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"content": "\u003cp>Ticks aren’t known as beach lovers, so ecologist Dan Salkeld and a colleague were surprised when they found 180 ticks in less than a mile on a coastal trail near Muir Beach in California one day in 2016.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Contrary to most people, we were delighted at the high numbers of ticks! It was exciting in terms of sample sizes and data,” says Salkeld, whose findings were \u003ca href=\"https://journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/AEM.00319-21\">published\u003c/a> in June.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But it’s also sobering. For years, people who track black-legged ticks — the kind that carry Lyme disease — have been finding them in further-flung territory, though still in mostly traditional habitats of forested areas with tall grasses and leaf litter.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Now, “as the numbers expand, we see ticks in areas that we don’t think of as traditional habitat,” Mayo Clinic parasitologist Bobbi Pritt says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That trend has continued, with ticks are showing up in places previously deemed safe from the disease-carrying arachnids, from those coastal California beach areas to manicured lawns in the Northeast. The sheer number of ticks may be forcing them to branch out into new habitats, Pritt theorizes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And, more of them appear to be carrying pathogens. Pritt’s lab tests tens of thousands of ticks; over the last three years, they’ve found that more and more of the ticks carry the bacteria that causes anaplasmosis, a disease that can cause headache, fever and chills and severe illness if treatment is delayed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11880480\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 300px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/MDH-tick-jpeg.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"400\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11880480\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/MDH-tick-jpeg.jpg 300w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/MDH-tick-jpeg-160x213.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Minnesota Department of Health employees demo a smart hack for keeping critters off while out in the field: Wrap duct tape around socks and pant legs to prevent ticks from crawling in. \u003ccite>(Sheila Eldred for NPR)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>It all adds up to more illness: Tick-borne diseases are at \u003ca href=\"https://www.cdc.gov/ticks/data-summary/index.html\">an all-time high\u003c/a>, with about 50,000 cases reported each year — and far more going unreported.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While Lyme disease is by far the most prevalent, accounting for nearly 35,000 cases in 2019, ticks also carry pathogens that can make you allergic to red meat or cause acute respiratory distress. In rare cases, tick-borne diseases are fatal. Anaplasmosis is the second-most common tick-borne disease, with nearly 8,000 cases reported in 2019.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Here’s what you need to know about what kinds of ticks to watch out for, where — and what to do if you get bitten.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Check Your Local Tick Forecast\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Your personal disease risk is highly dependent on your location.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Tick prevalence hinges on a number of local factors that make sweeping generalizations tricky, says Dr. George Dempsey of East Hampton Family Medicine and \u003ca href=\"https://www.bayarealyme.org/\">Bay Area Lyme Foundation’\u003c/a>s Lyme Disease Biobank. That’s why he’s skeptical when he hears predictions for upcoming tick seasons.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Every year they say it’s going to be a big year — either because of acorns or cold winters or warm winters …,” he says, but all of those factors vary from one location to the next.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://youtu.be/_IoOJu2_FKE\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Currently, a mild winter plus a hot, humid summer in the Midwest is bringing out ticks earlier than usual, for example. “It’s prime time — ticks are already out and about in Minnesota,” says Elizabeth Schiffman, epidemiologist supervisor at the Minnesota Department of Health.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Regional differences are shifting as well. In East Hampton, New York, Dempsey is seeing more Lone Star ticks, a relative newcomer to the area, and fewer black-legged ticks — resulting in less Lyme disease. And back on that Muir Beach trail in California, Salkeld’s team got its second surprise when they tested the ticks they found.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Our prediction would have been that they didn’t have Lyme, but they were just as high as ticks in woodland areas,” he says, leading him to pose the question in his study: Should infection prevalence in ticks be reported at a hyper-local level — possibly even for a single trail?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>What does it mean for those of us trying to stay away from ticks? Be familiar with the ticks in your area, Pritt says. (Try this field map from the University of Rhode Island’s \u003ca href=\"https://web.uri.edu/tickencounter/fieldguide/\">TickEncounter\u003c/a> website.) And note that your state or county health department is your best bet for local tick information.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Know Your Tick Types\u003c/h3>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11880481\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/ticks_types-jpeg.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"531\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11880481\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/ticks_types-jpeg.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/ticks_types-jpeg-160x106.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Six common types of adult female ticks. Top row, left to right: Lone star, Black-legged, Asian long-horned. Bottom row, left to right: Gulf coast, American dog, Rocky mountain wood \u003ccite>((Top row, left to right) Public Health Image Library, Wikimedia Commons, James Gathany/CDC (Bottom row, left to right) Public Health Image Library, Patrick Gorring/iNaturalist, Public Health Image Library)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>These are the main types you may encounter in the U.S.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>The black-legged tick, often referred to as a deer tick,\u003c/strong> can carry Lyme disease, babesiosis, ehrlichiosis, anaplasmosis and Powassan virus. An adult full-grown black-legged tick is the size of a sesame seed; a nymph is the size of a poppy seed. It’s found in the \u003ca href=\"https://www.cdc.gov/ticks/surveillance/BlackleggedTick.html\">eastern half of the U.S. \u003c/a>Black-legged ticks near the Pacific Coast are a cousin of this tick, known as the Western black-legged tick.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside tag=\"ticks\" label=\"Related Stories\"]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>The Lone Star tick\u003c/strong> is aggressive; instead of “questing” from a blade of grass like a black-legged tick, it may pursue a person 50 to 75 feet away. “People could be hanging out on their deck and they’ll crawl up on them,” Dempsey says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They can carry ehrlichiosis, heartland virus, tularemia and Southern tick-associated rash illness. Their bite may also trigger alpha-gal syndrome, which can cause an allergy to meat. Adult females have a white dot on their backs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Its range includes a \u003ca href=\"https://www.cdc.gov/stari/geo/index.html\">large swath of the country\u003c/a> from Iowa to Texas and everywhere east of there.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>The Gulf Coast tick\u003c/strong> is a close relation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>The American dog tick, also known as a wood tick,\u003c/strong> can carry Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever, one of the deadliest tick-borne diseases, and tularemia. This tick is much bigger than a black-legged tick, so people are more likely to spot them when they latch on. It’s found in the \u003ca href=\"https://www.cdc.gov/ticks/maps/american_dog_tick.pdf\">eastern two-thirds of the country and California\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>The Rocky Mountain wood tick\u003c/strong> can spread Colorado Tick Fever in addition to Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever and tularemia. It ranges primarily in the \u003ca href=\"https://www.cdc.gov/ticks/maps/rocky_mountain_wood_tick.pdf\">northern Rocky Mountain region\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>The Asian long-horned tick\u003c/strong> A new species landed in the U.S. in 2017, when it was spotted for the first time on a sheep in New Jersey. It’s now been noted in at least 15 states in \u003ca href=\"https://www.cdc.gov/ticks/longhorned-tick/index.html\">the Midwest and East Coast.\u003c/a> Female ticks do not need to mate to lay eggs, and thousands can be found together, making grassy areas appear to be moving. They have not yet been found to transmit disease in the U.S.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>How to Avoid Getting Bitten\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>To avoid a tick encounter, you’ll want to be vigilant about taking precautions whenever you’re spending a significant amount of time outdoors in tick territory, whether you’re hiking or mowing your lawn. Fortunately, the same prevention techniques work for all types of ticks, Pritt says:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>1. Get dorky: \u003c/strong>Repelling ticks starts with your outfit. Choose long sleeves and pants if possible. “And it may feel dorky, but tucking your pants into your socks gives ticks less access into the areas they can bite,” says Pritt, who wears white coveralls and duct tapes the legs to her socks when going on tick drags. Spray exposed skin with a good repellent. And treat clothes likely to be worn in tick habitat ahead of time with a permethrin repellent for the greatest protection.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>2. Strip:\u003c/strong> After your adventure — even if it’s just mowing the lawn — the easiest way to make sure ticks stay outside is to disrobe as soon as possible — shed all your clothes on a porch before going inside to keep any hangers-on outside if possible — jump in the shower, check for ticks and scrub. Remember that disease-carrying ticks can be tiny: At the nymph stage, when it’s likely to bite you, a black-legged tick is the size of a poppy seed. Don’t forget about pets and kids. Check them for ticks outside; otherwise, a tick can fall off a dog inside and bite you.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>3. Disinfect:\u003c/strong> Throw discarded clothes into the dryer on high heat for at least 6 minutes to kill any stragglers.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>What to Do if You Do Get Bitten\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>1. Don’t panic. \u003c/strong> It’s a hard rule to follow, Pritt admits, but remember that not every tick carries a harmful bacteria or virus.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>2. Forget the folk remedies:\u003c/strong> “Grab a pair of fine tipped tweezers, remove as quickly as possible as close to skin as you can by pulling it out in a smooth, continuous motion without twisting it,” Pritt says. And don’t light a match or roll it in butter, as in fact, those methods often result in only partial removal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>3. Save it: \u003c/strong>Put the tick in a plastic bag in the freezer, especially if you think it may have been attached a long time, which may increase the risk of Lyme disease transmission. That way if you decide to see a doctor, they’ll be able to identify the type of tick that bit you, and even test it for disease-causing bacteria. Keep in mind, though, that you may not get infected even if the tick tests positive, Dempsey says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>4. Watch for symptoms:\u003c/strong> A rash, headache, flu-like symptoms and joint pain can all be signs of Lyme disease, anaplasmosis and ehrlichiosis. A stiff neck and swollen lymph nodes are associated with Lyme disease.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>IF YOU HAVE SYMPTOMS: \u003c/strong>Many people with Lyme disease \u003ca href=\"https://westnile.ca.gov/pdfs/VBDSAnnualReport19.pdf\">don’t remember getting a rash\u003c/a> or a tick bite. So mention your concerns to your health care provider. Blood tests may be able to detect Lyme disease after your body has developed antibodies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Copyright 2021 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Ticks aren’t known as beach lovers, so ecologist Dan Salkeld and a colleague were surprised when they found 180 ticks in less than a mile on a coastal trail near Muir Beach in California one day in 2016.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Contrary to most people, we were delighted at the high numbers of ticks! It was exciting in terms of sample sizes and data,” says Salkeld, whose findings were \u003ca href=\"https://journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/AEM.00319-21\">published\u003c/a> in June.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But it’s also sobering. For years, people who track black-legged ticks — the kind that carry Lyme disease — have been finding them in further-flung territory, though still in mostly traditional habitats of forested areas with tall grasses and leaf litter.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Now, “as the numbers expand, we see ticks in areas that we don’t think of as traditional habitat,” Mayo Clinic parasitologist Bobbi Pritt says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That trend has continued, with ticks are showing up in places previously deemed safe from the disease-carrying arachnids, from those coastal California beach areas to manicured lawns in the Northeast. The sheer number of ticks may be forcing them to branch out into new habitats, Pritt theorizes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And, more of them appear to be carrying pathogens. Pritt’s lab tests tens of thousands of ticks; over the last three years, they’ve found that more and more of the ticks carry the bacteria that causes anaplasmosis, a disease that can cause headache, fever and chills and severe illness if treatment is delayed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11880480\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 300px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/MDH-tick-jpeg.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"400\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11880480\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/MDH-tick-jpeg.jpg 300w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/MDH-tick-jpeg-160x213.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Minnesota Department of Health employees demo a smart hack for keeping critters off while out in the field: Wrap duct tape around socks and pant legs to prevent ticks from crawling in. \u003ccite>(Sheila Eldred for NPR)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>It all adds up to more illness: Tick-borne diseases are at \u003ca href=\"https://www.cdc.gov/ticks/data-summary/index.html\">an all-time high\u003c/a>, with about 50,000 cases reported each year — and far more going unreported.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While Lyme disease is by far the most prevalent, accounting for nearly 35,000 cases in 2019, ticks also carry pathogens that can make you allergic to red meat or cause acute respiratory distress. In rare cases, tick-borne diseases are fatal. Anaplasmosis is the second-most common tick-borne disease, with nearly 8,000 cases reported in 2019.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Here’s what you need to know about what kinds of ticks to watch out for, where — and what to do if you get bitten.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Check Your Local Tick Forecast\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Your personal disease risk is highly dependent on your location.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Tick prevalence hinges on a number of local factors that make sweeping generalizations tricky, says Dr. George Dempsey of East Hampton Family Medicine and \u003ca href=\"https://www.bayarealyme.org/\">Bay Area Lyme Foundation’\u003c/a>s Lyme Disease Biobank. That’s why he’s skeptical when he hears predictions for upcoming tick seasons.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Every year they say it’s going to be a big year — either because of acorns or cold winters or warm winters …,” he says, but all of those factors vary from one location to the next.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/_IoOJu2_FKE'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/_IoOJu2_FKE'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cp>Currently, a mild winter plus a hot, humid summer in the Midwest is bringing out ticks earlier than usual, for example. “It’s prime time — ticks are already out and about in Minnesota,” says Elizabeth Schiffman, epidemiologist supervisor at the Minnesota Department of Health.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Regional differences are shifting as well. In East Hampton, New York, Dempsey is seeing more Lone Star ticks, a relative newcomer to the area, and fewer black-legged ticks — resulting in less Lyme disease. And back on that Muir Beach trail in California, Salkeld’s team got its second surprise when they tested the ticks they found.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Our prediction would have been that they didn’t have Lyme, but they were just as high as ticks in woodland areas,” he says, leading him to pose the question in his study: Should infection prevalence in ticks be reported at a hyper-local level — possibly even for a single trail?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>What does it mean for those of us trying to stay away from ticks? Be familiar with the ticks in your area, Pritt says. (Try this field map from the University of Rhode Island’s \u003ca href=\"https://web.uri.edu/tickencounter/fieldguide/\">TickEncounter\u003c/a> website.) And note that your state or county health department is your best bet for local tick information.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Know Your Tick Types\u003c/h3>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11880481\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/ticks_types-jpeg.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"531\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11880481\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/ticks_types-jpeg.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/ticks_types-jpeg-160x106.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Six common types of adult female ticks. Top row, left to right: Lone star, Black-legged, Asian long-horned. Bottom row, left to right: Gulf coast, American dog, Rocky mountain wood \u003ccite>((Top row, left to right) Public Health Image Library, Wikimedia Commons, James Gathany/CDC (Bottom row, left to right) Public Health Image Library, Patrick Gorring/iNaturalist, Public Health Image Library)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>These are the main types you may encounter in the U.S.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>The black-legged tick, often referred to as a deer tick,\u003c/strong> can carry Lyme disease, babesiosis, ehrlichiosis, anaplasmosis and Powassan virus. An adult full-grown black-legged tick is the size of a sesame seed; a nymph is the size of a poppy seed. It’s found in the \u003ca href=\"https://www.cdc.gov/ticks/surveillance/BlackleggedTick.html\">eastern half of the U.S. \u003c/a>Black-legged ticks near the Pacific Coast are a cousin of this tick, known as the Western black-legged tick.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>The Lone Star tick\u003c/strong> is aggressive; instead of “questing” from a blade of grass like a black-legged tick, it may pursue a person 50 to 75 feet away. “People could be hanging out on their deck and they’ll crawl up on them,” Dempsey says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They can carry ehrlichiosis, heartland virus, tularemia and Southern tick-associated rash illness. Their bite may also trigger alpha-gal syndrome, which can cause an allergy to meat. Adult females have a white dot on their backs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Its range includes a \u003ca href=\"https://www.cdc.gov/stari/geo/index.html\">large swath of the country\u003c/a> from Iowa to Texas and everywhere east of there.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>The Gulf Coast tick\u003c/strong> is a close relation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>The American dog tick, also known as a wood tick,\u003c/strong> can carry Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever, one of the deadliest tick-borne diseases, and tularemia. This tick is much bigger than a black-legged tick, so people are more likely to spot them when they latch on. It’s found in the \u003ca href=\"https://www.cdc.gov/ticks/maps/american_dog_tick.pdf\">eastern two-thirds of the country and California\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>The Rocky Mountain wood tick\u003c/strong> can spread Colorado Tick Fever in addition to Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever and tularemia. It ranges primarily in the \u003ca href=\"https://www.cdc.gov/ticks/maps/rocky_mountain_wood_tick.pdf\">northern Rocky Mountain region\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>The Asian long-horned tick\u003c/strong> A new species landed in the U.S. in 2017, when it was spotted for the first time on a sheep in New Jersey. It’s now been noted in at least 15 states in \u003ca href=\"https://www.cdc.gov/ticks/longhorned-tick/index.html\">the Midwest and East Coast.\u003c/a> Female ticks do not need to mate to lay eggs, and thousands can be found together, making grassy areas appear to be moving. They have not yet been found to transmit disease in the U.S.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>How to Avoid Getting Bitten\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>To avoid a tick encounter, you’ll want to be vigilant about taking precautions whenever you’re spending a significant amount of time outdoors in tick territory, whether you’re hiking or mowing your lawn. Fortunately, the same prevention techniques work for all types of ticks, Pritt says:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>1. Get dorky: \u003c/strong>Repelling ticks starts with your outfit. Choose long sleeves and pants if possible. “And it may feel dorky, but tucking your pants into your socks gives ticks less access into the areas they can bite,” says Pritt, who wears white coveralls and duct tapes the legs to her socks when going on tick drags. Spray exposed skin with a good repellent. And treat clothes likely to be worn in tick habitat ahead of time with a permethrin repellent for the greatest protection.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>2. Strip:\u003c/strong> After your adventure — even if it’s just mowing the lawn — the easiest way to make sure ticks stay outside is to disrobe as soon as possible — shed all your clothes on a porch before going inside to keep any hangers-on outside if possible — jump in the shower, check for ticks and scrub. Remember that disease-carrying ticks can be tiny: At the nymph stage, when it’s likely to bite you, a black-legged tick is the size of a poppy seed. Don’t forget about pets and kids. Check them for ticks outside; otherwise, a tick can fall off a dog inside and bite you.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>3. Disinfect:\u003c/strong> Throw discarded clothes into the dryer on high heat for at least 6 minutes to kill any stragglers.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>What to Do if You Do Get Bitten\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>1. Don’t panic. \u003c/strong> It’s a hard rule to follow, Pritt admits, but remember that not every tick carries a harmful bacteria or virus.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>2. Forget the folk remedies:\u003c/strong> “Grab a pair of fine tipped tweezers, remove as quickly as possible as close to skin as you can by pulling it out in a smooth, continuous motion without twisting it,” Pritt says. And don’t light a match or roll it in butter, as in fact, those methods often result in only partial removal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>3. Save it: \u003c/strong>Put the tick in a plastic bag in the freezer, especially if you think it may have been attached a long time, which may increase the risk of Lyme disease transmission. That way if you decide to see a doctor, they’ll be able to identify the type of tick that bit you, and even test it for disease-causing bacteria. Keep in mind, though, that you may not get infected even if the tick tests positive, Dempsey says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>4. Watch for symptoms:\u003c/strong> A rash, headache, flu-like symptoms and joint pain can all be signs of Lyme disease, anaplasmosis and ehrlichiosis. A stiff neck and swollen lymph nodes are associated with Lyme disease.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>IF YOU HAVE SYMPTOMS: \u003c/strong>Many people with Lyme disease \u003ca href=\"https://westnile.ca.gov/pdfs/VBDSAnnualReport19.pdf\">don’t remember getting a rash\u003c/a> or a tick bite. So mention your concerns to your health care provider. Blood tests may be able to detect Lyme disease after your body has developed antibodies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Copyright 2021 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cp>In his multiple attempts to overcome a methamphetamine addiction that ground through two decades of his life, Tyrone Clifford Jr. remembers well the closest he came. “The most success I had,” he said, “is when my dealer was in jail.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Then, Clifford walked into a rehab clinic in San Francisco called PROP, the Positive Reinforcement Opportunity Project. There, he encountered an approach so simple he sounds slightly bemused explaining it. The secret? The program paid him to show up and stay clean.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It wasn’t much money — very little, in fact, and I didn’t really need it,” said Clifford, 52. “But I did need the support. I did need the connection. I was doing something positive for the first time in a long, long time, and it changed my outlook.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The concept of a reward for sobriety — known as contingency management — lies at the heart of many an addiction therapy success story. \u003ca href=\"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3083448/#ref1\">Research\u003c/a> showing it’s a highly effective tool for managing substance use disorder, especially for stimulants, goes back decades.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside tag=\"methamphetamine\" label=\"Related Stories\"]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Department of Veterans Affairs has \u003ca href=\"https://blogs.va.gov/VAntage/64870/how-va-uses-contingency-management-help-veterans-stay-drug-free/\">long employed\u003c/a> the therapy, providing it to more than 5,600 veterans. Some 92% of the 72,000 urine samples collected during treatment tested negative for the targeted drug, said Dominick DePhilippis, a clinical psychologist and researcher who helped launch the VA’s program in 2011.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But outside of the VA? “It is used almost zero,” said Richard Rawson, a professor emeritus at UCLA who has researched the therapy for \u003ca href=\"https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/7931857/\">nearly 30 years\u003c/a>. Providers worry that by paying patients they’ll violate \u003ca href=\"https://www.healthaffairs.org/do/10.1377/hblog20200305.965186/full/\">anti-kickback regulations\u003c/a> and thus jeopardize their federal funding through Medicaid.