .
He ’ s leaving the house to give his wife space to work from their home in Echo Park .
The extra people on the road , he said , must be “ feeling some fatigue , and because it helps with that interpersonal element at home.
” As Strugar bikes home , he sometimes pulls over , opens Google Maps and takes a screenshot of where traffic seems to be getting worse .
On Wednesday , the 405 through the Sepulveda Pass was a familiar shade of dark red .

The morning commute on the southbound 15 Freeway in Ontario was slightly busier May 8 than in prior weeks.
During the first month of California’s stay-at-home order, Hollywood writer Jon Hotchkiss went to great lengths to film the vast emptiness of the street grid: walking onto an onramp, lingering on overpasses, even strapping a camera on his car and driving through the sparse traffic in the Sepulveda Pass.
Last week, as cars zipped past him on Ventura Boulevard, he realized that the blissful, eerie period of no traffic was already ending.
“I’m seeing more cars everywhere,” Hotchkiss said. “It’s just strange, like: Where are all these people going?”
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Like the first tender shoots of spring, or perhaps the proverbial canary in the coal mine, traffic is beginning to reappear in Los Angeles.
Congestion is still far below pre-pandemic levels. But the number of drivers who are out and about is steadily creeping upward, and travel times are retreating from the white-hot pace of late March, when the 405 Freeway saw speeds of 70 mph at rush hour.
For three straight weeks, trips taken and miles driven in Los Angeles have been on the rise, according to an analysis performed by Inrix, a traffic data company in Seattle. Miles driven are now about 54% of pre-pandemic levels, compared with 43% a month ago.
“Traffic took a dive right away,” said Bob Pishue, an Inrix transportation analyst. “We’re starting to see it slowly recover.”
Requests for driving directions through Apple Maps have surged, too.
Requests for driving, walking and biking directions are starting to creep back up. (Apple Maps)
Some residents say they’ve started shutting their windows during work calls because traffic is getting louder. Municipal buses are no longer idling at stops, ahead of schedule. Pedestrians, who strolled across major boulevards against the light a month ago, are waiting for the walk signal again.
The uptick in traffic comes as California begins its seventh week of stay-at-home orders, and the economic and emotional strain of the shutdown begins to sink in.
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“People are starting to get a little stir crazy,” Hotchkiss said. “The podcasts that I listen to were doing episodes about loneliness and how incredibly debilitating it can be. And I was listening and going, ‘Oh, yeah. I’m starting to feel that, just a little.’”
After a rainy and cool March and April, temperatures are soaring into the 90s. Staying home in the heat of the afternoon is becoming unbearable for tens of thousands of residents without air conditioning.
“We drove an hour just to get out of the house,” said Michelle Miranda, 38, who loaded her two young children into the car in El Monte and went to the grocery store in Santa Monica. “The car has air conditioning but the house doesn’t.”
The Inrix analysis found that driving trips are rising on the weekends. That could be a cause for concern for California officials, who continue to warn that residents should continue to stay home whenever possible, even as they begin to tentatively reopen small sections of the economy.
“If we don’t adhere to public health orders... we are not going to get out of this mess,” Los Angeles County Supervisor Hilda Solis said Thursday, adding that people are not taking stay-at-home orders as seriously as they should. “It is going to hurt people, and it is going to hurt the economy.”
In Los Angeles County, some retailers, including florists, toy stores and bookshops, are now open for curbside pickup only. Golf courses and trails also reopened Friday. People still must adhere to physical distancing requirements and wear face coverings, health officials said.
Luis Duran, 29, an urban planner who lives in Hawthorne, opened Instagram this week and saw multiple friends complaining about bumper-to-bumper traffic on major freeways. He opened Google Maps and took a screenshot of the dark red lines, signifying heavy congestion, on the northbound 405 and the 10 Freeway between downtown and Santa Monica.
“Why are there so many red lines when we’re all supposed to be home?” Duran said. “The streets should still be empty.”
He posted the screenshot on Instagram with the caption: “I didn’t know all the stay-at-home orders were lifted already?” For good measure, he added a smirking emoji.
So, with freeways fuller, where are people going?
Trips to grocery stores and pharmacies in Los Angeles County have risen slightly since April, according to data analyzed by Google. Trips to parks have increased, too, with the number of visits about 40% lower than usual in May, compared with 80% lower than usual in April.
Some people, chafing under the requirements of staying home all day, or struggling to work at home with roommates or a spouse, are heading back to the office.
From his office in the Equitable Life Building in Koreatown, attorney Matthew Strugar, 41, has a clear view of Wilshire Boulevard. Over the last two weeks, he said, traffic has slowly gotten worse, to the point that some drivers don’t make it down a block before the light turns red again.
The lobby of his building was a ghost town for weeks. Now, he said, he sometimes has to wait for the next elevator so he can ride up alone to his office, where he works by himself.
He’s leaving the house to give his wife space to work from their home in Echo Park. The extra people on the road, he said, must be “feeling some fatigue, and because it helps with that interpersonal element at home.”
As Strugar bikes home, he sometimes pulls over, opens Google Maps and takes a screenshot of where traffic seems to be getting worse. On Wednesday, the 405 through the Sepulveda Pass was a familiar shade of dark red.


