California is deploying nearly 1,300 medical workers to assist at short-staffed hospitals around the state that are straining to handle the barrage of new COVID-19 cases.
Those workers, from a range of federal and state agencies, including the Cal Guard, are being sent to hospitals, nursing homes and other medical facilities in the most overwhelmed regions, like San Joaquin Valley and Southern California, according to the Governor's Office of Emergency Services.
"We've been deploying technical assistance teams all up and down the state of California," Gov. Gavin Newsom said Monday, noting a particular focus on Los Angeles, where hospital ICUs are at capacity. These teams, he said, are intended to reduce "stress on certain physical locations, space, equipment, supplies, the whole gambit."
But more than half of those extra hands include about 750 contract workers who come from the same pool that a lot of hospitals already dip into for extra help, according to Santa Clara County Counsel James Williams.
"It’s not like there's an extra magical pool the state has," he said. "A lot of it, I fear, is resource shifting when there is a much broader need."