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But California appears poised to challenge the regulations. On June 1, the state Senate \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=202120220SB110\">unanimously passed\u003c/a> Senate Bill 110, introduced by state Sen. Scott Wiener, D-San Francisco, which declares contingency management (CM) a legal practice and authorizes its funding by adding it to the list of drug treatment services offered through Medi-Cal, the state’s version of Medicaid. The price tag for the bill depends on how many patients use the therapy, but it would cost only about $179,000 a year to include the approach in treatment for 1,000 people trying to kick stimulant use, according to a \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billAnalysisClient.xhtml?bill_id=202120220SB110\">financial analysis\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>California’s latest budget, passed by the state Legislature in late June but subject to continuing modifications, may ultimately include money for a CM pilot program for next year. Wiener’s standalone bill would provide permanent funding — if, that is, Medi-Cal can get federal signoff on the practice.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The federal anti-kickback statute prohibits offering an inducement to a patient to choose a specific program or type of treatment. The Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of the Inspector General has to this point agreed with the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services that a violation would occur at any monetary incentive beyond $75 a year, which contingency management experts say isn’t enough to get results.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>More than a dozen organizations have written to the Department of Health and Human Services to ask for a waiver of the anti-kickback statute as it pertains to the therapy. A group led by Dr. Westley Clark, former director of the federal Center for Substance Abuse Treatment, is asking Congress to instruct HHS to allow the treatment in Medicaid programs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In response to questions from Kaiser Health News, a spokesman for the HHS Office of the Inspector General declined to comment on specific “waivers in development,” but said the OIG “recognizes that contingency management interventions are the most effective currently available treatment for stimulant use disorders.” Any CM program put in place would be evaluated on a case-by-case basis, he said, and going over the $75 annual limit “does not mean that such incentive automatically violates the statute and is illegal.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The VA can ignore the OIG’s interpretation of the rule because the department’s budget covers all its costs. “VA is in many ways the ideal setting for [the therapy’s] implementation,” said DePhilippis. “We’re not subject to the funding concerns that I hear expressed by my colleagues in programs outside of the VA.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As the name implies, patients in a CM program are rewarded on a contingency basis for modifying their behavior — specifically, by not missing recovery meetings or failing a drug test. While the approach can be employed to treat any type of substance addiction, it’s been especially useful for stimulants like meth and cocaine, for which there is no well-established addiction-combating medication, such as methadone for an addiction to opioids.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Tyrone Clifford Jr., 52, attended the Positive Reinforcement Opportunity Project (PROP) clinic in San Francisco\"]‘It wasn’t much money — very little, in fact, and I didn’t really need it. But I did need the support. I did need the connection. I was doing something positive for the first time in a long, long time, and it changed my outlook.’[/pullquote]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Patients at VA recovery sessions draw from a plastic fishbowl that holds 500 slips of paper. Half of those slips contain positive messages: “Good job.” “Way to go.” Another 209 slips are worth $1, while 40 are worth $20 and one “jumbo” prize of $100 lurks in every bowl. As patients continue to stay clean, the number of slips they get to draw increases, to a maximum of eight. If they skip meetings or test positive, they go back to drawing a single slip. The money is paid in the form of vouchers that can be used through the VA’s canteen system to buy food and other items, but not alcohol or tobacco.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In other programs that employ the approach, including the one Tyrone Clifford Jr. found in San Francisco in 2011, patients receive gift cards worth $300 to $400 over 12 weeks in exchange for regularly attending meetings and producing clean tests. Most of the incentive programs are designed to end after three months, on the theory that patients have used the time to regularly attend counseling and therapy sessions and kick-start their recoveries.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That is what happened to Clifford, who fell into meth use after learning he was HIV-positive at age 21. He and his partner (now husband) soon moved from Georgia to San Francisco, where his use spiraled out of control until he was advised to visit PROP, administered through the San Francisco AIDS Foundation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The money wasn’t the main thing for me — but it is for some of the guys who come in here,” Clifford said. “They may need that small amount to keep a cellphone bill paid. They may need that for a doctor. I hear people say, ‘Why should we pay a drug user to stop using drugs?’ My answer is that it works. You keep coming in, week after week, and pretty soon you’re back on your feet.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some critics have moral qualms about paying a patient for good behavior, and therapists are sometimes wary of the approach. But effective approaches are needed. In San Francisco, the meth overdose death rate \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfdph.org/dph/comupg/knowlcol/MethTaskForce/default.asp\">has increased more than 500%\u003c/a> since 2008, and half of all psychiatric emergency room admissions at San Francisco General Hospital are now meth-related.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“As a gay man in San Francisco, my community has been deeply affected by meth use,” Wiener said. Meth use \u003ca href=\"https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/public-global-health/515530-meth-use-rose-across-us-during-pandemics-early-days\">spiked 20% nationally\u003c/a> among those tested in the early months of the pandemic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Those who’ve seen the approach used successfully in treating meth addiction are befuddled by its unavailability, especially now that states \u003ca href=\"https://www.nga.org/center/publications/covid-19-vaccine-incentives/\">offer everything\u003c/a> from marijuana to Yankees tickets to persuade people to get vaccinated against COVID-19.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Still, Rawson said he doubts California’s bill can override the HHS restrictions as currently written. Wiener, on the other hand, doesn’t believe the use of therapy was ever in violation of anti-kickback statutes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Clifford simply knows it works.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I see it now from the other side,” said Clifford, who is 10 years sober and now counsels those trying to kick meth addiction through the San Francisco AIDS Foundation. “Guys keep coming back. You can see it building every week.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Update: A response from the HHS Office of the Inspector General has been added to this story.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This story was produced by \u003ca href=\"https://californiahealthline.org/news/article/california-lawmakers-push-feds-to-allow-a-therapy-that-pays-meth-users-to-abstain/\">Kaiser Health News\u003c/a>, which publishes \u003ca href=\"https://californiahealthline.org/news/article/california-lawmakers-push-feds-to-allow-a-therapy-that-pays-meth-users-to-abstain/\">California Healthline\u003c/a>, an editorially independent service of the California Health Care Foundation.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>In his multiple attempts to overcome a methamphetamine addiction that ground through two decades of his life, Tyrone Clifford Jr. remembers well the closest he came. “The most success I had,” he said, “is when my dealer was in jail.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Then, Clifford walked into a rehab clinic in San Francisco called PROP, the Positive Reinforcement Opportunity Project. There, he encountered an approach so simple he sounds slightly bemused explaining it. The secret? The program paid him to show up and stay clean.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It wasn’t much money — very little, in fact, and I didn’t really need it,” said Clifford, 52. “But I did need the support. I did need the connection. I was doing something positive for the first time in a long, long time, and it changed my outlook.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The concept of a reward for sobriety — known as contingency management — lies at the heart of many an addiction therapy success story. \u003ca href=\"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3083448/#ref1\">Research\u003c/a> showing it’s a highly effective tool for managing substance use disorder, especially for stimulants, goes back decades.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Department of Veterans Affairs has \u003ca href=\"https://blogs.va.gov/VAntage/64870/how-va-uses-contingency-management-help-veterans-stay-drug-free/\">long employed\u003c/a> the therapy, providing it to more than 5,600 veterans. Some 92% of the 72,000 urine samples collected during treatment tested negative for the targeted drug, said Dominick DePhilippis, a clinical psychologist and researcher who helped launch the VA’s program in 2011.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But outside of the VA? “It is used almost zero,” said Richard Rawson, a professor emeritus at UCLA who has researched the therapy for \u003ca href=\"https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/7931857/\">nearly 30 years\u003c/a>. Providers worry that by paying patients they’ll violate \u003ca href=\"https://www.healthaffairs.org/do/10.1377/hblog20200305.965186/full/\">anti-kickback regulations\u003c/a> and thus jeopardize their federal funding through Medicaid.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But California appears poised to challenge the regulations. On June 1, the state Senate \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=202120220SB110\">unanimously passed\u003c/a> Senate Bill 110, introduced by state Sen. Scott Wiener, D-San Francisco, which declares contingency management (CM) a legal practice and authorizes its funding by adding it to the list of drug treatment services offered through Medi-Cal, the state’s version of Medicaid. The price tag for the bill depends on how many patients use the therapy, but it would cost only about $179,000 a year to include the approach in treatment for 1,000 people trying to kick stimulant use, according to a \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billAnalysisClient.xhtml?bill_id=202120220SB110\">financial analysis\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>California’s latest budget, passed by the state Legislature in late June but subject to continuing modifications, may ultimately include money for a CM pilot program for next year. Wiener’s standalone bill would provide permanent funding — if, that is, Medi-Cal can get federal signoff on the practice.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The federal anti-kickback statute prohibits offering an inducement to a patient to choose a specific program or type of treatment. The Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of the Inspector General has to this point agreed with the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services that a violation would occur at any monetary incentive beyond $75 a year, which contingency management experts say isn’t enough to get results.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>More than a dozen organizations have written to the Department of Health and Human Services to ask for a waiver of the anti-kickback statute as it pertains to the therapy. A group led by Dr. Westley Clark, former director of the federal Center for Substance Abuse Treatment, is asking Congress to instruct HHS to allow the treatment in Medicaid programs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In response to questions from Kaiser Health News, a spokesman for the HHS Office of the Inspector General declined to comment on specific “waivers in development,” but said the OIG “recognizes that contingency management interventions are the most effective currently available treatment for stimulant use disorders.” Any CM program put in place would be evaluated on a case-by-case basis, he said, and going over the $75 annual limit “does not mean that such incentive automatically violates the statute and is illegal.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The VA can ignore the OIG’s interpretation of the rule because the department’s budget covers all its costs. “VA is in many ways the ideal setting for [the therapy’s] implementation,” said DePhilippis. “We’re not subject to the funding concerns that I hear expressed by my colleagues in programs outside of the VA.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As the name implies, patients in a CM program are rewarded on a contingency basis for modifying their behavior — specifically, by not missing recovery meetings or failing a drug test. While the approach can be employed to treat any type of substance addiction, it’s been especially useful for stimulants like meth and cocaine, for which there is no well-established addiction-combating medication, such as methadone for an addiction to opioids.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "‘It wasn’t much money — very little, in fact, and I didn’t really need it. But I did need the support. I did need the connection. I was doing something positive for the first time in a long, long time, and it changed my outlook.’",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Patients at VA recovery sessions draw from a plastic fishbowl that holds 500 slips of paper. Half of those slips contain positive messages: “Good job.” “Way to go.” Another 209 slips are worth $1, while 40 are worth $20 and one “jumbo” prize of $100 lurks in every bowl. As patients continue to stay clean, the number of slips they get to draw increases, to a maximum of eight. If they skip meetings or test positive, they go back to drawing a single slip. The money is paid in the form of vouchers that can be used through the VA’s canteen system to buy food and other items, but not alcohol or tobacco.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In other programs that employ the approach, including the one Tyrone Clifford Jr. found in San Francisco in 2011, patients receive gift cards worth $300 to $400 over 12 weeks in exchange for regularly attending meetings and producing clean tests. Most of the incentive programs are designed to end after three months, on the theory that patients have used the time to regularly attend counseling and therapy sessions and kick-start their recoveries.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That is what happened to Clifford, who fell into meth use after learning he was HIV-positive at age 21. He and his partner (now husband) soon moved from Georgia to San Francisco, where his use spiraled out of control until he was advised to visit PROP, administered through the San Francisco AIDS Foundation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The money wasn’t the main thing for me — but it is for some of the guys who come in here,” Clifford said. “They may need that small amount to keep a cellphone bill paid. They may need that for a doctor. I hear people say, ‘Why should we pay a drug user to stop using drugs?’ My answer is that it works. You keep coming in, week after week, and pretty soon you’re back on your feet.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some critics have moral qualms about paying a patient for good behavior, and therapists are sometimes wary of the approach. But effective approaches are needed. In San Francisco, the meth overdose death rate \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfdph.org/dph/comupg/knowlcol/MethTaskForce/default.asp\">has increased more than 500%\u003c/a> since 2008, and half of all psychiatric emergency room admissions at San Francisco General Hospital are now meth-related.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“As a gay man in San Francisco, my community has been deeply affected by meth use,” Wiener said. Meth use \u003ca href=\"https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/public-global-health/515530-meth-use-rose-across-us-during-pandemics-early-days\">spiked 20% nationally\u003c/a> among those tested in the early months of the pandemic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Those who’ve seen the approach used successfully in treating meth addiction are befuddled by its unavailability, especially now that states \u003ca href=\"https://www.nga.org/center/publications/covid-19-vaccine-incentives/\">offer everything\u003c/a> from marijuana to Yankees tickets to persuade people to get vaccinated against COVID-19.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Still, Rawson said he doubts California’s bill can override the HHS restrictions as currently written. Wiener, on the other hand, doesn’t believe the use of therapy was ever in violation of anti-kickback statutes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Clifford simply knows it works.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I see it now from the other side,” said Clifford, who is 10 years sober and now counsels those trying to kick meth addiction through the San Francisco AIDS Foundation. “Guys keep coming back. You can see it building every week.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Update: A response from the HHS Office of the Inspector General has been added to this story.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This story was produced by \u003ca href=\"https://californiahealthline.org/news/article/california-lawmakers-push-feds-to-allow-a-therapy-that-pays-meth-users-to-abstain/\">Kaiser Health News\u003c/a>, which publishes \u003ca href=\"https://californiahealthline.org/news/article/california-lawmakers-push-feds-to-allow-a-therapy-that-pays-meth-users-to-abstain/\">California Healthline\u003c/a>, an editorially independent service of the California Health Care Foundation.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"slug": "trucks-are-banned-on-oaklands-i-580-these-sixth-graders-wondered-why",
"title": "Trucks are Banned on Oakland's I-580. These Sixth Graders Wondered Why",
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"headTitle": "Trucks are Banned on Oakland’s I-580. These Sixth Graders Wondered Why | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>A handful of kids sit in teacher Patrick Messac’s sixth grade classroom at \u003ca href=\"https://lifeacademyoak.org/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Life Academy of Health and Bioscience\u003c/a> in East Oakland. They’re surrounded by colorful wall displays of human anatomy, moon cycles, and books categorized by scientific topics. Then there are the signs of the pandemic: one kid at each table, each distanced from their neighbors, air filters and stacks of unused chairs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[baycuriouspodcastinfo]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The chairs are for the rest of the class, who are at home, zooming into the discussion instead. While this makes the conversation stop-and-go, the students are focused. They’re talking about air pollution, and it’s personal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It just hurts to know that our community is slowly dying because of this air pollution,” says student Jasmine Orejudos.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Orejudos and her classmates live in East Oakland, a region traversed by the Interstate 880 highway. The freeway is heavily used by large trucks, bringing goods from the Port of Oakland to the rest of California and the country. The majority of those trucks are powered by diesel.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11879651\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11879651\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Messac-class-1920.jpg\" alt=\"Sixth grade teacher Patrick Messac teaches a science class at Life Academy of Health and Bioscience in East Oakland. Students are studying the health impacts of air pollution and asking questions about their own exposure.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1080\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Messac-class-1920.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Messac-class-1920-800x450.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Messac-class-1920-1020x574.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Messac-class-1920-160x90.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Messac-class-1920-1536x864.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Sixth grade teacher Patrick Messac teaches a science class at Life Academy of Health and Bioscience in East Oakland. Students are studying the health impacts of air pollution and asking questions about their own exposure. \u003ccite>(Laura Klivans/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Most of students at Life Academy are Latino, and studies show communities where Black and Latino people live are overburdened with pollution. Students have been making connections between the dirty air they breathe and some of the poor health they experience.\u003cstrong>\u003cbr>\n\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Me and my granny both have asthma and sometimes we can’t even go outside to enjoy ourselves because of the diesel-burning trucks,” said student Rodney Moten.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While many factors \u003ca href=\"https://www.aafa.org/asthma-triggers-causes/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">can cause and exacerbate asthma\u003c/a>, diesel exhaust is one of them. Residents of East and West Oakland have the \u003ca href=\"https://acphd-web-media.s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/media/data-reports/city-county-regional/docs/maps2016.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">highest asthma hospitalization rates in Alameda County,\u003c/a> which health experts say is worsened by breathing diesel pollution wafting down from the highway and over from the nearby Port of Oakland.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As the class studied air quality issues, they came across a state law that seemed odd to them. For 70 years, large trucks have been banned on a stretch of the Interstate 580 freeway that runs along the base of the East Bay Hills in Oakland and San Leandro. As a result, large trucks nearly exclusively drive through — and pollute — neighborhoods in Oakland’s flatlands.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11879652\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11879652\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Messac-w-student-1920.jpg\" alt=\"Sixth grade science teacher Patrick Messac helps a student with his microscope.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1080\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Messac-w-student-1920.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Messac-w-student-1920-800x450.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Messac-w-student-1920-1020x574.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Messac-w-student-1920-160x90.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Messac-w-student-1920-1536x864.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Sixth grade science teacher Patrick Messac helps a student with his microscope at Life Academy of Health and Bioscience in East Oakland. \u003ccite>(Laura Klivans/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>This realization got students like Belinda Castro wondering: “Why are large polluting trucks banned on I-580, the highway that runs through the Oakland hills, but not the 880, the highway that runs through my neighborhood?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The students aren’t the only ones questioning this decades-old ban. Alameda County Supervisor Nate Miley, who supported the ban in 1999 when he was on the Oakland City Council, said he’s changed his thinking.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Knowing what I know now, I would make a different decision to try to phase it out,” Miley said. “We need to take steps to phase that ban out.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Miley was quick to add that he wants to improve air quality along I-880, but not at the expense of reducing air quality along I-580.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Oakland City Councilmember Rebecca Kaplan called the ban “a troubling example of environmental racism.” Kaplan said the state law “should be reconsidered.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>San Leandro City Councilmember Fred Simon supports lifting the ban as well. He plans to reach out to local elected leaders and agencies “to build a coalition to overturn the 580 truck ban through state legislative efforts.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But changing the law will take more than statements to the press. Others have tried, and failed, to lift the ban in its 70-year history. To actually get it done would require support from Oakland, San Leandro and state government.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>The Ban Goes All the Way Back to the 1950s\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Oakland is sandwiched between hills to the east and the San Francisco Bay to the west.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I-880 traverses the flatlands and I-580 largely hugs the hills,” said \u003ca href=\"https://www.brown.edu/academics/history/people/robert-self\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Robert Self\u003c/a>, a history professor at Brown University. His book \u003ca href=\"https://press.princeton.edu/books/paperback/9780691124865/american-babylon\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>American Babylon: Race and the Struggle for Postwar Oakland\u003c/em>\u003c/a> is about the fight for civil rights after World War II. “This has been historically a representation of the class and to some extent racial divide in the East Bay,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[baycuriouspodcastinfo]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The hills were middle and upper middle class, and the flatlands were working class.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The truck ban on 580 \u003ca href=\"https://www.newspapers.com/clip/80150442/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">dates back to 1951\u003c/a>, before the road was even a highway. Then it was called MacArthur Boulevard and Oakland’s City Council wanted to keep it free from truck traffic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“MacArthur Boulevard was what you might call the heart of middle class white Oakland in those years,” Self said. “It was a neighborhood whose opinions about the world had the ear of city hall.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And a neighborhood that didn’t have heavy industry like the flatlands. The trucks were re-routed onto the already-constructed 880 highway (then State Route 17).\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The city, at the time, certainly did not believe that [flatland] neighborhoods mattered in the same way that the hill neighborhoods mattered,” Self said.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>The Road Evolves, But the Ban Remains\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>When MacArthur Boulevard became a highway in the early 1960s, the City of Oakland \u003ca href=\"https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/20972147/6789-cms-1.