HILDA SOLIS

President Joe Biden’s visit to California and Oregon this week comes close to Election Day and shows how Democrats are calling in reinforcements in states that are typically afterthoughts for the party.

A new report shows that nearly 2,000 homeless people died in Los Angeles County during the first year of the pandemic, an increase of 56% from the previous year, driven mainly by drug overdoses.

California will require all of its roughly 2.2 million health care and long term care workers to be fully vaccinated against the coronavirus by Sept. 30.

Los Angeles County residents are again required to wear masks indoors regardless of their vaccination status — a mandate that health officials hope will reverse the latest spikes in coronavirus cases, hospitalizations and deaths.

Five more California counties will move to less restrictive tiers because of improving COVID-19 conditions and no counties regressed.

Marshals Service officers after holding a court hearing at the Downtown Women's Center in Los Angeles Thursday, Feb. 4, 2021. “This is an extraordinary hearing,” Carter said, acknowledging the setting but also the scope of the problem facing the court. “The only answer is housing!” said Pete White, an activist with the Los Angeles Community Action Network. A January 2020 count by the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority reported that there were more than 66,400 homeless people living in Los Angeles County — by far the largest single concentration in the state. Carter noted that 1,383 homeless people died in the city and county of Los Angeles last year, a 32% increase from 2019.

(AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)SACRAMENTO, Calif. – California on Wednesday said it’s safe to resume using a batch of Moderna coronavirus vaccine after some people fell ill and a halt to injections was recommended. About 330,000 doses from the lot had been distributed to nearly 300 providers in California this month. More than 4 million doses had been shipped and about 1.5 million had been administered as of Tuesday, according to figures from the state public health department. “The chief obstacle we are facing is not enough doses,” said Roland Pickens, director of San Francisco’s public health care system, at a supervisors’ hearing Wednesday. The total of 694 new deaths is second to the record 708 reported Jan. 8, according to the state Department of Public Health.

The county health department received 12,000 doses last week and had expected the same amount this week, but it received only 1,775. “This unreliable source makes it very hard to plan,” public health director Dr. Grant Colfax said. Yet Yolo County Public Health Officer Dr. Aimee Sisson said the state is “creating unreasonable expectations” by pushing to inoculate those age 65 and up when the county still lacks enough vaccines even for health care workers. Sacramento County Public Health has just 975 doses allocated for this week, leading Public Health Officer Dr. Olivia Kasirye to call for patience. So far 3.2 million doses have been shipped to California and 1.5 million have been administered, Ghaly said.

SACRAMENTO, Calif. – California lifted a stay-at-home order in the 13-county Sacramento region on Tuesday as hospital conditions improved, a rare turn of good news as the state pushes through what Gov. Three of the state's five regions — the San Francisco Bay Area, Central Valley and Southern California — remain under the stay-at-home order because their intensive care capacity at hospitals is severely limited. To try to get the virus in check California, is moving more quickly to distribute vaccines. Newsom imposed the nation's first statewide stay-at-home order in March. Supervisor Mike Ziegenmeyer of Sutter County in the Sacramento region acknowledged as much when he reacted to the order being lifted.

The four-time Grammy winner isn't the only Biden playlist mainstay helping his campaign against President Donald Trump. Still, Biden has gone beyond celebrities in search of campaign surrogates. Stars generate candidate buzz, help with fundraising and can build campaign event crowds even for those online. His reelection campaign has been holding its own online events with top supporters nearly every night for months and says its online events average 2.6 million views per broadcast, though its headliners are often the presidents children. The Trump campaign has also seized on Biden's preferred venue for participating in online events, a basement studio in his Delaware home accusing the former vice president of hiding from voters.