latimes--2020-05-08--Two bears were fatally hit by cars on the same freeway within 24 hours

A bear was fatally struck by a car while walking through traffic on the northbound 5 Freeway in Castaic early Friday , the second fatal bear collision on the same freeway in less than 24 hours , authorities said .
In the most recent incident , the bear died upon impact when it was struck by a Toyota Prius shortly before 4 a.m. Friday , according to the California Highway Patrol .
The car skidded into an embankment , but the driver was not injured .
The first incident occurred about 11 a.m. Thursday , Sgt .
Zachary Emmons said @ @ @ @ @ @ @ right shoulder of the 5 freeway near the Smokey Bear off-ramp , Emmons said .
The person who hit that bear left the scene , he said .
It ’ s unclear why the bears had wandered onto the freeway .
“ This is something that does not normally happen in our area , ” Emmons said .
One possibility could be a decline in traffic , as shelter-in-place orders stemming from the coronavirus have kept more commuters off the road .
There has been at least one other incident in the region @ @ @ @ @ @ @ near Fort Tejon , a bear was struck by a car two weeks ago , authorities said .
It ’ s not uncommon to see a bear collision in that area once or twice a year , CHP public information officer Richard Anthes said .
But so far there hasn ’ t been an uptick of such incidents .
Although traffic along that stretch of the 5 freeway has dropped off by about 35 % , Anthes said that it ’ s not desolate .
Trucks are still traveling up and down to @ @ @

A bear was fatally struck by a car while walking through traffic on the northbound 5 Freeway in Castaic early Friday, the second fatal bear collision on the same freeway in less than 24 hours, authorities said.
In the most recent incident, the bear died upon impact when it was struck by a Toyota Prius shortly before 4 a.m. Friday, according to the California Highway Patrol. The car skidded into an embankment, but the driver was not injured.
The first incident occurred about 11 a.m. Thursday, Sgt. Zachary Emmons said.
A bear was hit on the right shoulder of the 5 freeway near the Smokey Bear off-ramp, Emmons said. The person who hit that bear left the scene, he said.
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It’s unclear why the bears had wandered onto the freeway. “This is something that does not normally happen in our area,” Emmons said.
One possibility could be a decline in traffic, as shelter-in-place orders stemming from the coronavirus have kept more commuters off the road. There has been at least one other incident in the region recently.
Further north along the Grapevine near Fort Tejon, a bear was struck by a car two weeks ago, authorities said.
It’s not uncommon to see a bear collision in that area once or twice a year, CHP public information officer Richard Anthes said. But so far there hasn’t been an uptick of such incidents.
Although traffic along that stretch of the 5 freeway has dropped off by about 35%, Anthes said that it’s not desolate. Trucks are still traveling up and down to distribute supplies.


latimes--2020-05-08--What will concerts look like when California reopens?

Even in the most optimistic future under COVID-19 , live music will be one of the last things to return to normal .
When it does — and it will eventually — shows will be profoundly different .
Beloved venues may have closed for good , crowds will be wary of each other on dancefloors and digital life may have supplanted sweaty clubs and sunny festival fields.Since The Times started documenting the fallout of COVID-19 for the music industry , the news has often been dire .
The concert business is decimated for now , and everyone from wedding bands @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the next few months.But public health experts believe there is a path forward to return eventually .
Artists have turned to livestreaming in ingenious , sometimes hilarious ways to stay afloat ( and sane ) .
Music , as always , finds a way to be heard.We hear from readers every day about how much they miss the heartbeat of L.A. nightlife .
Until it returns in all its close-quartered , ear-splitting glory , just imagine how good that first cold drink on a hot festival field will taste .
We ’ ll @ @ @ @ @

August Brown, Randall Roberts, Mikael Wood

Even in the most optimistic future under COVID-19, live music will be one of the last things to return to normal. When it does — and it will eventually — shows will be profoundly different. Beloved venues may have closed for good, crowds will be wary of each other on dancefloors and digital life may have supplanted sweaty clubs and sunny festival fields.
Since The Times started documenting the fallout of COVID-19 for the music industry, the news has often been dire. The concert business is decimated for now, and everyone from wedding bands to record store clerks are terrified of the next few months.
But public health experts believe there is a path forward to return eventually. Artists have turned to livestreaming in ingenious, sometimes hilarious ways to stay afloat (and sane). Music, as always, finds a way to be heard.
We hear from readers every day about how much they miss the heartbeat of L.A. nightlife. Until it returns in all its close-quartered, ear-splitting glory, just imagine how good that first cold drink on a hot festival field will taste. We’ll get back there someday.