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">continued the ban\u003c/a> on a roughly nine mile stretch of highway without significant debate. It applied to vehicles weighing more than 9,000 pounds, like big rigs, but not smaller trucks like those delivering packages on residential streets. The ban also excluded buses.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11879658\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1484px\">\u003ca href=\"https://www.newspapers.com/clip/80173555/oakland-tribune/\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11879658\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Truck-ban-clipping.png\" alt=\"Oakland Tribune article from November 14, 1967\" width=\"1484\" height=\"1298\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Truck-ban-clipping.png 1484w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Truck-ban-clipping-800x700.png 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Truck-ban-clipping-1020x892.png 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Truck-ban-clipping-160x140.png 160w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1484px) 100vw, 1484px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Oakland Tribune article from November 14, 1967 on the truck ban controversy. \u003ccite>(Newspapers.com)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In 1967, the ban was up for renewal, this time sparking a more intense deliberation. The possibility that trucks could barrel down both East Bay highways made people irate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Several \u003ca href=\"https://www.newspapers.com/clip/80173555/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">news articles\u003c/a> in the Oakland Tribune outlined the \u003ca href=\"https://www.newspapers.com/clip/80175750/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">controversy\u003c/a>. Those wanting to continue the ban to keep heavy-duty trucks off 580 were led by Oakland’s then-mayor John Reading, and known as “Citizens Against Trucks on MacArthur Freeway.” They argued the area around the highway was far more residential, had more schools and hospitals, and that the road itself was curvier and hillier than 880.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One of the loudest voices on the other side was Richard Zeller of the California Trucking Association. He argued that taxes on trucks partially funded the freeway. He also brought up equity, saying the ban was “discriminatory against the people who live near the Nimitz Freeway [ I-880 ] or must use it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11879659\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003ca href=\"https://www.newspapers.com/clip/80175750/oakland-tribune/#\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11879659\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/MacArthur-clip.jpg\" alt=\"Oakland tribune article from July 4, 1967\" width=\"800\" height=\"1821\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/MacArthur-clip.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/MacArthur-clip-160x364.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/MacArthur-clip-675x1536.jpg 675w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Oakland tribune article from July 4, 1967 discussing the truck ban on 580. \u003ccite>(Newspapers.com)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>He continued, “Are the senses of those living along the MacArthur Freeway more acute than those living along all the other freeways in the state? Are the schools and hospitals more valuable?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The California Department of Transportation, Caltrans, \u003ca href=\"https://dot.ca.gov/programs/traffic-operations/legal-truck-access/restrict-route-580\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">studied the issue\u003c/a> in 1967 to verify that trucks could travel an alternate route instead of 580. The study looked at traffic, not impacts on health or quality of life. According to their website, the department concluded that “there was no strong evidence either to retain or to terminate the truck ban.” Caltrans recommended the ban be extended indefinitely, but with periodic reviews of “operations of the alternate routes, 238 and 880.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Those reviews happened just a few times, with none occurring after 1972.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>The 1990s: Asking ‘A Simple Question’\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>In 1999, Robert Ramorino, head of Roadstar Trucking, asked what he called “a simple question.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“How come my trucks are banned on this stretch of 580?” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ramorino would later go on to become the president of the California Trucking Association. Like his predecessor, he found the ban insulting. He was paying federal highway use taxes for his trucks, which were not allowed to go on the highway running near his business. If heavy trucks were allowed on 580 it would be convenient for both his company and freight movement in general, he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ramorino said he and the California Trucking Association asked Caltrans to study lifting the ban on trucks on the 580 freeway. And according to their website, Caltrans officials said if they found good reasons to lift the ban — and the City of Oakland was onboard — they would recommend opening the freeway to trucks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That study never happened though. Residents living along 580 worried studying the issue would open the door to lifting the ban, so they put pressure on their representatives to stop the study before it started. And the Oakland City Council passed a resolution affirming they wanted to continue the ban.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We thought keeping trucks off of 580 was a good thing based on traffic safety. I don’t think we were really thinking a lot about air quality at the time,” said Miley, the Alameda County supervisor, who was on the Oakland City Council in 1999.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>State legislators also wanted to stop the study and continue the ban.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was getting dozens and dozens of calls from angry neighbors who wanted to know why this was happening,” said former Assemblymember Ellen Corbett, whose district included Alameda, San Leandro and much of Oakland.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Corbett was a newly-elected state assemblymember at the time. She held a meeting for constituents and Caltrans representatives.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We ended up with hundreds of people. In fact, there were so many people that came to the meeting, there was overflow out into the parking lot,” Corbett said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She said residents were worried about noise and road safety. Corbett said her research about the I-580 showed it wasn’t made for trucks, which Caltrans refuted: “the freeway was designed to be safe for all vehicular traffic.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Beyond this, however, Corbett says her constituents felt that if Oakland and San Leandro lifted the ban, they would be breaking a promise made to residents decades ago.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“People were actually displaced and homes were taken from people,” she said. “There was a commitment made that trucks would not be on that freeway because these neighborhoods had been destroyed.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Building freeways through established neighborhoods was \u003ca href=\"https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3539889\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">commonplace by that time\u003c/a>. It often happened to communities of color, who didn’t have the political clout to extract promises like a ban on trucks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Corbett said she did not hear from any of her constituents who lived or worked along the I-880 freeway. She wrote a bill to make the ban permanent. It was signed into law in 2000 by California Governor Gray Davis.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A large truck ban on an interstate is exceedingly rare, and the I-580 highway ban is the only one of its kind meant to assuage the concerns of local residents. According to the Federal Highway Authority, there are only nine such bans nationwide. Seven of those bans are due to construction or structural engineering constraints. One ban — on the Theodore Roosevelt Memorial Bridge in D.C. — was \u003ca href=\"https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/highwayhistory/dcrevolt/part01.pdf\">ordered by President Eisenhower to keep trucks away from the Lincoln Memorial\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Considering the Truck Ban from a Health Perspective\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Residents living along the I-880 corridor in East Oakland experience some of the \u003ca href=\"https://acphd-web-media.s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/media/data-reports/city-county-regional/docs/maps2016.pdf\">highest rates of asthma hospitalizations in Alameda County\u003c/a>, according to the Alameda County Public Health Department.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Life Academy sixth graders learned one of the factors contributing to asthma is polluted air: The tiny particles in diesel exhaust are some of the most dangerous.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We may not see this bad air, but we can breathe it,” said student Abrianna Meza. “These diesel trucks burn fuel that causes \u003ca href=\"https://www.epa.gov/sites/production/files/2013-12/documents/black-carbon-fact-sheet_0.pdf\">black carbon\u003c/a>.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[baycuriouspodcastinfo]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Phil Martien, of the Bay Area Air Quality Management District, agreed. “Those particles are small enough to get deep into lungs and in some cases even pass through the lung barrier to get into the bloodstream.” In Martien’s role as director of the Assessment, Inventory, & Modeling Division, he reviews how air pollution is distributed in the Bay Area.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He said diesel particles, and the chemicals attached to them, can lead to heart attacks, lung cancer and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), a group of diseases that make it hard to breathe.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Young people are particularly vulnerable because their lungs are still developing,” Martien said. “There’s actually been \u003ca href=\"https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(07)60037-3/fulltext\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">studies\u003c/a> where they’ve looked at young lungs of children who live near freeways and their lungs don’t ever fully develop,” as compared to kids living farther from busy freeways. Martien says living by freeways can also \u003ca href=\"https://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/doi/full/10.1289/ehp.0901232\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">cause asthma\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11879605\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1772px\">\u003ca href=\"https://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/acs.est.7b00891\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11879605 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Screen-Shot-2021-06-24-at-3.32.37-PM-1.png\" alt=\"Levels of black carbon (BC), nitric oxide (NO), and nitrogen dioxide (NO2) in neighborhoods along Interstate 580 (purple) and Interstate 880 (red). Large trucks are not permitted on a section of I-580.\" width=\"1772\" height=\"1296\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Screen-Shot-2021-06-24-at-3.32.37-PM-1.png 1772w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Screen-Shot-2021-06-24-at-3.32.37-PM-1-800x585.png 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Screen-Shot-2021-06-24-at-3.32.37-PM-1-1020x746.png 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Screen-Shot-2021-06-24-at-3.32.37-PM-1-160x117.png 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Screen-Shot-2021-06-24-at-3.32.37-PM-1-1536x1123.png 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1772px) 100vw, 1772px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Levels of black carbon (BC), nitric oxide (NO), and nitrogen dioxide (NO2) in neighborhoods along Interstate 580 (purple) and Interstate 880 (red). Large trucks are not permitted on a section of I-580. \u003ccite>(Image Courtesy Environmental Defense Fund)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>A \u003ca href=\"https://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/acs.est.7b00891\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">collaborative project\u003c/a> by the \u003ca href=\"https://www.edf.org/airqualitymaps/oakland/tale-two-freeways\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Environmental Defense Fund,\u003c/a> a technology company \u003ca href=\"https://www.aclima.io/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Aclima\u003c/a>, Google Street View and The University of Texas at Austin found that concentrations of harmful pollutants from diesel exhaust were significantly higher in neighborhoods along 880 than those along 580. Black carbon concentrations were roughly 80% higher, nitrogen dioxide concentrations were 60% higher, and nitric oxide were more than double.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>What a Truck Ban Means for Equity\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Historian Robert Self said what’s happened with the 580 truck ban is the definition of structural racism.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“People can make decisions that don’t on their face, seem as if they’re motivated by racial animosity but have profound downstream racial effects,” Self said. “Any individual person can make a decision within that system that appears entirely neutral, and yet it’s got massive racial impacts and effects.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Angela Scott, an East Oakland community organizer with the environmental justice group \u003ca href=\"https://www.cbecal.org/\">Communities for a Better Environment\u003c/a>, agreed. She said she’s talked with people across East Oakland about whether they’d want to push back on the 580 truck ban.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Folks said, ‘We don’t want to put that on anybody else because it’s horrible,'” Scott said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But Scott thinks if East Oakland residents don’t push back against policies like this one it hides the problem. Truck emissions are just one example of the outsized pollution burden her community bears, she said. She thinks it’s time for change.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We have to go beyond, ‘Oh, that was maybe a bad decision,'” Scott said. “How do we undo all those bad decisions with all the things that we know now? How do we fix it so that people are sharing burdens? That’s solidarity.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cblockquote class=\"tiktok-embed\" style=\"max-width: 605px; min-width: 325px;\" cite=\"https://www.tiktok.com/@kqedofficial/video/6987554195729583365\" data-video-id=\"6987554195729583365\">\n\u003csection>\u003ca title=\"@kqedofficial\" href=\"https://www.tiktok.com/@kqedofficial\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">@kqedofficial\u003c/a>We explain how a truck policy affects POC in East and West parts of Oakland. \u003ca title=\"racismawareness\" href=\"https://www.tiktok.com/tag/racismawareness\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#racismawareness\u003c/a> \u003ca title=\"oaklandca\" href=\"https://www.tiktok.com/tag/oaklandca\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#oaklandca\u003c/a> \u003ca title=\"socialjustice\" href=\"https://www.tiktok.com/tag/socialjustice\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#socialjustice\u003c/a> \u003ca title=\"environmental\" href=\"https://www.tiktok.com/tag/environmental\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#environmental\u003c/a> \u003ca title=\"fyp\" href=\"https://www.tiktok.com/tag/fyp\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#fyp\u003c/a> \u003ca title=\"bayarea\" href=\"https://www.tiktok.com/tag/bayarea\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#bayarea\u003c/a>\u003ca title=\"♬ original sound - kqed\" href=\"https://www.tiktok.com/music/original-sound-6987558479233846022\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">♬ original sound – kqed\u003c/a>\n\u003c/section>\n\u003c/blockquote>\n\u003cp>[tiktok]\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>What Happens Now\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>The sixth grade students at Life Academy have plenty of ideas to improve air quality along their highway, from electrifying trucks to planting more trees in the community, to distributing free air purifiers to people living in heavily polluted areas.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>State officials have some of the same ideas. Last summer, the California Air Resources Board announced a rule \u003ca href=\"https://ww2.arb.ca.gov/news/california-takes-bold-step-reduce-truck-pollution#:~:text=SACRAMENTO%20%E2%80%93%20Today%2C%20the%20California%20Air,California%20will%20be%20zero%2Demission.\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">requiring truck manufacturers to transition from diesel to electric\u003c/a> starting in 2024. These regulations say by 2045 every new truck sold in California will be zero-emission.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Angela Scott, of Communities for a Better Environment, wants to take things further.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Lift that ban,” she said. “I know people are not going to like it, but it’s such a racist policy. Lift the ban!”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Students are pushing for one more thing, something community advocates have been demanding for decades: a study of the ban’s health effects. And there has been some movement on that front. Bay Area air district officials said in an email to KQED they are committed to studying health impacts of the 580 truck ban, “probably in the 2022-2023 time frame.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[baycuriousquestion]\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"excerpt": "A 70-year-old ban on large trucks on Interstate 580 pushes diesel-burning vehicles, and their pollution, to Interstate 880. Students living along the 880 corridor want their elected officials to do something about it.\r\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>A handful of kids sit in teacher Patrick Messac’s sixth grade classroom at \u003ca href=\"https://lifeacademyoak.org/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Life Academy of Health and Bioscience\u003c/a> in East Oakland. They’re surrounded by colorful wall displays of human anatomy, moon cycles, and books categorized by scientific topics. Then there are the signs of the pandemic: one kid at each table, each distanced from their neighbors, air filters and stacks of unused chairs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003caside class=\"alignleft utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__bayCuriousPodcastShortcode__bayCurious\">\u003cimg src=https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/bayCuriousLogo.png alt=\"Bay Curious Podcast\" loading=\"lazy\" />\n \u003ca href=\"/news/series/baycurious\">Bay Curious\u003c/a> is a podcast that answers your questions about the Bay Area.\n Subscribe on \u003ca href=\"https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/bay-curious/id1172473406\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Apple Podcasts\u003c/a>,\n \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/podcasts/500557090/bay-curious\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">NPR One\u003c/a> or your favorite podcast platform.\u003c/aside>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The chairs are for the rest of the class, who are at home, zooming into the discussion instead. While this makes the conversation stop-and-go, the students are focused. They’re talking about air pollution, and it’s personal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It just hurts to know that our community is slowly dying because of this air pollution,” says student Jasmine Orejudos.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Orejudos and her classmates live in East Oakland, a region traversed by the Interstate 880 highway. The freeway is heavily used by large trucks, bringing goods from the Port of Oakland to the rest of California and the country. The majority of those trucks are powered by diesel.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11879651\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11879651\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Messac-class-1920.jpg\" alt=\"Sixth grade teacher Patrick Messac teaches a science class at Life Academy of Health and Bioscience in East Oakland. Students are studying the health impacts of air pollution and asking questions about their own exposure.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1080\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Messac-class-1920.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Messac-class-1920-800x450.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Messac-class-1920-1020x574.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Messac-class-1920-160x90.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Messac-class-1920-1536x864.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Sixth grade teacher Patrick Messac teaches a science class at Life Academy of Health and Bioscience in East Oakland. Students are studying the health impacts of air pollution and asking questions about their own exposure. \u003ccite>(Laura Klivans/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Most of students at Life Academy are Latino, and studies show communities where Black and Latino people live are overburdened with pollution. Students have been making connections between the dirty air they breathe and some of the poor health they experience.\u003cstrong>\u003cbr>\n\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Me and my granny both have asthma and sometimes we can’t even go outside to enjoy ourselves because of the diesel-burning trucks,” said student Rodney Moten.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While many factors \u003ca href=\"https://www.aafa.org/asthma-triggers-causes/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">can cause and exacerbate asthma\u003c/a>, diesel exhaust is one of them. Residents of East and West Oakland have the \u003ca href=\"https://acphd-web-media.s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/media/data-reports/city-county-regional/docs/maps2016.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">highest asthma hospitalization rates in Alameda County,\u003c/a> which health experts say is worsened by breathing diesel pollution wafting down from the highway and over from the nearby Port of Oakland.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As the class studied air quality issues, they came across a state law that seemed odd to them. For 70 years, large trucks have been banned on a stretch of the Interstate 580 freeway that runs along the base of the East Bay Hills in Oakland and San Leandro. As a result, large trucks nearly exclusively drive through — and pollute — neighborhoods in Oakland’s flatlands.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11879652\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11879652\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Messac-w-student-1920.jpg\" alt=\"Sixth grade science teacher Patrick Messac helps a student with his microscope.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1080\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Messac-w-student-1920.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Messac-w-student-1920-800x450.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Messac-w-student-1920-1020x574.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Messac-w-student-1920-160x90.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Messac-w-student-1920-1536x864.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Sixth grade science teacher Patrick Messac helps a student with his microscope at Life Academy of Health and Bioscience in East Oakland. \u003ccite>(Laura Klivans/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>This realization got students like Belinda Castro wondering: “Why are large polluting trucks banned on I-580, the highway that runs through the Oakland hills, but not the 880, the highway that runs through my neighborhood?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The students aren’t the only ones questioning this decades-old ban. Alameda County Supervisor Nate Miley, who supported the ban in 1999 when he was on the Oakland City Council, said he’s changed his thinking.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Knowing what I know now, I would make a different decision to try to phase it out,” Miley said. “We need to take steps to phase that ban out.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Miley was quick to add that he wants to improve air quality along I-880, but not at the expense of reducing air quality along I-580.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Oakland City Councilmember Rebecca Kaplan called the ban “a troubling example of environmental racism.” Kaplan said the state law “should be reconsidered.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>San Leandro City Councilmember Fred Simon supports lifting the ban as well. He plans to reach out to local elected leaders and agencies “to build a coalition to overturn the 580 truck ban through state legislative efforts.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But changing the law will take more than statements to the press. Others have tried, and failed, to lift the ban in its 70-year history. To actually get it done would require support from Oakland, San Leandro and state government.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>The Ban Goes All the Way Back to the 1950s\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Oakland is sandwiched between hills to the east and the San Francisco Bay to the west.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I-880 traverses the flatlands and I-580 largely hugs the hills,” said \u003ca href=\"https://www.brown.edu/academics/history/people/robert-self\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Robert Self\u003c/a>, a history professor at Brown University. His book \u003ca href=\"https://press.princeton.edu/books/paperback/9780691124865/american-babylon\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">\u003cem>American Babylon: Race and the Struggle for Postwar Oakland\u003c/em>\u003c/a> is about the fight for civil rights after World War II. “This has been historically a representation of the class and to some extent racial divide in the East Bay,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003caside class=\"alignleft utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__bayCuriousPodcastShortcode__bayCurious\">\u003cimg src=https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/bayCuriousLogo.png alt=\"Bay Curious Podcast\" loading=\"lazy\" />\n \u003ca href=\"/news/series/baycurious\">Bay Curious\u003c/a> is a podcast that answers your questions about the Bay Area.\n Subscribe on \u003ca href=\"https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/bay-curious/id1172473406\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Apple Podcasts\u003c/a>,\n \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/podcasts/500557090/bay-curious\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">NPR One\u003c/a> or your favorite podcast platform.\u003c/aside>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The hills were middle and upper middle class, and the flatlands were working class.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The truck ban on 580 \u003ca href=\"https://www.newspapers.com/clip/80150442/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">dates back to 1951\u003c/a>, before the road was even a highway. Then it was called MacArthur Boulevard and Oakland’s City Council wanted to keep it free from truck traffic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“MacArthur Boulevard was what you might call the heart of middle class white Oakland in those years,” Self said. “It was a neighborhood whose opinions about the world had the ear of city hall.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And a neighborhood that didn’t have heavy industry like the flatlands. The trucks were re-routed onto the already-constructed 880 highway (then State Route 17).\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The city, at the time, certainly did not believe that [flatland] neighborhoods mattered in the same way that the hill neighborhoods mattered,” Self said.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>The Road Evolves, But the Ban Remains\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>When MacArthur Boulevard became a highway in the early 1960s, the City of Oakland \u003ca href=\"https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/20972147/6789-cms-1.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">continued the ban\u003c/a> on a roughly nine mile stretch of highway without significant debate. It applied to vehicles weighing more than 9,000 pounds, like big rigs, but not smaller trucks like those delivering packages on residential streets. The ban also excluded buses.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11879658\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1484px\">\u003ca href=\"https://www.newspapers.com/clip/80173555/oakland-tribune/\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11879658\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Truck-ban-clipping.png\" alt=\"Oakland Tribune article from November 14, 1967\" width=\"1484\" height=\"1298\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Truck-ban-clipping.png 1484w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Truck-ban-clipping-800x700.png 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Truck-ban-clipping-1020x892.png 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Truck-ban-clipping-160x140.png 160w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1484px) 100vw, 1484px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Oakland Tribune article from November 14, 1967 on the truck ban controversy. \u003ccite>(Newspapers.com)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In 1967, the ban was up for renewal, this time sparking a more intense deliberation. The possibility that trucks could barrel down both East Bay highways made people irate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Several \u003ca href=\"https://www.newspapers.com/clip/80173555/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">news articles\u003c/a> in the Oakland Tribune outlined the \u003ca href=\"https://www.newspapers.com/clip/80175750/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">controversy\u003c/a>. Those wanting to continue the ban to keep heavy-duty trucks off 580 were led by Oakland’s then-mayor John Reading, and known as “Citizens Against Trucks on MacArthur Freeway.” They argued the area around the highway was far more residential, had more schools and hospitals, and that the road itself was curvier and hillier than 880.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One of the loudest voices on the other side was Richard Zeller of the California Trucking Association. He argued that taxes on trucks partially funded the freeway. He also brought up equity, saying the ban was “discriminatory against the people who live near the Nimitz Freeway [ I-880 ] or must use it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11879659\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003ca href=\"https://www.newspapers.com/clip/80175750/oakland-tribune/#\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11879659\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/MacArthur-clip.jpg\" alt=\"Oakland tribune article from July 4, 1967\" width=\"800\" height=\"1821\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/MacArthur-clip.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/MacArthur-clip-160x364.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/MacArthur-clip-675x1536.jpg 675w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Oakland tribune article from July 4, 1967 discussing the truck ban on 580. \u003ccite>(Newspapers.com)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>He continued, “Are the senses of those living along the MacArthur Freeway more acute than those living along all the other freeways in the state? Are the schools and hospitals more valuable?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The California Department of Transportation, Caltrans, \u003ca href=\"https://dot.ca.gov/programs/traffic-operations/legal-truck-access/restrict-route-580\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">studied the issue\u003c/a> in 1967 to verify that trucks could travel an alternate route instead of 580. The study looked at traffic, not impacts on health or quality of life. According to their website, the department concluded that “there was no strong evidence either to retain or to terminate the truck ban.” Caltrans recommended the ban be extended indefinitely, but with periodic reviews of “operations of the alternate routes, 238 and 880.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Those reviews happened just a few times, with none occurring after 1972.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>The 1990s: Asking ‘A Simple Question’\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>In 1999, Robert Ramorino, head of Roadstar Trucking, asked what he called “a simple question.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“How come my trucks are banned on this stretch of 580?” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ramorino would later go on to become the president of the California Trucking Association. Like his predecessor, he found the ban insulting. He was paying federal highway use taxes for his trucks, which were not allowed to go on the highway running near his business. If heavy trucks were allowed on 580 it would be convenient for both his company and freight movement in general, he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ramorino said he and the California Trucking Association asked Caltrans to study lifting the ban on trucks on the 580 freeway. And according to their website, Caltrans officials said if they found good reasons to lift the ban — and the City of Oakland was onboard — they would recommend opening the freeway to trucks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That study never happened though. Residents living along 580 worried studying the issue would open the door to lifting the ban, so they put pressure on their representatives to stop the study before it started. And the Oakland City Council passed a resolution affirming they wanted to continue the ban.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We thought keeping trucks off of 580 was a good thing based on traffic safety. I don’t think we were really thinking a lot about air quality at the time,” said Miley, the Alameda County supervisor, who was on the Oakland City Council in 1999.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>State legislators also wanted to stop the study and continue the ban.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was getting dozens and dozens of calls from angry neighbors who wanted to know why this was happening,” said former Assemblymember Ellen Corbett, whose district included Alameda, San Leandro and much of Oakland.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Corbett was a newly-elected state assemblymember at the time. She held a meeting for constituents and Caltrans representatives.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We ended up with hundreds of people. In fact, there were so many people that came to the meeting, there was overflow out into the parking lot,” Corbett said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She said residents were worried about noise and road safety. Corbett said her research about the I-580 showed it wasn’t made for trucks, which Caltrans refuted: “the freeway was designed to be safe for all vehicular traffic.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Beyond this, however, Corbett says her constituents felt that if Oakland and San Leandro lifted the ban, they would be breaking a promise made to residents decades ago.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“People were actually displaced and homes were taken from people,” she said. “There was a commitment made that trucks would not be on that freeway because these neighborhoods had been destroyed.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Building freeways through established neighborhoods was \u003ca href=\"https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3539889\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">commonplace by that time\u003c/a>. It often happened to communities of color, who didn’t have the political clout to extract promises like a ban on trucks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Corbett said she did not hear from any of her constituents who lived or worked along the I-880 freeway. She wrote a bill to make the ban permanent. It was signed into law in 2000 by California Governor Gray Davis.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A large truck ban on an interstate is exceedingly rare, and the I-580 highway ban is the only one of its kind meant to assuage the concerns of local residents. According to the Federal Highway Authority, there are only nine such bans nationwide. Seven of those bans are due to construction or structural engineering constraints. One ban — on the Theodore Roosevelt Memorial Bridge in D.C. — was \u003ca href=\"https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/highwayhistory/dcrevolt/part01.pdf\">ordered by President Eisenhower to keep trucks away from the Lincoln Memorial\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Considering the Truck Ban from a Health Perspective\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Residents living along the I-880 corridor in East Oakland experience some of the \u003ca href=\"https://acphd-web-media.s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/media/data-reports/city-county-regional/docs/maps2016.pdf\">highest rates of asthma hospitalizations in Alameda County\u003c/a>, according to the Alameda County Public Health Department.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Life Academy sixth graders learned one of the factors contributing to asthma is polluted air: The tiny particles in diesel exhaust are some of the most dangerous.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We may not see this bad air, but we can breathe it,” said student Abrianna Meza. “These diesel trucks burn fuel that causes \u003ca href=\"https://www.epa.gov/sites/production/files/2013-12/documents/black-carbon-fact-sheet_0.pdf\">black carbon\u003c/a>.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003caside class=\"alignleft utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__bayCuriousPodcastShortcode__bayCurious\">\u003cimg src=https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/bayCuriousLogo.png alt=\"Bay Curious Podcast\" loading=\"lazy\" />\n \u003ca href=\"/news/series/baycurious\">Bay Curious\u003c/a> is a podcast that answers your questions about the Bay Area.\n Subscribe on \u003ca href=\"https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/bay-curious/id1172473406\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Apple Podcasts\u003c/a>,\n \u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/podcasts/500557090/bay-curious\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">NPR One\u003c/a> or your favorite podcast platform.\u003c/aside>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Phil Martien, of the Bay Area Air Quality Management District, agreed. “Those particles are small enough to get deep into lungs and in some cases even pass through the lung barrier to get into the bloodstream.” In Martien’s role as director of the Assessment, Inventory, & Modeling Division, he reviews how air pollution is distributed in the Bay Area.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He said diesel particles, and the chemicals attached to them, can lead to heart attacks, lung cancer and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), a group of diseases that make it hard to breathe.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Young people are particularly vulnerable because their lungs are still developing,” Martien said. “There’s actually been \u003ca href=\"https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(07)60037-3/fulltext\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">studies\u003c/a> where they’ve looked at young lungs of children who live near freeways and their lungs don’t ever fully develop,” as compared to kids living farther from busy freeways. Martien says living by freeways can also \u003ca href=\"https://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/doi/full/10.1289/ehp.0901232\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">cause asthma\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11879605\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1772px\">\u003ca href=\"https://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/acs.est.7b00891\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11879605 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Screen-Shot-2021-06-24-at-3.32.37-PM-1.png\" alt=\"Levels of black carbon (BC), nitric oxide (NO), and nitrogen dioxide (NO2) in neighborhoods along Interstate 580 (purple) and Interstate 880 (red). Large trucks are not permitted on a section of I-580.\" width=\"1772\" height=\"1296\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Screen-Shot-2021-06-24-at-3.32.37-PM-1.png 1772w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Screen-Shot-2021-06-24-at-3.32.37-PM-1-800x585.png 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Screen-Shot-2021-06-24-at-3.32.37-PM-1-1020x746.png 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Screen-Shot-2021-06-24-at-3.32.37-PM-1-160x117.png 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Screen-Shot-2021-06-24-at-3.32.37-PM-1-1536x1123.png 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1772px) 100vw, 1772px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Levels of black carbon (BC), nitric oxide (NO), and nitrogen dioxide (NO2) in neighborhoods along Interstate 580 (purple) and Interstate 880 (red). Large trucks are not permitted on a section of I-580. \u003ccite>(Image Courtesy Environmental Defense Fund)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>A \u003ca href=\"https://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/acs.est.7b00891\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">collaborative project\u003c/a> by the \u003ca href=\"https://www.edf.org/airqualitymaps/oakland/tale-two-freeways\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Environmental Defense Fund,\u003c/a> a technology company \u003ca href=\"https://www.aclima.io/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Aclima\u003c/a>, Google Street View and The University of Texas at Austin found that concentrations of harmful pollutants from diesel exhaust were significantly higher in neighborhoods along 880 than those along 580. Black carbon concentrations were roughly 80% higher, nitrogen dioxide concentrations were 60% higher, and nitric oxide were more than double.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>What a Truck Ban Means for Equity\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Historian Robert Self said what’s happened with the 580 truck ban is the definition of structural racism.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“People can make decisions that don’t on their face, seem as if they’re motivated by racial animosity but have profound downstream racial effects,” Self said. “Any individual person can make a decision within that system that appears entirely neutral, and yet it’s got massive racial impacts and effects.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Angela Scott, an East Oakland community organizer with the environmental justice group \u003ca href=\"https://www.cbecal.org/\">Communities for a Better Environment\u003c/a>, agreed. She said she’s talked with people across East Oakland about whether they’d want to push back on the 580 truck ban.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Folks said, ‘We don’t want to put that on anybody else because it’s horrible,'” Scott said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But Scott thinks if East Oakland residents don’t push back against policies like this one it hides the problem. Truck emissions are just one example of the outsized pollution burden her community bears, she said. She thinks it’s time for change.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We have to go beyond, ‘Oh, that was maybe a bad decision,'” Scott said. “How do we undo all those bad decisions with all the things that we know now? How do we fix it so that people are sharing burdens? That’s solidarity.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cblockquote class=\"tiktok-embed\" style=\"max-width: 605px; min-width: 325px;\" cite=\"https://www.tiktok.com/@kqedofficial/video/6987554195729583365\" data-video-id=\"6987554195729583365\">\n\u003csection>\u003ca title=\"@kqedofficial\" href=\"https://www.tiktok.com/@kqedofficial\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">@kqedofficial\u003c/a>We explain how a truck policy affects POC in East and West parts of Oakland. \u003ca title=\"racismawareness\" href=\"https://www.tiktok.com/tag/racismawareness\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#racismawareness\u003c/a> \u003ca title=\"oaklandca\" href=\"https://www.tiktok.com/tag/oaklandca\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#oaklandca\u003c/a> \u003ca title=\"socialjustice\" href=\"https://www.tiktok.com/tag/socialjustice\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#socialjustice\u003c/a> \u003ca title=\"environmental\" href=\"https://www.tiktok.com/tag/environmental\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#environmental\u003c/a> \u003ca title=\"fyp\" href=\"https://www.tiktok.com/tag/fyp\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#fyp\u003c/a> \u003ca title=\"bayarea\" href=\"https://www.tiktok.com/tag/bayarea\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#bayarea\u003c/a>\u003ca title=\"♬ original sound - kqed\" href=\"https://www.tiktok.com/music/original-sound-6987558479233846022\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">♬ original sound – kqed\u003c/a>\n\u003c/section>\n\u003c/blockquote>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>What Happens Now\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>The sixth grade students at Life Academy have plenty of ideas to improve air quality along their highway, from electrifying trucks to planting more trees in the community, to distributing free air purifiers to people living in heavily polluted areas.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>State officials have some of the same ideas. Last summer, the California Air Resources Board announced a rule \u003ca href=\"https://ww2.arb.ca.gov/news/california-takes-bold-step-reduce-truck-pollution#:~:text=SACRAMENTO%20%E2%80%93%20Today%2C%20the%20California%20Air,California%20will%20be%20zero%2Demission.\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">requiring truck manufacturers to transition from diesel to electric\u003c/a> starting in 2024. These regulations say by 2045 every new truck sold in California will be zero-emission.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Angela Scott, of Communities for a Better Environment, wants to take things further.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Lift that ban,” she said. “I know people are not going to like it, but it’s such a racist policy. Lift the ban!”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Students are pushing for one more thing, something community advocates have been demanding for decades: a study of the ban’s health effects. And there has been some movement on that front. Bay Area air district officials said in an email to KQED they are committed to studying health impacts of the 580 truck ban, “probably in the 2022-2023 time frame.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003cem>Corrections: We adjusted our overall number of evictions after removing 6 duplicate records and 5 evictions at commercial properties.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As California’s eviction protections neared their expiration on June 30 and concern rose about a wave of evictions, the governor signed legislation this week to \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11879337/california-to-extend-eviction-moratorium-with-rent-relief-and-back-rent-for-tenants\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">extend the moratorium\u003c/a>, allowing more time to get relief into the hands of struggling renters and landlords.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But even as the state and local moratoriums have been in place during the pandemic, more than 1,000 Bay Area residents were evicted from their homes, according to an analysis of public records from sheriff’s offices in nine counties.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The data includes only instances when sheriff’s deputies were called to physically remove someone from their home, which experts say represents only a small fraction of total evictions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But the data — compiled and analyzed by KQED and researchers at UC Berkeley’s Urban Displacement Project — provides insight into where those evictions are happening, who is most vulnerable and the effectiveness of tenant protections.\u003c/p>\n\u003ctable style=\"border-spacing: 10px;border: thin solid grey\">\n\u003ctbody>\n\u003ctr>\n\u003ctd>\n\u003ch2>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11879725\">See Where People Were Evicted in the Bay Area\u003c/a>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Click on the map below to see how many people were evicted from March 19, 2020 to March 31, 2021 by county, city or census tract.\u003cbr>\n\u003ca href=\"https://shiny.demog.berkeley.edu/alexramiller/kqed-evictions/\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-11879745\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Screen-Shot-2021-06-29-at-12.57.34-PM-800x408.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"408\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Screen-Shot-2021-06-29-at-12.57.34-PM-800x408.png 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Screen-Shot-2021-06-29-at-12.57.34-PM-160x82.png 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Screen-Shot-2021-06-29-at-12.57.34-PM.png 981w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\u003c/td>\n\u003c/tr>\n\u003c/tbody>\n\u003c/table>\n\u003cp>Roughly half of the 1,012 lockouts occurred in two counties, with 270 in Santa Clara County and 227 in Contra Costa County. Comparatively, in Alameda County, which has half a million more residents than in Contra Costa, sheriff’s deputies performed 25 lockouts, the lowest of all nine counties.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The disparity is largely due to differences in protections for tenants that county and city officials enacted during the pandemic, said Anne Tamiko Omura, the executive director of the Eviction Defense Center. The legal services organization counsels tenants in Alameda County and parts of Contra Costa County.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It quantifies what we experience day in and day out,” she said, “which is the huge disparity between tenants who live in Alameda and Contra Costa counties.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Alameda County \u003ca href=\"http://www.acgov.org/cda/hcd/documents/Item27O-2020-41.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">allows only evictions\u003c/a> for health and safety violations or if a landlord is taking their property off the rental market, Tamiko Omura said, making its moratorium one of the strongest in the state. By contrast, Contra Costa’s tenant protections are more narrowly focused on blocking evictions for nonpayment of rent. It allows other evictions, including, for instance, breaches of the lease or nuisance allegations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The same is true in Santa Clara County, said Caryn Hreha, a staff attorney at the Law Foundation of Silicon Valley. Hreha said her office now mostly sees nuisance claims as the grounds cited for an eviction, in part because it’s one of the few ways landlords can evict tenants.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We have cases where it’s the sound of running and jumping from children because it happens frequently, backyards that aren’t cleaned up, parking disputes over who is parking in what spots,” Hreha said. “Those are things landlords are calling nuisances, and those are the cases that are going forward.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Where Bay Area Sheriffs Evicted People in the Pandemic's First Year \" aria-label=\"Bar Chart\" id=\"datawrapper-chart-DRkC1\" src=\"https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/DRkC1/7/\" scrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"0\" style=\"width: 0; min-width: 100% !important; border: none;\" height=\"450\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The data also points to racial disparities in evictions, said Tim Thomas, research director at UC Berkeley’s Urban Displacement Project. He estimates that Black renters were twice as likely to be evicted than white renters, a finding that is \u003ca href=\"https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/23780231211009983\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">in keeping with national studies\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The data does not include racial demographic information for the people who were evicted. But Thomas and graduate student Alex Ramiller used an algorithm that combines last names with neighborhood demographic information and applied it to 658 eviction records to predict the race of an individual evicted.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Tenants who were evicted were also more likely to be living in neighborhoods that have higher poverty rates, lower median rents and have slightly higher levels of rent burden — meaning renters pay more than a third of their income toward rent.[aside postID='news_11879040' label='Bay Area Eviction Dashboard']\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>What is most startling about the data KQED collected, Thomas said, was that it pointed to the effectiveness of Alameda County’s tenant protections. The Urban Displacement Project on Monday released a \u003ca href=\"https://www.urbandisplacement.org/us-regions/housing-precarity-risk-model\">new map and modeling tool to predict where residents are most at risk of eviction\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Tenants in parts of West and East Oakland, Hayward and elsewhere in Alameda County were at high risk of eviction because of the levels of poverty, unemployment and rent burden among residents, Thomas said. But sheriff lockouts remained low.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If that doesn’t make you a believer that policy has an impact,” Thomas said, “I don’t know what will.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>As Coronavirus Cases Surged, So Did Lockouts\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Across the Bay Area, sheriff’s lockouts began picking up in the fall, jumping from 39 in September to 104 in October. They peaked in December with 171, as a \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfchronicle.com/projects/coronavirus-map/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">deadly surge in coronavirus cases\u003c/a> was sweeping the region.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Suzanne Dershowitz, a housing policy attorney at Legal Aid of Sonoma County, said the uptick in lockouts might be attributed to the expiration of the Judicial Council of California’s eviction moratorium. It was in effect between \u003ca href=\"https://newsroom.courts.ca.gov/news/judicial-council-adopts-new-rules-lower-jail-population-suspend-evictions-and-foreclosures\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">April 6\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11833268/california-eviction-moratorium-to-end-on-sept-1-court-says\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Aug. 31\u003c/a> last year and prohibited eviction cases from moving forward, except for health and safety violations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When the Judicial Council’s order expired, the California Legislature \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11836164/statewide-eviction-protections-approved-by-state-lawmakers-but-tenant-groups-still-fear-eviction-wave\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">enacted new statewide tenant protections\u003c/a>, which went into effect on Sept. 1. The law, Assembly Bill 3088, prohibited evictions for nonpayment of rent if the tenant could demonstrate they lost income due to the pandemic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But it left other grounds for eviction in place, such as when an owner wants to remove a property from the rental market, or move themselves or a family member into the property. It also allows evictions for nuisance claims, breaches of the lease or health and safety allegations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That was a big turning point for us,” Dershowitz said. “As soon as (the Judicial Council’s order) was lifted and the state law went into effect, we saw evictions taking place that had previously been protected.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"People Evicted by Bay Area Sheriffs Since the Start of the Pandemic\" aria-label=\"Interactive line chart\" id=\"datawrapper-chart-lXcNW\" src=\"https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/lXcNW/7/\" scrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"0\" style=\"width: 0; min-width: 100% !important; border: none;\" height=\"400\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003cbr>\n[datawrapper]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cases that had been put on hold during the first months of the pandemic began to move forward, and new cases that were now permitted under the new state rules were added to the queue, said the Eviction Defense Center’s Anne Tamiko Omura.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I don’t think it’s a coincidence that the peak happened a couple months after the courts reopened,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After KQED reported its first findings in January on sheriff’s lockouts, Dershowitz said her organization, along with others, were able to successfully lobby the Sonoma County Board of Supervisors to amend the county’s existing tenant protections. The legislation, \u003ca href=\"https://sonomacounty.ca.gov/CAO/Press-Releases/Supervisors-strengthen-protections-regarding-evictions-and-sick-leave-during-pandemic/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">adopted Feb. 9\u003c/a>, added protections for more tenants by only allowing evictions when a landlord wants to remove a property from the rental market and for health and safety violations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The argument we were making was a public health argument,” Dershowtiz said, “that evictions for nonpayment of rent spreads COVID just as much as an eviction for a lease violation.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The new legislation appears to have had some impact. Sheriff’s lockouts in Sonoma County decreased nearly 60% between January and March of this year, dropping from 37 to 16, according to records from the Sonoma County Sheriff’s Office.\u003cbr>\n[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Protections for Renters, Pressure on Landlords\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Despite the more than 1,000 sheriff lockouts across the Bay Area, evictions were significantly down from previous years, tenant attorneys said. Pre-pandemic eviction numbers are not widely available, but in Contra Costa County, for example, the \u003ca href=\"http://64.166.146.245/docs/2020/BOS/20200414_1601/41623_Sheriff%27s%20Department%20Eviction%20Report.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Sheriff’s Office reported\u003c/a> enforcing roughly 30 evictions per week in the 18 months prior to the pandemic, compared to an average 4.5 per week between March 19, 2020 and March 31, 2021.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s historic, the levels of protections” for tenants, said Dershowitz. “All of our clients have been impacted by COVID in one way or another, and these protections have been absolutely critical to keeping clients housed.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote align='right' citation='Jim Siegel']‘Everybody always thinks landlords are rich, but we have lots of expenses.’[/pullquote]But not having the option of evicting tenants has also put some landlords in a bind. Jim Siegel operates 10 rental units across six properties in San Francisco and Sonoma counties. He said he’s owed roughly $150,300 from tenants who haven’t paid rent and said he plans to evict some of them if they aren’t able to pay the back rent once the state and local moratoriums lift.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He owns a retail store in San Francisco that reduced its hours significantly, and he said he had to go on unemployment as a result.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Everybody always thinks landlords are rich, but we have lots of expenses,” Siegel said. “We have mortgages, property taxes, insurance, utilities, we have upkeep on the buildings.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Paying all those costs has bled his bank account, Siegel said. He had been using any profit from his buildings to fund his retirement. Now, he said he’ll have to keep working for another couple years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“To keep continually extending the eviction moratorium, it’s just making the tenants’ debt worse,” Siegel said. “Eventually, there will be a reckoning day.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11879729\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS46914_020_SanJose_AntiEvictionProtest_01272021-qut.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11879729\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS46914_020_SanJose_AntiEvictionProtest_01272021-qut.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS46914_020_SanJose_AntiEvictionProtest_01272021-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS46914_020_SanJose_AntiEvictionProtest_01272021-qut-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS46914_020_SanJose_AntiEvictionProtest_01272021-qut-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS46914_020_SanJose_AntiEvictionProtest_01272021-qut-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS46914_020_SanJose_AntiEvictionProtest_01272021-qut-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Protesters rally in front of Santa Clara County Superior Court in San Jose on Jan. 27, 2021, demanding stronger state eviction protections. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Siegel and his tenants in San Francisco and Sonoma counties have applied for rent relief but haven’t received any response.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Rent relief has been slow to go out across the state. Cities and counties are administering about half of the $5.2 billion in federal stimulus funds dedicated to rent relief in California, and the state’s Department of Housing and Community Development is administering the other half.\u003cbr>\n[aside label=\"Statewide Evictions\" link1=\"https://calmatters.org/housing/2021/07/california-eviction-moratorium-tenants/,CalMatters: Where Are Tenants Falling Through the Cracks of California Eviction Ban?\"]\u003cbr>\nBut according to the department, as of Tuesday, the state had received 92,749 completed applications for its portion of the rent relief program, requesting more than $722 million in rental assistance. The state had paid out a little more than $73 million — or about 10% of the requested amount — to 6,610 households.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With the passage of AB 832, the latest extension of the statewide eviction moratorium through Sept. 30, Tamiko Omura said she’s hopeful those extra months will allow enough time to get the money into the hands of renters and landlords.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I just hope we can forestall all of these evictions long enough,” she said, “to get the bulk of this money pushed out.”\u003c/p>\n\u003chr>\n\u003ch2>How We Did It\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>When the state enacted its first statewide tenant protections, AB 3088, in September 2020, the housing desk at KQED started wondering: What happens when the moratoriums end?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/\">CalMatters\u003c/a> had \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/housing/2020/08/californians-evicted-coronavirus-pandemic/?_gl=1*1fnj54d*_ga*NzM2MjI2MTgyLjE1NzM2MDYwNzk\">gathered eviction data from 44 county sheriff’s departments\u003c/a> across California and shared that with KQED and other newsrooms in August 2020. The data included sheriff lockouts from March through June of 2020.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>KQED reporters began requesting monthly sheriff lockout data from Alameda, Contra Costa, Marin, Napa, San Francisco, San Mateo, Santa Clara, Solano and Sonoma counties for lockouts beginning in July 2020. We have continued submitting records requests every month since.\u003cbr>\n[aside tag='evictions' label='Evictions']\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A sheriff lockout is a court order to physically remove tenants from a household after they have lost their eviction case. Tenant attorneys say it represents only a small fraction of total evictions since most tenants agree to leave the house or apartment before sheriff’s deputies are called. But it is one of the few ways to determine how many evictions are taking place and provides information about who was evicted and where those evictions have occurred. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In most cases, the data provided by the sheriff’s offices included the names of people being evicted and the landlord, the address, and the date of the lockout. The data does not include information about why someone was evicted (i.e., breach of lease, non-payment of rent, nuisance, owner move-in, etc.). We are not publishing people’s names or record level data.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>KQED and researchers at the Urban Displacement Project converted the records into data and cleaned the results, omitting where possible any lockouts for commercial buildings, duplicate records, cancelled and stayed lockouts. In cases where sheriff’s offices included “post and mail” and “personal” service records, we only included “personal” records. This means that a sheriff’s deputies physically showed up at someone’s home to remove them, whereas “post and mail” indicates the sheriff’s deputies posted a notice for an upcoming eviction on someone’s door. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Then Urban Displacement researchers used an algorithm that combines last names with neighborhood demographic information to determine the likely race and ethnicity of evictees. This algorithm has been used to estimate eviction data without race by academics at \u003ca href=\"https://evictions.study/washington/\">UC Berkeley\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://evictionlab.org/demographics-of-eviction/\">Princeton\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Urban Displacement Project researchers also used data from the American Community Survey to analyze the characteristics of the neighborhoods where evictions occurred, including median rent, median household income and the racial demographics of residents in those neighborhoods.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1osuqwVOt8GcqD_cKmpqS8Y1ZGHrADZgy-sFu1sq48EE/edit#gid=224868833\">You can download aggregated data here.\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"excerpt": "More than 1,000 people were evicted across the Bay Area during the pandemic’s first year, according to an analysis of public records from sheriff's offices in nine counties. ",
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"title": "Santa Clara, Contra Costa Top Bay Area Counties With Most Evictions During Pandemic | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cem>Corrections: We adjusted our overall number of evictions after removing 6 duplicate records and 5 evictions at commercial properties.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As California’s eviction protections neared their expiration on June 30 and concern rose about a wave of evictions, the governor signed legislation this week to \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11879337/california-to-extend-eviction-moratorium-with-rent-relief-and-back-rent-for-tenants\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">extend the moratorium\u003c/a>, allowing more time to get relief into the hands of struggling renters and landlords.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But even as the state and local moratoriums have been in place during the pandemic, more than 1,000 Bay Area residents were evicted from their homes, according to an analysis of public records from sheriff’s offices in nine counties.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The data includes only instances when sheriff’s deputies were called to physically remove someone from their home, which experts say represents only a small fraction of total evictions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But the data — compiled and analyzed by KQED and researchers at UC Berkeley’s Urban Displacement Project — provides insight into where those evictions are happening, who is most vulnerable and the effectiveness of tenant protections.\u003c/p>\n\u003ctable style=\"border-spacing: 10px;border: thin solid grey\">\n\u003ctbody>\n\u003ctr>\n\u003ctd>\n\u003ch2>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11879725\">See Where People Were Evicted in the Bay Area\u003c/a>\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Click on the map below to see how many people were evicted from March 19, 2020 to March 31, 2021 by county, city or census tract.\u003cbr>\n\u003ca href=\"https://shiny.demog.berkeley.edu/alexramiller/kqed-evictions/\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-11879745\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Screen-Shot-2021-06-29-at-12.57.34-PM-800x408.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"408\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Screen-Shot-2021-06-29-at-12.57.34-PM-800x408.png 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Screen-Shot-2021-06-29-at-12.57.34-PM-160x82.png 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Screen-Shot-2021-06-29-at-12.57.34-PM.png 981w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\u003c/td>\n\u003c/tr>\n\u003c/tbody>\n\u003c/table>\n\u003cp>Roughly half of the 1,012 lockouts occurred in two counties, with 270 in Santa Clara County and 227 in Contra Costa County. Comparatively, in Alameda County, which has half a million more residents than in Contra Costa, sheriff’s deputies performed 25 lockouts, the lowest of all nine counties.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The disparity is largely due to differences in protections for tenants that county and city officials enacted during the pandemic, said Anne Tamiko Omura, the executive director of the Eviction Defense Center. The legal services organization counsels tenants in Alameda County and parts of Contra Costa County.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It quantifies what we experience day in and day out,” she said, “which is the huge disparity between tenants who live in Alameda and Contra Costa counties.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Alameda County \u003ca href=\"http://www.acgov.org/cda/hcd/documents/Item27O-2020-41.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">allows only evictions\u003c/a> for health and safety violations or if a landlord is taking their property off the rental market, Tamiko Omura said, making its moratorium one of the strongest in the state. By contrast, Contra Costa’s tenant protections are more narrowly focused on blocking evictions for nonpayment of rent. It allows other evictions, including, for instance, breaches of the lease or nuisance allegations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The same is true in Santa Clara County, said Caryn Hreha, a staff attorney at the Law Foundation of Silicon Valley. Hreha said her office now mostly sees nuisance claims as the grounds cited for an eviction, in part because it’s one of the few ways landlords can evict tenants.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We have cases where it’s the sound of running and jumping from children because it happens frequently, backyards that aren’t cleaned up, parking disputes over who is parking in what spots,” Hreha said. “Those are things landlords are calling nuisances, and those are the cases that are going forward.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Where Bay Area Sheriffs Evicted People in the Pandemic's First Year \" aria-label=\"Bar Chart\" id=\"datawrapper-chart-DRkC1\" src=\"https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/DRkC1/7/\" scrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"0\" style=\"width: 0; min-width: 100% !important; border: none;\" height=\"450\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The data also points to racial disparities in evictions, said Tim Thomas, research director at UC Berkeley’s Urban Displacement Project. He estimates that Black renters were twice as likely to be evicted than white renters, a finding that is \u003ca href=\"https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/23780231211009983\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">in keeping with national studies\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The data does not include racial demographic information for the people who were evicted. But Thomas and graduate student Alex Ramiller used an algorithm that combines last names with neighborhood demographic information and applied it to 658 eviction records to predict the race of an individual evicted.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Tenants who were evicted were also more likely to be living in neighborhoods that have higher poverty rates, lower median rents and have slightly higher levels of rent burden — meaning renters pay more than a third of their income toward rent.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>What is most startling about the data KQED collected, Thomas said, was that it pointed to the effectiveness of Alameda County’s tenant protections. The Urban Displacement Project on Monday released a \u003ca href=\"https://www.urbandisplacement.org/us-regions/housing-precarity-risk-model\">new map and modeling tool to predict where residents are most at risk of eviction\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Tenants in parts of West and East Oakland, Hayward and elsewhere in Alameda County were at high risk of eviction because of the levels of poverty, unemployment and rent burden among residents, Thomas said. But sheriff lockouts remained low.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If that doesn’t make you a believer that policy has an impact,” Thomas said, “I don’t know what will.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>As Coronavirus Cases Surged, So Did Lockouts\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Across the Bay Area, sheriff’s lockouts began picking up in the fall, jumping from 39 in September to 104 in October. They peaked in December with 171, as a \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfchronicle.com/projects/coronavirus-map/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">deadly surge in coronavirus cases\u003c/a> was sweeping the region.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Suzanne Dershowitz, a housing policy attorney at Legal Aid of Sonoma County, said the uptick in lockouts might be attributed to the expiration of the Judicial Council of California’s eviction moratorium. It was in effect between \u003ca href=\"https://newsroom.courts.ca.gov/news/judicial-council-adopts-new-rules-lower-jail-population-suspend-evictions-and-foreclosures\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">April 6\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11833268/california-eviction-moratorium-to-end-on-sept-1-court-says\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Aug. 31\u003c/a> last year and prohibited eviction cases from moving forward, except for health and safety violations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When the Judicial Council’s order expired, the California Legislature \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11836164/statewide-eviction-protections-approved-by-state-lawmakers-but-tenant-groups-still-fear-eviction-wave\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">enacted new statewide tenant protections\u003c/a>, which went into effect on Sept. 1. The law, Assembly Bill 3088, prohibited evictions for nonpayment of rent if the tenant could demonstrate they lost income due to the pandemic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But it left other grounds for eviction in place, such as when an owner wants to remove a property from the rental market, or move themselves or a family member into the property. It also allows evictions for nuisance claims, breaches of the lease or health and safety allegations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That was a big turning point for us,” Dershowitz said. “As soon as (the Judicial Council’s order) was lifted and the state law went into effect, we saw evictions taking place that had previously been protected.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"People Evicted by Bay Area Sheriffs Since the Start of the Pandemic\" aria-label=\"Interactive line chart\" id=\"datawrapper-chart-lXcNW\" src=\"https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/lXcNW/7/\" scrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"0\" style=\"width: 0; min-width: 100% !important; border: none;\" height=\"400\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003cbr>\n\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cases that had been put on hold during the first months of the pandemic began to move forward, and new cases that were now permitted under the new state rules were added to the queue, said the Eviction Defense Center’s Anne Tamiko Omura.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I don’t think it’s a coincidence that the peak happened a couple months after the courts reopened,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After KQED reported its first findings in January on sheriff’s lockouts, Dershowitz said her organization, along with others, were able to successfully lobby the Sonoma County Board of Supervisors to amend the county’s existing tenant protections. The legislation, \u003ca href=\"https://sonomacounty.ca.gov/CAO/Press-Releases/Supervisors-strengthen-protections-regarding-evictions-and-sick-leave-during-pandemic/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">adopted Feb. 9\u003c/a>, added protections for more tenants by only allowing evictions when a landlord wants to remove a property from the rental market and for health and safety violations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The argument we were making was a public health argument,” Dershowtiz said, “that evictions for nonpayment of rent spreads COVID just as much as an eviction for a lease violation.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The new legislation appears to have had some impact. Sheriff’s lockouts in Sonoma County decreased nearly 60% between January and March of this year, dropping from 37 to 16, according to records from the Sonoma County Sheriff’s Office.\u003cbr>\n\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Protections for Renters, Pressure on Landlords\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Despite the more than 1,000 sheriff lockouts across the Bay Area, evictions were significantly down from previous years, tenant attorneys said. Pre-pandemic eviction numbers are not widely available, but in Contra Costa County, for example, the \u003ca href=\"http://64.166.146.245/docs/2020/BOS/20200414_1601/41623_Sheriff%27s%20Department%20Eviction%20Report.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Sheriff’s Office reported\u003c/a> enforcing roughly 30 evictions per week in the 18 months prior to the pandemic, compared to an average 4.5 per week between March 19, 2020 and March 31, 2021.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s historic, the levels of protections” for tenants, said Dershowitz. “All of our clients have been impacted by COVID in one way or another, and these protections have been absolutely critical to keeping clients housed.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "‘Everybody always thinks landlords are rich, but we have lots of expenses.’",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>But not having the option of evicting tenants has also put some landlords in a bind. Jim Siegel operates 10 rental units across six properties in San Francisco and Sonoma counties. He said he’s owed roughly $150,300 from tenants who haven’t paid rent and said he plans to evict some of them if they aren’t able to pay the back rent once the state and local moratoriums lift.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He owns a retail store in San Francisco that reduced its hours significantly, and he said he had to go on unemployment as a result.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Everybody always thinks landlords are rich, but we have lots of expenses,” Siegel said. “We have mortgages, property taxes, insurance, utilities, we have upkeep on the buildings.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Paying all those costs has bled his bank account, Siegel said. He had been using any profit from his buildings to fund his retirement. Now, he said he’ll have to keep working for another couple years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“To keep continually extending the eviction moratorium, it’s just making the tenants’ debt worse,” Siegel said. “Eventually, there will be a reckoning day.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11879729\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS46914_020_SanJose_AntiEvictionProtest_01272021-qut.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11879729\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS46914_020_SanJose_AntiEvictionProtest_01272021-qut.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS46914_020_SanJose_AntiEvictionProtest_01272021-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS46914_020_SanJose_AntiEvictionProtest_01272021-qut-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS46914_020_SanJose_AntiEvictionProtest_01272021-qut-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS46914_020_SanJose_AntiEvictionProtest_01272021-qut-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS46914_020_SanJose_AntiEvictionProtest_01272021-qut-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Protesters rally in front of Santa Clara County Superior Court in San Jose on Jan. 27, 2021, demanding stronger state eviction protections. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Siegel and his tenants in San Francisco and Sonoma counties have applied for rent relief but haven’t received any response.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Rent relief has been slow to go out across the state. Cities and counties are administering about half of the $5.2 billion in federal stimulus funds dedicated to rent relief in California, and the state’s Department of Housing and Community Development is administering the other half.\u003cbr>\n\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"link1": "https://calmatters.org/housing/2021/07/california-eviction-moratorium-tenants/,CalMatters: Where Are Tenants Falling Through the Cracks of California Eviction Ban?"
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cbr>\nBut according to the department, as of Tuesday, the state had received 92,749 completed applications for its portion of the rent relief program, requesting more than $722 million in rental assistance. The state had paid out a little more than $73 million — or about 10% of the requested amount — to 6,610 households.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With the passage of AB 832, the latest extension of the statewide eviction moratorium through Sept. 30, Tamiko Omura said she’s hopeful those extra months will allow enough time to get the money into the hands of renters and landlords.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I just hope we can forestall all of these evictions long enough,” she said, “to get the bulk of this money pushed out.”\u003c/p>\n\u003chr>\n\u003ch2>How We Did It\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>When the state enacted its first statewide tenant protections, AB 3088, in September 2020, the housing desk at KQED started wondering: What happens when the moratoriums end?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/\">CalMatters\u003c/a> had \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/housing/2020/08/californians-evicted-coronavirus-pandemic/?_gl=1*1fnj54d*_ga*NzM2MjI2MTgyLjE1NzM2MDYwNzk\">gathered eviction data from 44 county sheriff’s departments\u003c/a> across California and shared that with KQED and other newsrooms in August 2020. The data included sheriff lockouts from March through June of 2020.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>KQED reporters began requesting monthly sheriff lockout data from Alameda, Contra Costa, Marin, Napa, San Francisco, San Mateo, Santa Clara, Solano and Sonoma counties for lockouts beginning in July 2020. We have continued submitting records requests every month since.\u003cbr>\n\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A sheriff lockout is a court order to physically remove tenants from a household after they have lost their eviction case. Tenant attorneys say it represents only a small fraction of total evictions since most tenants agree to leave the house or apartment before sheriff’s deputies are called. But it is one of the few ways to determine how many evictions are taking place and provides information about who was evicted and where those evictions have occurred. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In most cases, the data provided by the sheriff’s offices included the names of people being evicted and the landlord, the address, and the date of the lockout. The data does not include information about why someone was evicted (i.e., breach of lease, non-payment of rent, nuisance, owner move-in, etc.). We are not publishing people’s names or record level data.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>KQED and researchers at the Urban Displacement Project converted the records into data and cleaned the results, omitting where possible any lockouts for commercial buildings, duplicate records, cancelled and stayed lockouts. In cases where sheriff’s offices included “post and mail” and “personal” service records, we only included “personal” records. This means that a sheriff’s deputies physically showed up at someone’s home to remove them, whereas “post and mail” indicates the sheriff’s deputies posted a notice for an upcoming eviction on someone’s door. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Then Urban Displacement researchers used an algorithm that combines last names with neighborhood demographic information to determine the likely race and ethnicity of evictees. This algorithm has been used to estimate eviction data without race by academics at \u003ca href=\"https://evictions.study/washington/\">UC Berkeley\u003c/a> and \u003ca href=\"https://evictionlab.org/demographics-of-eviction/\">Princeton\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Urban Displacement Project researchers also used data from the American Community Survey to analyze the characteristics of the neighborhoods where evictions occurred, including median rent, median household income and the racial demographics of residents in those neighborhoods.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1osuqwVOt8GcqD_cKmpqS8Y1ZGHrADZgy-sFu1sq48EE/edit#gid=224868833\">You can download aggregated data here.\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"slug": "so-thankful-california-to-offer-medi-cal-to-235000-undocumented-californians",
"title": "'So Thankful': California to Offer Medi-Cal to 235,000 Undocumented Adults",
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"headTitle": "‘So Thankful’: California to Offer Medi-Cal to 235,000 Undocumented Adults | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>Nearly a quarter of a million undocumented adults and seniors in California – many of whom are or have been essential workers – will gain access to low-cost or free medical services as early as next year under a groundbreaking budget deal approved Monday by the Legislature.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>California is now positioned to officially become the first state in the nation to offer public health insurance to low-income, undocumented residents ages 50 and older, a highly vulnerable population which has been made even more vulnerable by the deadly COVID-19 pandemic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Gov. Gavin Newsom is expected to sign the agreement into law before July 1.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>State Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara, who as senator introduced the first (unsuccessful) \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=201320140SB1005\">bill\u003c/a> in 2014 to end the exclusion of undocumented immigrants from full Medi-Cal benefits, applauded the news as “a dream come true.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“California’s immigrants have given so much to our state and now they’ll have the dignity of accessing health care,” Lara said. “Today the state Legislature and the governor will be erasing a vestige of discrimination against our immigrant communities that so many of us have fought for years to overcome.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The whopping $262.6 billion state budget deal includes spending on a range of programs with an eye toward social equity, including other projects like universal transitional kindergarten, enhanced after-school and summer learning programs and an effort to make the state’s top public universities more accessible to in-state students.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Isabel, 76-year-old farmworker\"]‘I am so thankful. I’m very excited. We worked so much in the fields and we never got any benefits.’[/pullquote]Assembly Budget Chair Phil Ting, D-San Francisco, said the record-breaking budget presents a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This is a budget that really demonstrates that our values are protecting the most vulnerable families, the families who need our help the most in the time of the pandemic. But also well into the future,” Ting said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One of the \u003ca href=\"https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/4423\">estimated 235,000 undocumented immigrants\u003c/a> who could benefit from low or no-cost health care is Isabel, a 76-year-old former farmworker who did not want her last name used because of her immigration status.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I am so thankful. I’m very excited,” she said, her voice breaking. “We worked so much in the fields and we never got any benefits.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Isabel, who picked crops for more than three decades, said she feared for her life after she became seriously ill with COVID-19. But she did not seek medical care because she lacked insurance and worried about the cost of seeing a doctor, she said in Spanish.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It was very, very difficult,” said Isabel, adding that her daughter, who lives with her, also got sick with the virus. “When we went to sleep, we thought we wouldn’t rise in the morning.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Nearly 1.5 million unauthorized immigrants lacked health insurance last year, the largest group of uninsured in the state, according to a \u003ca href=\"https://laborcenter.berkeley.edu/ca-coverage-gains-to-erode-without-further-state-action/\">report\u003c/a> by the UC Berkeley Labor Center.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Undocumented immigrants in the United States \u003ca href=\"https://www.americanimmigrationcouncil.org/topics/tax-contributions\">pay billions of dollars in taxes\u003c/a> and often do \u003ca href=\"https://www.fwd.us/news/immigrant-essential-workers/\">essential work\u003c/a> in agriculture, food services, health care and other industries. But they are excluded from the Affordable Care Act and they cannot purchase subsidized coverage through Covered California, the state’s ACA health exchange.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In recent years, the state began offering full-scope Medi-Cal – covering doctor’s visits, prescriptions, eye and dental care and other services – to low-income undocumented children and young adults up to age 26. But older immigrants have only been eligible for limited Medi-Cal, which only covers prenatal care and health emergencies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The earliest newly eligible seniors and older adults could access full coverage is May 2022, according to state Sen. María Elena Durazo, D-Los Angeles, who championed the program’s expansion. It will cost up to $1.3 billion per year, once the changes are fully established, according to the \u003ca href=\"https://abgt.assembly.ca.gov/sites/abgt.assembly.ca.gov/files/Floor%20Report%20of%20the%202021-22%20Budget%20-%20%28June%2028%2C%202021%20Version%29.pdf\">budget agreement\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Durazo and other advocates stressed that because most undocumented adults ages 50 and older are already enrolled in restricted Medi-Cal, the state is responsible for paying the cost of emergency room visits, which are much more expensive than preventive care.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That’s not a smart use of our funds,” said Durazo. “It’s much better to use our funds for preventative, primary health care. And that really matters not only to the individuals, but it matters in terms of dollars and cents.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside label='Related Coverage' tag='undocumented-immigrants']The budget deal also includes resources to begin offering regular food assistance benefits to low-income residents, regardless of immigration status.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lawmakers approved funds – up to $280 million by 2023 – to expand the \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11876704/essential-for-everyone-food-aid-bill-for-undocumented-californians-gains-momentum\">California Food Assistance Program\u003c/a>. CFAP currently provides food aid to thousands of legal immigrants and refugees who have been excluded from federally funded food stamps.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We are grateful to state leaders for seizing this historic opportunity to take tangible steps toward ensuring that undocumented immigrants – our neighbors, friends, colleagues, and important members of our California communities – are no longer denied basic food assistance,” said Jared Call, senior policy advocate with Nourish California, in a statement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Call, whose organization co-leads the Food for All campaign, said California is set to become the first state to offer food assistance to undocumented immigrants via a permanent program.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Even before the COVID pandemic in California, children in families that include undocumented immigrants were three to four times more likely to grow up with unmet basic needs compared to children in non-immigrant families, according to a \u003ca href=\"https://calbudgetcenter.org/resources/state-policymakers-can-provide-food-support-to-undocumented-and-mixed-status-california-families-blocked-by-federal-policies/\">report\u003c/a> by the California Budget and Policy Center.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Advocates say that the process for newly eligible undocumented people to sign up for state-funded health coverage or food aid will be no different than for others applying for Medi-Cal or CalFresh. Enrollment for food assistance benefits is set to start in 2023.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This story includes reporting from KQED’s Katie Orr.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"title": "'So Thankful': California to Offer Medi-Cal to 235,000 Undocumented Adults | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Nearly a quarter of a million undocumented adults and seniors in California – many of whom are or have been essential workers – will gain access to low-cost or free medical services as early as next year under a groundbreaking budget deal approved Monday by the Legislature.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>California is now positioned to officially become the first state in the nation to offer public health insurance to low-income, undocumented residents ages 50 and older, a highly vulnerable population which has been made even more vulnerable by the deadly COVID-19 pandemic.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Gov. Gavin Newsom is expected to sign the agreement into law before July 1.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>State Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara, who as senator introduced the first (unsuccessful) \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=201320140SB1005\">bill\u003c/a> in 2014 to end the exclusion of undocumented immigrants from full Medi-Cal benefits, applauded the news as “a dream come true.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“California’s immigrants have given so much to our state and now they’ll have the dignity of accessing health care,” Lara said. “Today the state Legislature and the governor will be erasing a vestige of discrimination against our immigrant communities that so many of us have fought for years to overcome.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The whopping $262.6 billion state budget deal includes spending on a range of programs with an eye toward social equity, including other projects like universal transitional kindergarten, enhanced after-school and summer learning programs and an effort to make the state’s top public universities more accessible to in-state students.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Assembly Budget Chair Phil Ting, D-San Francisco, said the record-breaking budget presents a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This is a budget that really demonstrates that our values are protecting the most vulnerable families, the families who need our help the most in the time of the pandemic. But also well into the future,” Ting said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>One of the \u003ca href=\"https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/4423\">estimated 235,000 undocumented immigrants\u003c/a> who could benefit from low or no-cost health care is Isabel, a 76-year-old former farmworker who did not want her last name used because of her immigration status.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I am so thankful. I’m very excited,” she said, her voice breaking. “We worked so much in the fields and we never got any benefits.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Isabel, who picked crops for more than three decades, said she feared for her life after she became seriously ill with COVID-19. But she did not seek medical care because she lacked insurance and worried about the cost of seeing a doctor, she said in Spanish.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It was very, very difficult,” said Isabel, adding that her daughter, who lives with her, also got sick with the virus. “When we went to sleep, we thought we wouldn’t rise in the morning.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Nearly 1.5 million unauthorized immigrants lacked health insurance last year, the largest group of uninsured in the state, according to a \u003ca href=\"https://laborcenter.berkeley.edu/ca-coverage-gains-to-erode-without-further-state-action/\">report\u003c/a> by the UC Berkeley Labor Center.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Undocumented immigrants in the United States \u003ca href=\"https://www.americanimmigrationcouncil.org/topics/tax-contributions\">pay billions of dollars in taxes\u003c/a> and often do \u003ca href=\"https://www.fwd.us/news/immigrant-essential-workers/\">essential work\u003c/a> in agriculture, food services, health care and other industries. But they are excluded from the Affordable Care Act and they cannot purchase subsidized coverage through Covered California, the state’s ACA health exchange.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In recent years, the state began offering full-scope Medi-Cal – covering doctor’s visits, prescriptions, eye and dental care and other services – to low-income undocumented children and young adults up to age 26. But older immigrants have only been eligible for limited Medi-Cal, which only covers prenatal care and health emergencies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The earliest newly eligible seniors and older adults could access full coverage is May 2022, according to state Sen. María Elena Durazo, D-Los Angeles, who championed the program’s expansion. It will cost up to $1.3 billion per year, once the changes are fully established, according to the \u003ca href=\"https://abgt.assembly.ca.gov/sites/abgt.assembly.ca.gov/files/Floor%20Report%20of%20the%202021-22%20Budget%20-%20%28June%2028%2C%202021%20Version%29.pdf\">budget agreement\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Durazo and other advocates stressed that because most undocumented adults ages 50 and older are already enrolled in restricted Medi-Cal, the state is responsible for paying the cost of emergency room visits, which are much more expensive than preventive care.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That’s not a smart use of our funds,” said Durazo. “It’s much better to use our funds for preventative, primary health care. And that really matters not only to the individuals, but it matters in terms of dollars and cents.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>The budget deal also includes resources to begin offering regular food assistance benefits to low-income residents, regardless of immigration status.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lawmakers approved funds – up to $280 million by 2023 – to expand the \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11876704/essential-for-everyone-food-aid-bill-for-undocumented-californians-gains-momentum\">California Food Assistance Program\u003c/a>. CFAP currently provides food aid to thousands of legal immigrants and refugees who have been excluded from federally funded food stamps.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We are grateful to state leaders for seizing this historic opportunity to take tangible steps toward ensuring that undocumented immigrants – our neighbors, friends, colleagues, and important members of our California communities – are no longer denied basic food assistance,” said Jared Call, senior policy advocate with Nourish California, in a statement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Call, whose organization co-leads the Food for All campaign, said California is set to become the first state to offer food assistance to undocumented immigrants via a permanent program.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Even before the COVID pandemic in California, children in families that include undocumented immigrants were three to four times more likely to grow up with unmet basic needs compared to children in non-immigrant families, according to a \u003ca href=\"https://calbudgetcenter.org/resources/state-policymakers-can-provide-food-support-to-undocumented-and-mixed-status-california-families-blocked-by-federal-policies/\">report\u003c/a> by the California Budget and Policy Center.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Advocates say that the process for newly eligible undocumented people to sign up for state-funded health coverage or food aid will be no different than for others applying for Medi-Cal or CalFresh. Enrollment for food assistance benefits is set to start in 2023.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This story includes reporting from KQED’s Katie Orr.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>There’s mounting research to suggest that protecting people who are immunocompromised from getting COVID is important not just for their sake – it could be critical in the effort to end the pandemic for everyone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The evidence comes from two separate strands of studies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.ucl.ac.uk/infection-immunity/people/dr-laura-mccoy\">Dr. Laura McCoy\u003c/a> has been doing the first type. She’s an infectious disease researcher at University College London.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The group of people that I’m particularly interested in are those living with HIV,” she says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She’s been studying how well their immune systems respond to vaccines against COVID-19 — specifically the Pfizer vaccine.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So far, it’s worked quite well for HIV-positive people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But there’s a catch. In her studies, “all of our participants had really quite well-controlled HIV.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Normally, HIV attacks the immune system. But these patients were on anti-HIV medications that were suppressing HIV’s impact. “What we hadn’t yet seen was how people’s immune response was affected when their HIV was effectively out of control because they weren’t on medication,” says McCoy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Then, in a clinic she was working with, an HIV-positive patient came in who was not on any meds. The HIV virus had decimated this person’s immune system. For instance, says McCoy, “when we looked at their blood there were very few functional B-cells or T-cells.” Both are crucial players in the immune system.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And as it happened, just 16 days earlier, this person had gotten their second dose of the Pfizer vaccine.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Typically two weeks after the second dose a person’s blood is teeming with antibodies against COVID. But with this person, “we actually couldn’t see any measurable levels of anti-coronavirus antibody in the blood,” says McCoy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Even after 44 days — once this person had been put on HIV meds and their immune system had recovered — they still had not produced any COVID-19 antibodies in response to the vaccine.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That’s really quite extraordinary,” says McCoy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>These results, \u003ca href=\"https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanhiv/article/PIIS2352-3018(21)00099-0/fulltext\">published in the journal The Lancet\u003c/a> this month, match similar findings that the vaccines may not be effective for people who are immunocompromised for other reasons such as individuals with cancer or organ transplant recipients who are taking immunosuppressing drugs to keep their bodies from rejecting the transplant.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.publichealth.columbia.edu/people/our-faculty/ssa16\">Dr. Salim Abdool Karim\u003c/a> directs South Africa’s Centre for the AIDS Programme of Research. He says this research suggests that a lot of people are at risk around the world. “Most countries will have immunosuppressed individuals,” he notes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And Abdool Karim says it’s time to connect the dots to the second category of research regarding immunocompromised people and COVID-19.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Specifically, a team that includes researchers at the center Abdool Karim leads \u003ca href=\"https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.06.03.21258228v1\">recently followed the case of a woman in South Africa\u003c/a> who was infected with the coronavirus at a time when her HIV was uncontrolled. It took her body seven months to clear the coronavirus.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“In the course of that time the virus underwent multiple mutations,” says Abdool Karim. And step by step these mutations morphed the virus into a version of the variants of concern that have fueled new surges across the world.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“So essentially this HIV-positive woman became a cauldron for the creation of a whole lot of new variants,” he says. “She literally recreated the steps.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That finding echoes a handful of similar studies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Abdool Karim, who also co-chairs South Africa’s advisory committee on COVID-19, says his takeaway is this: “Immunosuppressed individuals are really important in this pandemic.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Protecting them needs to be made a top priority — to keep them safe and to slow the emergence of variants, he says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There are potential solutions: For instance, a recent \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2021/06/15/1006382264/a-3rd-dose-of-covid-vaccines-may-boost-immunity-for-transplant-recipients\">study of organ transplant patients \u003c/a>who were on immunosuppressing drugs found that giving them a third dose of either the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine did have some effect. Similarly, McCoy’s work on HIV-positive patients suggests if you make sure a person’s HIV has been treated before you give them a COVID vaccine, the vaccine will work.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>What’s important, says Abdool Karim, will be to ramp up research on all this. This is a new scientific puzzle, he says. And “we’ve only just begun putting the pieces together.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">Copyright 2021 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=Protecting+The+Immuno-Compromised+Against+COVID+Could+Be+Key+To+Ending+The+Pandemic&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/div>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>There’s mounting research to suggest that protecting people who are immunocompromised from getting COVID is important not just for their sake – it could be critical in the effort to end the pandemic for everyone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The evidence comes from two separate strands of studies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.ucl.ac.uk/infection-immunity/people/dr-laura-mccoy\">Dr. Laura McCoy\u003c/a> has been doing the first type. She’s an infectious disease researcher at University College London.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The group of people that I’m particularly interested in are those living with HIV,” she says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She’s been studying how well their immune systems respond to vaccines against COVID-19 — specifically the Pfizer vaccine.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So far, it’s worked quite well for HIV-positive people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But there’s a catch. In her studies, “all of our participants had really quite well-controlled HIV.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Normally, HIV attacks the immune system. But these patients were on anti-HIV medications that were suppressing HIV’s impact. “What we hadn’t yet seen was how people’s immune response was affected when their HIV was effectively out of control because they weren’t on medication,” says McCoy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Then, in a clinic she was working with, an HIV-positive patient came in who was not on any meds. The HIV virus had decimated this person’s immune system. For instance, says McCoy, “when we looked at their blood there were very few functional B-cells or T-cells.” Both are crucial players in the immune system.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And as it happened, just 16 days earlier, this person had gotten their second dose of the Pfizer vaccine.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Typically two weeks after the second dose a person’s blood is teeming with antibodies against COVID. But with this person, “we actually couldn’t see any measurable levels of anti-coronavirus antibody in the blood,” says McCoy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Even after 44 days — once this person had been put on HIV meds and their immune system had recovered — they still had not produced any COVID-19 antibodies in response to the vaccine.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“That’s really quite extraordinary,” says McCoy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>These results, \u003ca href=\"https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanhiv/article/PIIS2352-3018(21)00099-0/fulltext\">published in the journal The Lancet\u003c/a> this month, match similar findings that the vaccines may not be effective for people who are immunocompromised for other reasons such as individuals with cancer or organ transplant recipients who are taking immunosuppressing drugs to keep their bodies from rejecting the transplant.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.publichealth.columbia.edu/people/our-faculty/ssa16\">Dr. Salim Abdool Karim\u003c/a> directs South Africa’s Centre for the AIDS Programme of Research. He says this research suggests that a lot of people are at risk around the world. “Most countries will have immunosuppressed individuals,” he notes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And Abdool Karim says it’s time to connect the dots to the second category of research regarding immunocompromised people and COVID-19.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Specifically, a team that includes researchers at the center Abdool Karim leads \u003ca href=\"https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.06.03.21258228v1\">recently followed the case of a woman in South Africa\u003c/a> who was infected with the coronavirus at a time when her HIV was uncontrolled. It took her body seven months to clear the coronavirus.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“In the course of that time the virus underwent multiple mutations,” says Abdool Karim. And step by step these mutations morphed the virus into a version of the variants of concern that have fueled new surges across the world.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“So essentially this HIV-positive woman became a cauldron for the creation of a whole lot of new variants,” he says. “She literally recreated the steps.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That finding echoes a handful of similar studies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Abdool Karim, who also co-chairs South Africa’s advisory committee on COVID-19, says his takeaway is this: “Immunosuppressed individuals are really important in this pandemic.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Protecting them needs to be made a top priority — to keep them safe and to slow the emergence of variants, he says.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There are potential solutions: For instance, a recent \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2021/06/15/1006382264/a-3rd-dose-of-covid-vaccines-may-boost-immunity-for-transplant-recipients\">study of organ transplant patients \u003c/a>who were on immunosuppressing drugs found that giving them a third dose of either the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine did have some effect. Similarly, McCoy’s work on HIV-positive patients suggests if you make sure a person’s HIV has been treated before you give them a COVID vaccine, the vaccine will work.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>What’s important, says Abdool Karim, will be to ramp up research on all this. This is a new scientific puzzle, he says. And “we’ve only just begun putting the pieces together.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">Copyright 2021 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=Protecting+The+Immuno-Compromised+Against+COVID+Could+Be+Key+To+Ending+The+Pandemic&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/div>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>Some 800 seafarers from around the world have received COVID-19 vaccinations at the Port of Oakland since May, part of an effort to ease an international crisis that has left hundreds of thousands of merchant ship crew members stuck at sea due to pandemic-related health concerns.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote align=\"right\" size=\"medium\" citation=\"Seth Gomez, senior pharmacist, Alameda County Health Care for the Homeless\"]‘I think it’s important that we get as many people vaccinated as possible, regardless of where they call home.’[/pullquote]The local vaccine drive, organized by the International Maritime Center in Oakland, mirrors similar initiatives in a growing number of ports around the world to administer the single-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine to stranded crews. Ports in India, the Philippines and Belgium have also recently launched their own programs to vaccinate stranded seafarers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At the Port of Oakland, medical workers from Alameda County’s Health Care for the Homeless program and Contra Costa Health Services, in partnership with the health care company Curative, typically set up shop aboard docked ships, and vaccinate anyone willing to roll up their sleeves. Many crew members hail from countries that have been ravaged by the pandemic, where vaccines are still largely out of reach, said John Claassen, chairman of the International Maritime Center.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11877727\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11877727 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49575_009_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49575_009_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49575_009_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49575_009_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49575_009_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49575_009_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Crew members from the cargo ship Sea Hope get their temperatures checked before receiving the Johnson & Johnson vaccine during a vaccination drive at the Port of Oakland on May 27, 2021. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“These are people who are stuck aboard the ship, and their families are worried sick about them. In countries like the Philippines and India, they’re not getting the vaccines,” he said. “So here … they’re so happy they’re taking pictures.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At the beginning of the pandemic, many governments shut down their borders and banned international shipping crews from coming ashore. That had devastating consequences not just for the world economy (an estimated 80% of global trade is moved by maritime transport), but also the roughly 2 million seafarers who operate the global fleet of merchant ships.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.imo.org/en/MediaCentre/HotTopics/Pages/FAQ-on-crew-changes-and-repatriation-of-seafarers.aspx\">The International Maritime Organization\u003c/a> estimates that as of March 2021, roughly 200,000 seafarers were still stranded on their ships, a logjam the group calls a humanitarian and economic crisis.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11877718\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49569_001_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11877718\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49569_001_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49569_001_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49569_001_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49569_001_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49569_001_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49569_001_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Crew members of the NYK Delphinus cargo ship wait to receive their Johnson & Johnson vaccines during a Port of Oakland vaccination drive on May 27, 2021. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Maritime workers are a crucial but often overlooked part of the vast global shipping industry, and have been impacted particularly hard by the pandemic, said Margaret Reasoner, a volunteer with the Oakland chapter of the International Maritime Center. One deck seaman on a container ship recently told her he had been stuck at sea for 14 months, she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]“Mariners are resilient people. They understand they’re going to be gone from their families, she said. But, “we don’t think, ‘I’ll go to work and I won’t see my family, I won’t see my kids, for 14 months.’ That’s a long time.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ships can’t afford to risk anyone on board contracting the virus, since containment is difficult and health care services limited.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11879622\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49592_026_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11879622\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49592_026_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49592_026_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49592_026_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49592_026_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49592_026_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49592_026_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A cargo ship crew member receives his vaccine during a pop-up event at the Port of Oakland on May 27, 2021. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Brian Helmle, a deckhand on the San Francisco Bay Ferry, and a member of the Inlandboatmen’s Union, recently volunteered to help vaccinate crew members of the MV Cape Orlando, docked just across the estuary in Alameda. Doing so, he said, is a good way to show international solidarity with other maritime workers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside label=\"related coverage\" tag=\"port-of-oakland\"]“I have coworkers on the ferry boats who have been shipped out on deep-sea shipping lines, and they have told me stories about how hard the work is and how isolating it is,” he said. “And in times where there’s any kind of emergency, you know, health or war or anything like that, people go from being isolated to being in danger or stranded and unable to get home.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Alameda County Health Care for the Homeless, one of the groups involved in the effort, is used to delivering vaccines to people where they are, said Seth Gomez, a senior pharmacist.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Being a clinician first, and a pharmacist, I think it’s important that we get as many people vaccinated as possible, regardless of where they call home,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>The local vaccine drive, organized by the International Maritime Center in Oakland, mirrors similar initiatives in a growing number of ports around the world to administer the single-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine to stranded crews. Ports in India, the Philippines and Belgium have also recently launched their own programs to vaccinate stranded seafarers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At the Port of Oakland, medical workers from Alameda County’s Health Care for the Homeless program and Contra Costa Health Services, in partnership with the health care company Curative, typically set up shop aboard docked ships, and vaccinate anyone willing to roll up their sleeves. Many crew members hail from countries that have been ravaged by the pandemic, where vaccines are still largely out of reach, said John Claassen, chairman of the International Maritime Center.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11877727\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11877727 size-full\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49575_009_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49575_009_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49575_009_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49575_009_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49575_009_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49575_009_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Crew members from the cargo ship Sea Hope get their temperatures checked before receiving the Johnson & Johnson vaccine during a vaccination drive at the Port of Oakland on May 27, 2021. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“These are people who are stuck aboard the ship, and their families are worried sick about them. In countries like the Philippines and India, they’re not getting the vaccines,” he said. “So here … they’re so happy they’re taking pictures.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At the beginning of the pandemic, many governments shut down their borders and banned international shipping crews from coming ashore. That had devastating consequences not just for the world economy (an estimated 80% of global trade is moved by maritime transport), but also the roughly 2 million seafarers who operate the global fleet of merchant ships.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.imo.org/en/MediaCentre/HotTopics/Pages/FAQ-on-crew-changes-and-repatriation-of-seafarers.aspx\">The International Maritime Organization\u003c/a> estimates that as of March 2021, roughly 200,000 seafarers were still stranded on their ships, a logjam the group calls a humanitarian and economic crisis.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11877718\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49569_001_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11877718\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49569_001_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49569_001_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49569_001_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49569_001_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49569_001_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49569_001_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Crew members of the NYK Delphinus cargo ship wait to receive their Johnson & Johnson vaccines during a Port of Oakland vaccination drive on May 27, 2021. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Maritime workers are a crucial but often overlooked part of the vast global shipping industry, and have been impacted particularly hard by the pandemic, said Margaret Reasoner, a volunteer with the Oakland chapter of the International Maritime Center. One deck seaman on a container ship recently told her he had been stuck at sea for 14 months, she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>“Mariners are resilient people. They understand they’re going to be gone from their families, she said. But, “we don’t think, ‘I’ll go to work and I won’t see my family, I won’t see my kids, for 14 months.’ That’s a long time.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ships can’t afford to risk anyone on board contracting the virus, since containment is difficult and health care services limited.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11879622\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49592_026_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11879622\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49592_026_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49592_026_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49592_026_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49592_026_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49592_026_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/RS49592_026_PortofOakland_Vaccination_05272021-qut-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A cargo ship crew member receives his vaccine during a pop-up event at the Port of Oakland on May 27, 2021. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Brian Helmle, a deckhand on the San Francisco Bay Ferry, and a member of the Inlandboatmen’s Union, recently volunteered to help vaccinate crew members of the MV Cape Orlando, docked just across the estuary in Alameda. Doing so, he said, is a good way to show international solidarity with other maritime workers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>“I have coworkers on the ferry boats who have been shipped out on deep-sea shipping lines, and they have told me stories about how hard the work is and how isolating it is,” he said. “And in times where there’s any kind of emergency, you know, health or war or anything like that, people go from being isolated to being in danger or stranded and unable to get home.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Alameda County Health Care for the Homeless, one of the groups involved in the effort, is used to delivering vaccines to people where they are, said Seth Gomez, a senior pharmacist.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Being a clinician first, and a pharmacist, I think it’s important that we get as many people vaccinated as possible, regardless of where they call home,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>[dropcap]W[/dropcap]hen Miriam McDonald decided she wanted to have another baby at age 44, her doctor told her she had a better chance of winning the lottery. So when she got pregnant, she and her husband were thrilled. But within three days of giving birth to their son, everything turned.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was thinking, ‘Oh my God, what did I do?’ I just brought this baby into this world and I can barely take care of myself right now,” she said. “I feel exhausted. I haven’t slept in three days. I haven’t really eaten in three days.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As the weeks went by, her depression got worse. She felt sad, but also indifferent. She didn’t want to hold her baby, she didn’t want to change him. She said she felt no connection with him at all.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This confused her – she never felt anything like this after her first two kids – and she worried her mood might hurt her son. \u003ca href=\"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4113321/#R2\">Untreated postpartum depression can affect babies’ cognitive and social development\u003c/a>. For the mother, it can be life or death. \u003ca href=\"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4113321/\">Suicide accounts for 20% of maternal deaths\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Every day, I was crying. Every day, I felt like I just wanted to die. Every day, I thought about ending my life,” said McDonald, who is Latina and works at UC Davis as an IT professional.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">She went to Kaiser Permanente, her health care provider, for help. She said they put her on a merry-go-round of medication trial and error. The first drug her doctor prescribed made her anxious. The second drug gave her horrific nightmares. A third drug gave her auditory and visual hallucinations that took seven weeks to go away. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Then, her doctor retired. And when McDonald complained to her new doctor that she was still depressed four months after giving birth, the physician suggested more medications.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was desperate,” McDonald said. “I was like, ‘I’m trying to help myself, but things are just getting worse.’ So what am I left with?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">She started doing her own research and learned about a new treatment called brexanolone. It’s \u003ca href=\"https://www.fda.gov/news-events/press-announcements/fda-approves-first-treatment-post-partum-depression\">the \u003c/a>\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">first and only drug\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to treat postpartum depression, which \u003ca href=\"https://www.americashealthrankings.org/explore/health-of-women-and-children/measure/postpartum_depression/state/CA\">affects \u003c/a>\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">1 out of 8 new mothers\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> in California. Instead of targeting the serotonin system in the brain, like most antidepressants, brexanolone works by rebalancing the stress hormones that can get out of kilter after having a baby. It’s delivered through an IV infusion over 2 1/2 days in the hospital. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">clinical trials\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, \u003ca href=\"https://www.fda.gov/media/121348/download\">75% of women who got brexanolone started to feel better\u003c/a> immediately after the three-day treatment. Half the women went into complete remission.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">McDonald wanted to try it. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11879318\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2560px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11879318\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/trying-to-smile-1-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1920\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/trying-to-smile-1-scaled.jpg 2560w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/trying-to-smile-1-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/trying-to-smile-1-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/trying-to-smile-1-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/trying-to-smile-1-1536x1152.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/trying-to-smile-1-2048x1536.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/trying-to-smile-1-1920x1440.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">For the first year of her son’s life, Miriam McDonald says all her smiles were fake or strained. \u003ccite>(Courtesy Miriam McDonald)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“People walk out of the hospital, wanting to be with their child, wanting to return home,” said \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.med.unc.edu/psych/directory/riah-patterson/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Dr. Riah Patterson\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, who has been treating women with brexanolone at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill since it became available in summer 2019. “There is a hopefulness, a brightness. You can really see that transformation in the hospital room over those 60 hours. It’s pretty miraculous.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">When McDonald asked her doctor for brexanolone, she said no. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In an email, she said the existing studies were “not very impressive.” She told McDonald that she didn’t meet Kaiser’s criteria for the drug: She would have had to try and fail four medications and electroconvulsive therapy before she could try brexanolone. And all this had to happen within six months of having her baby, or she couldn’t try it at all.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>How could anyone qualify, McDonald wondered?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“This is crazy. By the time you even try one drug, that’s like four weeks out,” she said. “Another drug is four weeks out, another drug is four weeks out. There’s just no way.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"State Sen. Scott Wiener, D-San Francisco\"]‘If Kaiser is making it effectively impossible to get a particular, important mental health treatment, that could definitely be a violation of our parity law.’[/pullquote]\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Kaiser’s guidance is an outlier. KQED analyzed guidelines from a dozen health plans operating in California. Three of them require women to fail one medication before trying brexanolone. One plan – the state’s Medi-Cal program for low-income women – requires two fails. But Kaiser is the only system KQED found that recommends women first fail four drugs.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“That’s absurd,” said UNC’s Patterson, one of several experts in postpartum depression who, in turn, called Kaiser’s guidance “ridiculous,” “harsh,” “abusive” and “insane.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It may also be illegal. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Under a \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=201920200SB855\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">new state law that took effect in January\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> , health plans must conform to “generally accepted standards of care,” including nonprofit guidelines, scientific literature and expert consensus, when making decisions about mental health treatment.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“If Kaiser is making it effectively impossible to get a particular, important mental health treatment, that could definitely be a violation of our parity law,” said state Sen. Scott Wiener, D-San Francisco, the bill’s author. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Kaiser says it always follows the law. It says its integrated structure makes it different from traditional insurers. At Kaiser, a patient’s doctor determines whether a medication is necessary, not the health plan, and the criteria doctors use are recommendations, not requirements or prerequisites that patients need to “exhaust,” said Dr. Maria Koshy, Kaiser’s chair of psychiatry for Northern California. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“At the end of the day, this is an individual clinical decision by both the provider – the physician – and the patient,” she said.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But former Kaiser clinicians and legislative experts familiar with Kaiser’s model say the culture around these recommendations is to follow them. Doctors get questioned or can face consequences if they don’t, said Wiener.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>‘It Saved My Life’\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">McDonald’s physician followed the criteria as if they were prerequisites when she declined to prescribe brexanolone. Kaiser’s grievance department sent a letter to another woman, Yesenia Muñoz, denying brexanolone because she had not failed enough medications.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“When I talked to the caseworker at Kaiser that had denied the medication, he said that Zulresso was very expensive,” said Muñoz, referring to brexanolone’s brand name.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Brexanolone treatment costs $34,000 for the medication, plus the cost of the three-day hospital stay, which can tack on another $30,000, at least. Kaiser is not yet certified to administer the treatment in-house, so it must pay outside hospitals to provide it. It says it has plans to eventually open three of its own certified centers.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Muñoz was devastated by the denial. She was overwhelmed by postpartum depression and anxiety shortly after her daughter was born and, as a Latina, she said she was hesitant to seek help at first. When she did, none of the medications or therapies Kaiser offered her worked. She still felt suicidal.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“I could get out the door sometimes and take the stroller and go walk, and my mind kept on saying, ‘If you just step in front of the car, it’s all going to go away,’ ” she remembers.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Muñoz got help from family and co-workers to appeal Kaiser’s decision to the state, and after reviewing her medical records, regulators ordered Kaiser to pay for the brexanolone treatment.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Muñoz went to UC Davis Medical Center to get it, and she started feeling better within the first day.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11879428\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11879428\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/MunozAndBaby.jpg\" alt=\"Yesenia smiling holding baby\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1760\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/MunozAndBaby.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/MunozAndBaby-800x733.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/MunozAndBaby-1020x935.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/MunozAndBaby-160x147.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/MunozAndBaby-1536x1408.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">After Yesenia Muñoz received brexanolone to treat her postpartum depression, she felt blessed, connected with her daughter and ‘happy enough to want to live.’ \u003ccite>(Courtesy Yesenia Munoz)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“The nurse came in and she said something funny and I laughed,” Muñoz said. “It was the first time I had laughed in so long.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">She started looking through photos and videos of her daughter on her phone and she says it was like she was experiencing those moments for the first time. She started making plans for the future. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“It was like a switch flicked and it made me happy enough to want to live,” she said. “It saved my life.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>‘There Is No Place Where We Say Kaiser Is Exempt’\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In 2008, Congress passed a landmark federal law aimed at correcting imbalances in how insurers covered mental health treatments compared to physical health, later reinforced by the Affordable Care Act in 2010. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/stateofhealth/series/state-of-mind\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">insurers found loopholes\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, creating overly restrictive or self-serving criteria that made it easy to deny services, and as a result, save money.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">California’s new law, \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=201920200SB855\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Senate Bill 855\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, is aimed at tightening those loopholes, and has been \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.statnews.com/2020/10/14/new-california-law-should-serve-as-a-national-model-for-mental-health-care-reform/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">hailed by advocates as a national model\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> for mental health reform. It requires health plans to use clinically based, expert-recognized criteria and guidelines in making medical decisions, with the goal of limiting arbitrary or cost-driven denials. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Kaiser raises questions about how precisely the new law applies to them, given its unique integrated structure, where doctors make determinations about what is medically necessary rather than the health plan side of the organization. Kaiser’s Dr. Koshy said SB 855’s requirement to comply with generally accepted standards of care “does not apply” to its brexanolone recommendations because they were developed and are used by doctors, not plan administrators. (When KQED asked Kaiser to provide the brexanolone policy its health plan uses, it said it didn’t have one.)\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“We 100% intended this law to apply to the care people get at Kaiser,” said Julie Snyder, government affairs director at \u003ca href=\"https://steinberginstitute.org/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">the Steinberg Institute\u003c/a>, which co-sponsored the law. “There is no place where we say Kaiser is exempt.” \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postID=stateofhealth_185796,stateofhealth_193386,stateofhealth_191734 label='Related Coverage']\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Doctors at Kaiser have historically been “gatekeepers” for services in the system, said \u003ca href=\"https://psych-appeal.com/meiram-bendat-attorney-founder/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Meiram Bendat\u003c/a>, an attorney and licensed psychotherapist who also advised on the law. It doesn’t matter if practice recommendations for brexanolone were written by doctors or administrators, or whether the recommendations are mandatory or optional – Bendat says they must be compliant with the law. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“If it’s inconsistent with generally accepted standards of care, then it has no place in California,” he said.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Some of Kaiser’s recommended criteria for brexanolone are aligned with generally accepted standards of care; for example, reserving the drug for women who are six months or less postpartum, which was a criterion used in the \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.fda.gov/media/121348/download\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">clinical trials the FDA relied on when it approved the drug\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But the recommendation to try four or five alternative treatments before considering brexanolone conflicts with the judgment of half a dozen women’s health experts interviewed for this story. They say there just isn’t enough time in the postpartum period. And there’s too much at stake. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Not only are babies at risk of developmental and emotional problems if their mother is depressed, \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://neurosciencenews.com/paternal-anxiety-18177/#:~:text=Summary%3A%20A%20new%20study%20reports,this%20period%20was%20under%204%25.\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">husbands and partners are also at higher risk for depression and anxiety\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. And because new moms are learning to breastfeed, and figuring out what’s part of the new normal and what’s not, it can take months just to recognize there’s a problem, said UNC’s Riah Patterson.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“It takes so long for this illness to come to recognition and for someone to actually get into an appointment and actually be seen by a provider,” she said.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11879416\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11879416\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Riah-Patterson.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1436\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Riah-Patterson.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Riah-Patterson-800x598.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Riah-Patterson-1020x763.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Riah-Patterson-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Riah-Patterson-1536x1149.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Dr. Riah Patterson discusses patients and treatment plans with her trainee, a third-year psychiatry resident at the Center for Women’s Mood Disorders at UNC-Chapel Hill. \u003ccite>(Courtesy Riah Patterson)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Indeed, the FDA fast-tracked the approval of brexanolone in part because of how quickly it worked, allowing women to feel better and get back to their families in three days.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“It’s new, it’s promising,” said Kaiser’s Koshy, but, she added, “it’s not a benign medication.” \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.fda.gov/media/121348/download\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Six women in the clinical trials experienced loss or near loss of consciousness,\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> which is why the FDA requires women to be continuously monitored in certified health centers when getting the infusion. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Also, the safety and efficacy data is limited, Koshy said. The clinical trials only compared brexanolone to placebo, not to alternative treatments. So while the data show brexanolone works better than nothing, there’s no data on whether it works better than Zoloft or electroconvulsive therapy. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Koshy says Kaiser is always reviewing practice recommendations as new evidence becomes available, but also acknowledged that Kaiser’s recommendations for brexanolone have not been updated since they were first developed two years ago, in July 2019. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It is unclear what role the \u003ca href=\"https://dmhc.ca.gov/\">Department of Managed Health Care\u003c/a>, the state agency that regulates Kaiser, will play in resolving these questions. In a statement, the department said it will review any criteria or guidelines the Kaiser health plan uses for brexanolone, but said it does not have jurisdiction over physician decisions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The DMHC also monitors patient complaints around new medications and treatments in order to identify problems with access to care. So far, \u003ca href=\"https://wpso.dmhc.ca.gov/imr/\">the DMHC has published two complaints about brexanolone in its public database\u003c/a> – both were filed by Kaiser patients.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.benefitscafe.com/insurance-companies/kaiserpermanente/\"> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Kaiser is the \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">largest insurer in California\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. It holds a 40% share of the market, covering 6.1 million patients. But at UC Davis, where Kaiser says it sends all patients who need brexanolone in Northern California, Kaiser patients are only 15% of those who got the drug, according to \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://health.ucdavis.edu/team/search/1499/shannon-clark---obstetrics-and-gynecology-sacramento\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Dr. Shannon Clark\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, a psychiatrist and OB-GYN overseeing the treatments. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">She says of the 13 women who’ve been treated at UC Davis in the last two years, only two were from Kaiser. One was Muñoz, who was approved only after the state intervened. The other was Whitney Worthington. Both women canceled their coverage with Kaiser over the postpartum mental health care they received.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Marcus Worthington, husband of Whitney Worthington\"]‘The only thing that changed was that we were able to stir up enough dirt and I was able to pitch a big enough fit … It finally got on somebody’s radar who wasn’t going to ignore it.’[/pullquote]\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Worthington struggled with depression for most of her adult life, but when she decided to get pregnant, she got help from her psychiatrist and therapist to wean off her antidepressant. It was a grueling withdrawal process. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“That was the worst two months of my life,” she said. “Feeling suicidal at times. It was just miserable.” \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">She knew then that if she got depressed after her baby was born, she did not want to take medication because she wanted to have more children and didn’t want to go through withdrawal again. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">When she ended up in the Kaiser ER with suicidal thoughts a few weeks after giving birth, she had to repeatedly decline offers — even threats — of medication. She saw a series of providers at two Kaiser hospitals and several told her she needed brexanolone. One said “it was her only hope.” \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But Worthington was also told by other Kaiser providers that it wasn’t necessary, that Kaiser didn’t offer it at all, and that cost was an issue. The official denial that came from Kaiser’s billing department offered no reason, said Marcus Worthington, Whitney’s husband. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">He spent weeks on the phone with multiple Kaiser representatives, fighting, negotiating and pleading, until a high-level administrator stepped in and personally approved it. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“The only thing that changed was that we were able to stir up enough dirt and I was able to pitch a big enough fit,” said Marcus, who is Latino and Native American. “I have a relatively Anglo-Saxon name and Whitney is a young white woman. Frankly, I think it all plays in that it finally got on somebody’s radar who wasn’t going to ignore it.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">After getting the treatment at UC Davis, Whitney says she could think clearly again and truly enjoy the last two months of maternity leave she had with her daughter. She called brexanolone “a total miracle.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>‘This Is How You Treat Postpartum Mental Health?’\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Kaiser said it cannot comment on any individual cases because of privacy laws, but said generally, “We feel deep compassion for any patient experiencing the difficult and serious effects of postpartum depression, and our goal is always to support every patient’s safe return to a healthy mental state.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">When Miriam McDonald called Kaiser’s grievance department to complain about her treatment, Kaiser sent the cops to her house for a welfare check.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The officers were calm and nice, McDonald said, but when she closed the door, she cried her eyes out.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“It just brought me to a whole new low,” she said. “Why didn’t my doctor call me and talk to me first? I mean, this is how you treat postpartum mental health? How dare\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">you.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">McDonald also appealed Kaiser’s denial of brexanolone to state regulators, \u003ca href=\"https://www.2020mom.org/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">with help from advocates at 2020 Mom\u003c/a>, but by the time she got there, the clock had already run out. She was past the six-month postpartum cutoff. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">She never got brexanolone.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Still, she continued to fight for relief and eventually got Kaiser to cover a different treatment called \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.mayoclinic.org/tests-procedures/transcranial-magnetic-stimulation/about/pac-20384625\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">transcranial magnetic stimulation\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, which uses an electromagnetic coil to stimulate nerve cells in the brain that control mood.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11879420\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11879420\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Out-of-the-fog.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1440\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Out-of-the-fog.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Out-of-the-fog-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Out-of-the-fog-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Out-of-the-fog-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Out-of-the-fog-1536x1152.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Miriam McDonald said she is finally feeling like herself again, a year and a half after her son’s birth. \u003ccite>(Courtesy Miriam McDonald)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>McDonald had to go five days a week for three months. Now, more than a year and a half after having her baby, she is finally feeling like herself again.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“I can remember I woke up one day and I was excited. I had actual joy,” she remembers. “I got up and I walked into his room and I was like, ‘Hey, Nico! Hi! Hey, baby!’ And he jumped up from his crib and giggled and put his arms out. And I just swooped him up in my arms and cried. Because I was like, ‘I am so proud to be your mom.’ ”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Now when her son smiles at her, she genuinely smiles back. But she can’t help but grieve all the smiles she didn’t return. How she felt like she was barely there when her son took his first steps.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“I felt like I’ve been robbed really of all those moments,” she said, “of those little milestones, that I’m never going to get back.” \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"excerpt": "Kaiser's practices around the new drug, brexanolone, may run afoul of a new California law designed to limit unfair denials of mental health treatment.",
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"title": "There's Only 1 Drug for Postpartum Depression. Why Does Kaiser Permanente Make It So Hard to Get? | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class=\"utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__dropcapShortcode__dropcap\">W\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>hen Miriam McDonald decided she wanted to have another baby at age 44, her doctor told her she had a better chance of winning the lottery. So when she got pregnant, she and her husband were thrilled. But within three days of giving birth to their son, everything turned.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was thinking, ‘Oh my God, what did I do?’ I just brought this baby into this world and I can barely take care of myself right now,” she said. “I feel exhausted. I haven’t slept in three days. I haven’t really eaten in three days.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As the weeks went by, her depression got worse. She felt sad, but also indifferent. She didn’t want to hold her baby, she didn’t want to change him. She said she felt no connection with him at all.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This confused her – she never felt anything like this after her first two kids – and she worried her mood might hurt her son. \u003ca href=\"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4113321/#R2\">Untreated postpartum depression can affect babies’ cognitive and social development\u003c/a>. For the mother, it can be life or death. \u003ca href=\"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4113321/\">Suicide accounts for 20% of maternal deaths\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Every day, I was crying. Every day, I felt like I just wanted to die. Every day, I thought about ending my life,” said McDonald, who is Latina and works at UC Davis as an IT professional.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">She went to Kaiser Permanente, her health care provider, for help. She said they put her on a merry-go-round of medication trial and error. The first drug her doctor prescribed made her anxious. The second drug gave her horrific nightmares. A third drug gave her auditory and visual hallucinations that took seven weeks to go away. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Then, her doctor retired. And when McDonald complained to her new doctor that she was still depressed four months after giving birth, the physician suggested more medications.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was desperate,” McDonald said. “I was like, ‘I’m trying to help myself, but things are just getting worse.’ So what am I left with?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">She started doing her own research and learned about a new treatment called brexanolone. It’s \u003ca href=\"https://www.fda.gov/news-events/press-announcements/fda-approves-first-treatment-post-partum-depression\">the \u003c/a>\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">first and only drug\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to treat postpartum depression, which \u003ca href=\"https://www.americashealthrankings.org/explore/health-of-women-and-children/measure/postpartum_depression/state/CA\">affects \u003c/a>\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">1 out of 8 new mothers\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> in California. Instead of targeting the serotonin system in the brain, like most antidepressants, brexanolone works by rebalancing the stress hormones that can get out of kilter after having a baby. It’s delivered through an IV infusion over 2 1/2 days in the hospital. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">clinical trials\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, \u003ca href=\"https://www.fda.gov/media/121348/download\">75% of women who got brexanolone started to feel better\u003c/a> immediately after the three-day treatment. Half the women went into complete remission.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">McDonald wanted to try it. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11879318\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2560px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11879318\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/trying-to-smile-1-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1920\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/trying-to-smile-1-scaled.jpg 2560w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/trying-to-smile-1-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/trying-to-smile-1-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/trying-to-smile-1-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/trying-to-smile-1-1536x1152.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/trying-to-smile-1-2048x1536.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/trying-to-smile-1-1920x1440.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">For the first year of her son’s life, Miriam McDonald says all her smiles were fake or strained. \u003ccite>(Courtesy Miriam McDonald)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“People walk out of the hospital, wanting to be with their child, wanting to return home,” said \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.med.unc.edu/psych/directory/riah-patterson/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Dr. Riah Patterson\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, who has been treating women with brexanolone at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill since it became available in summer 2019. “There is a hopefulness, a brightness. You can really see that transformation in the hospital room over those 60 hours. It’s pretty miraculous.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">When McDonald asked her doctor for brexanolone, she said no. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In an email, she said the existing studies were “not very impressive.” She told McDonald that she didn’t meet Kaiser’s criteria for the drug: She would have had to try and fail four medications and electroconvulsive therapy before she could try brexanolone. And all this had to happen within six months of having her baby, or she couldn’t try it at all.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>How could anyone qualify, McDonald wondered?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“This is crazy. By the time you even try one drug, that’s like four weeks out,” she said. “Another drug is four weeks out, another drug is four weeks out. There’s just no way.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "‘If Kaiser is making it effectively impossible to get a particular, important mental health treatment, that could definitely be a violation of our parity law.’",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Kaiser’s guidance is an outlier. KQED analyzed guidelines from a dozen health plans operating in California. Three of them require women to fail one medication before trying brexanolone. One plan – the state’s Medi-Cal program for low-income women – requires two fails. But Kaiser is the only system KQED found that recommends women first fail four drugs.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“That’s absurd,” said UNC’s Patterson, one of several experts in postpartum depression who, in turn, called Kaiser’s guidance “ridiculous,” “harsh,” “abusive” and “insane.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It may also be illegal. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Under a \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=201920200SB855\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">new state law that took effect in January\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> , health plans must conform to “generally accepted standards of care,” including nonprofit guidelines, scientific literature and expert consensus, when making decisions about mental health treatment.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“If Kaiser is making it effectively impossible to get a particular, important mental health treatment, that could definitely be a violation of our parity law,” said state Sen. Scott Wiener, D-San Francisco, the bill’s author. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Kaiser says it always follows the law. It says its integrated structure makes it different from traditional insurers. At Kaiser, a patient’s doctor determines whether a medication is necessary, not the health plan, and the criteria doctors use are recommendations, not requirements or prerequisites that patients need to “exhaust,” said Dr. Maria Koshy, Kaiser’s chair of psychiatry for Northern California. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“At the end of the day, this is an individual clinical decision by both the provider – the physician – and the patient,” she said.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But former Kaiser clinicians and legislative experts familiar with Kaiser’s model say the culture around these recommendations is to follow them. Doctors get questioned or can face consequences if they don’t, said Wiener.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>‘It Saved My Life’\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">McDonald’s physician followed the criteria as if they were prerequisites when she declined to prescribe brexanolone. Kaiser’s grievance department sent a letter to another woman, Yesenia Muñoz, denying brexanolone because she had not failed enough medications.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“When I talked to the caseworker at Kaiser that had denied the medication, he said that Zulresso was very expensive,” said Muñoz, referring to brexanolone’s brand name.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Brexanolone treatment costs $34,000 for the medication, plus the cost of the three-day hospital stay, which can tack on another $30,000, at least. Kaiser is not yet certified to administer the treatment in-house, so it must pay outside hospitals to provide it. It says it has plans to eventually open three of its own certified centers.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Muñoz was devastated by the denial. She was overwhelmed by postpartum depression and anxiety shortly after her daughter was born and, as a Latina, she said she was hesitant to seek help at first. When she did, none of the medications or therapies Kaiser offered her worked. She still felt suicidal.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“I could get out the door sometimes and take the stroller and go walk, and my mind kept on saying, ‘If you just step in front of the car, it’s all going to go away,’ ” she remembers.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Muñoz got help from family and co-workers to appeal Kaiser’s decision to the state, and after reviewing her medical records, regulators ordered Kaiser to pay for the brexanolone treatment.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Muñoz went to UC Davis Medical Center to get it, and she started feeling better within the first day.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11879428\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11879428\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/MunozAndBaby.jpg\" alt=\"Yesenia smiling holding baby\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1760\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/MunozAndBaby.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/MunozAndBaby-800x733.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/MunozAndBaby-1020x935.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/MunozAndBaby-160x147.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/MunozAndBaby-1536x1408.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">After Yesenia Muñoz received brexanolone to treat her postpartum depression, she felt blessed, connected with her daughter and ‘happy enough to want to live.’ \u003ccite>(Courtesy Yesenia Munoz)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“The nurse came in and she said something funny and I laughed,” Muñoz said. “It was the first time I had laughed in so long.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">She started looking through photos and videos of her daughter on her phone and she says it was like she was experiencing those moments for the first time. She started making plans for the future. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“It was like a switch flicked and it made me happy enough to want to live,” she said. “It saved my life.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>‘There Is No Place Where We Say Kaiser Is Exempt’\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In 2008, Congress passed a landmark federal law aimed at correcting imbalances in how insurers covered mental health treatments compared to physical health, later reinforced by the Affordable Care Act in 2010. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/stateofhealth/series/state-of-mind\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">insurers found loopholes\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, creating overly restrictive or self-serving criteria that made it easy to deny services, and as a result, save money.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">California’s new law, \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=201920200SB855\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Senate Bill 855\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, is aimed at tightening those loopholes, and has been \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.statnews.com/2020/10/14/new-california-law-should-serve-as-a-national-model-for-mental-health-care-reform/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">hailed by advocates as a national model\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> for mental health reform. It requires health plans to use clinically based, expert-recognized criteria and guidelines in making medical decisions, with the goal of limiting arbitrary or cost-driven denials. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Kaiser raises questions about how precisely the new law applies to them, given its unique integrated structure, where doctors make determinations about what is medically necessary rather than the health plan side of the organization. Kaiser’s Dr. Koshy said SB 855’s requirement to comply with generally accepted standards of care “does not apply” to its brexanolone recommendations because they were developed and are used by doctors, not plan administrators. (When KQED asked Kaiser to provide the brexanolone policy its health plan uses, it said it didn’t have one.)\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“We 100% intended this law to apply to the care people get at Kaiser,” said Julie Snyder, government affairs director at \u003ca href=\"https://steinberginstitute.org/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">the Steinberg Institute\u003c/a>, which co-sponsored the law. “There is no place where we say Kaiser is exempt.” \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Doctors at Kaiser have historically been “gatekeepers” for services in the system, said \u003ca href=\"https://psych-appeal.com/meiram-bendat-attorney-founder/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Meiram Bendat\u003c/a>, an attorney and licensed psychotherapist who also advised on the law. It doesn’t matter if practice recommendations for brexanolone were written by doctors or administrators, or whether the recommendations are mandatory or optional – Bendat says they must be compliant with the law. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“If it’s inconsistent with generally accepted standards of care, then it has no place in California,” he said.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Some of Kaiser’s recommended criteria for brexanolone are aligned with generally accepted standards of care; for example, reserving the drug for women who are six months or less postpartum, which was a criterion used in the \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.fda.gov/media/121348/download\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">clinical trials the FDA relied on when it approved the drug\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But the recommendation to try four or five alternative treatments before considering brexanolone conflicts with the judgment of half a dozen women’s health experts interviewed for this story. They say there just isn’t enough time in the postpartum period. And there’s too much at stake. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Not only are babies at risk of developmental and emotional problems if their mother is depressed, \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://neurosciencenews.com/paternal-anxiety-18177/#:~:text=Summary%3A%20A%20new%20study%20reports,this%20period%20was%20under%204%25.\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">husbands and partners are also at higher risk for depression and anxiety\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. And because new moms are learning to breastfeed, and figuring out what’s part of the new normal and what’s not, it can take months just to recognize there’s a problem, said UNC’s Riah Patterson.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“It takes so long for this illness to come to recognition and for someone to actually get into an appointment and actually be seen by a provider,” she said.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11879416\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11879416\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Riah-Patterson.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1436\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Riah-Patterson.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Riah-Patterson-800x598.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Riah-Patterson-1020x763.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Riah-Patterson-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Riah-Patterson-1536x1149.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Dr. Riah Patterson discusses patients and treatment plans with her trainee, a third-year psychiatry resident at the Center for Women’s Mood Disorders at UNC-Chapel Hill. \u003ccite>(Courtesy Riah Patterson)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Indeed, the FDA fast-tracked the approval of brexanolone in part because of how quickly it worked, allowing women to feel better and get back to their families in three days.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“It’s new, it’s promising,” said Kaiser’s Koshy, but, she added, “it’s not a benign medication.” \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.fda.gov/media/121348/download\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Six women in the clinical trials experienced loss or near loss of consciousness,\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> which is why the FDA requires women to be continuously monitored in certified health centers when getting the infusion. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Also, the safety and efficacy data is limited, Koshy said. The clinical trials only compared brexanolone to placebo, not to alternative treatments. So while the data show brexanolone works better than nothing, there’s no data on whether it works better than Zoloft or electroconvulsive therapy. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Koshy says Kaiser is always reviewing practice recommendations as new evidence becomes available, but also acknowledged that Kaiser’s recommendations for brexanolone have not been updated since they were first developed two years ago, in July 2019. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It is unclear what role the \u003ca href=\"https://dmhc.ca.gov/\">Department of Managed Health Care\u003c/a>, the state agency that regulates Kaiser, will play in resolving these questions. In a statement, the department said it will review any criteria or guidelines the Kaiser health plan uses for brexanolone, but said it does not have jurisdiction over physician decisions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The DMHC also monitors patient complaints around new medications and treatments in order to identify problems with access to care. So far, \u003ca href=\"https://wpso.dmhc.ca.gov/imr/\">the DMHC has published two complaints about brexanolone in its public database\u003c/a> – both were filed by Kaiser patients.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.benefitscafe.com/insurance-companies/kaiserpermanente/\"> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Kaiser is the \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">largest insurer in California\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. It holds a 40% share of the market, covering 6.1 million patients. But at UC Davis, where Kaiser says it sends all patients who need brexanolone in Northern California, Kaiser patients are only 15% of those who got the drug, according to \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://health.ucdavis.edu/team/search/1499/shannon-clark---obstetrics-and-gynecology-sacramento\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Dr. Shannon Clark\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, a psychiatrist and OB-GYN overseeing the treatments. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">She says of the 13 women who’ve been treated at UC Davis in the last two years, only two were from Kaiser. One was Muñoz, who was approved only after the state intervened. The other was Whitney Worthington. Both women canceled their coverage with Kaiser over the postpartum mental health care they received.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "‘The only thing that changed was that we were able to stir up enough dirt and I was able to pitch a big enough fit … It finally got on somebody’s radar who wasn’t going to ignore it.’",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Worthington struggled with depression for most of her adult life, but when she decided to get pregnant, she got help from her psychiatrist and therapist to wean off her antidepressant. It was a grueling withdrawal process. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“That was the worst two months of my life,” she said. “Feeling suicidal at times. It was just miserable.” \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">She knew then that if she got depressed after her baby was born, she did not want to take medication because she wanted to have more children and didn’t want to go through withdrawal again. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">When she ended up in the Kaiser ER with suicidal thoughts a few weeks after giving birth, she had to repeatedly decline offers — even threats — of medication. She saw a series of providers at two Kaiser hospitals and several told her she needed brexanolone. One said “it was her only hope.” \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But Worthington was also told by other Kaiser providers that it wasn’t necessary, that Kaiser didn’t offer it at all, and that cost was an issue. The official denial that came from Kaiser’s billing department offered no reason, said Marcus Worthington, Whitney’s husband. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">He spent weeks on the phone with multiple Kaiser representatives, fighting, negotiating and pleading, until a high-level administrator stepped in and personally approved it. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“The only thing that changed was that we were able to stir up enough dirt and I was able to pitch a big enough fit,” said Marcus, who is Latino and Native American. “I have a relatively Anglo-Saxon name and Whitney is a young white woman. Frankly, I think it all plays in that it finally got on somebody’s radar who wasn’t going to ignore it.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">After getting the treatment at UC Davis, Whitney says she could think clearly again and truly enjoy the last two months of maternity leave she had with her daughter. She called brexanolone “a total miracle.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>‘This Is How You Treat Postpartum Mental Health?’\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Kaiser said it cannot comment on any individual cases because of privacy laws, but said generally, “We feel deep compassion for any patient experiencing the difficult and serious effects of postpartum depression, and our goal is always to support every patient’s safe return to a healthy mental state.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">When Miriam McDonald called Kaiser’s grievance department to complain about her treatment, Kaiser sent the cops to her house for a welfare check.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The officers were calm and nice, McDonald said, but when she closed the door, she cried her eyes out.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“It just brought me to a whole new low,” she said. “Why didn’t my doctor call me and talk to me first? I mean, this is how you treat postpartum mental health? How dare\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">you.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">McDonald also appealed Kaiser’s denial of brexanolone to state regulators, \u003ca href=\"https://www.2020mom.org/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">with help from advocates at 2020 Mom\u003c/a>, but by the time she got there, the clock had already run out. She was past the six-month postpartum cutoff. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">She never got brexanolone.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Still, she continued to fight for relief and eventually got Kaiser to cover a different treatment called \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.mayoclinic.org/tests-procedures/transcranial-magnetic-stimulation/about/pac-20384625\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">transcranial magnetic stimulation\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, which uses an electromagnetic coil to stimulate nerve cells in the brain that control mood.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11879420\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11879420\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Out-of-the-fog.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1440\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Out-of-the-fog.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Out-of-the-fog-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Out-of-the-fog-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Out-of-the-fog-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Out-of-the-fog-1536x1152.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Miriam McDonald said she is finally feeling like herself again, a year and a half after her son’s birth. \u003ccite>(Courtesy Miriam McDonald)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>McDonald had to go five days a week for three months. Now, more than a year and a half after having her baby, she is finally feeling like herself again.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“I can remember I woke up one day and I was excited. I had actual joy,” she remembers. “I got up and I walked into his room and I was like, ‘Hey, Nico! Hi! Hey, baby!’ And he jumped up from his crib and giggled and put his arms out. And I just swooped him up in my arms and cried. Because I was like, ‘I am so proud to be your mom.’ ”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Now when her son smiles at her, she genuinely smiles back. But she can’t help but grieve all the smiles she didn’t return. How she felt like she was barely there when her son took his first steps.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“I felt like I’ve been robbed really of all those moments,” she said, “of those little milestones, that I’m never going to get back.” \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"slug": "some-disabled-californians-feel-abandoned-by-newsoms-golden-state-stimulus",
"title": "Some Disabled Californians Feel Abandoned by Newsom’s Golden State Stimulus",
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"headTitle": "Some Disabled Californians Feel Abandoned by Newsom’s Golden State Stimulus | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003cem>Lea este artículo en \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/calmatters-en-espanol/2021/06/algunos-californianos-discapacitados-se-sienten-abandonados-por-el-estimulo-golden-state-de-newsom/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">español\u003c/a>.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A $600 check would go a long way for Janet Clendenin.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The costs of the sugar-free foods she buys to manage her diabetes have risen sharply in South Lake Tahoe during the pandemic, Clendenin said. She usually has to crisscross the picturesque region by bus to find discounts at Dollar Tree, Grocery Outlet and Walmart.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So when she learned about Gov. Gavin Newsom’s plan to send $600 payments to the lowest-income Californians in February, Clendenin felt relief.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Charis Hill, disability activist\"]‘It’s really hard to see and read coverage of Newsom touting how great this is for middle-class people.’[/pullquote]Then came frustration.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Clendenin scoured the news for \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/california-divide/2021/02/california-golden-state-stimulus-600-check/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">details on eligibility\u003c/a>. She learned that she could have qualified if she worked in 2020. But a constellation of diabetes, arthritis, migraines, back injuries and nerve pain made work impossible about six years ago. Given her disabilities, she could also have qualified if only she received Supplemental Security Income, a federal safety-net program for elderly, blind and disabled people with limited income.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But nowhere could Clendenin find mention of Social Security Disability Insurance, the other main federal program for people with disabilities, which sends her $1,056 a month.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I couldn’t believe that we were left out,” said Clendenin. “How unfair is that?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s a sentiment shared by many Californians on federal disability insurance, who have asked why Newsom’s stimulus payments skipped them over.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While California lawmakers automatically sent checks to 1.2 million people who receive SSI, the 1.2 million Californians on SSDI only qualify if they had income from work in 2020. But that’s rare — \u003ca href=\"https://www.cbpp.org/research/social-security/paul-n-van-de-water-promoting-opportunity-for-social-security-disability\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">research shows\u003c/a> that \u003ca href=\"https://www.ssa.gov/disabilityresearch/documents/TTW5_Brief_2_DIcohort_REV2.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">fewer than 1 in 5 SSDI recipients work during a typical year\u003c/a>, often because they are limited by their disabilities or risk losing their benefits if they work too much.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postID=\"news_11860924\" hero=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/02/RS47239_001_SanFrancisco_HenryZhang_02162021-qut-1020x680.jpg\"]Disability advocates say it’s the latest example of the state abandoning some of its most vulnerable residents during the pandemic, after having directed medical health providers to \u003ca href=\"https://www.sacbee.com/article243474286.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">ration COVID-19 care to elderly and less-healthy people\u003c/a> last spring and \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/health/coronavirus/2021/02/covid-advisory-group-rejects-higher-vaccine-priority-for-disabled-californians-and-those-with-chronic-conditions/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">deprioritize people with disabilities for vaccines\u003c/a> earlier this year — both policies that were \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/health/coronavirus/2021/02/california-shifts-priorities-vaccine-chronic-conditions/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">reversed after considerable outcry\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Overall the state has been uneven in how it’s helped people with disabilities navigate the pandemic,” said Andrew Imparato, executive director of Disability Rights California. “A lot of people with disabilities have had to fend for themselves.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Department of Finance spokesperson H.D. Palmer cites logistical challenges. California maintains an up-to-date list of residents who get SSI \u003ca href=\"https://www.cdss.ca.gov/inforesources/ssi-ssp\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">because the state supplements the federal benefit by a few hundred dollars\u003c/a>, but doesn’t have access to the same information for SSDI.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Trying to include SSDI … would be a time-consuming and laborious process with the feds that doesn’t line up with the intent of (the Golden State Stimulus) — to get immediate relief to Californians with whom we have an existing relationship,” Palmer wrote in an email.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>‘Make Hard Decisions Quickly’\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>The Newsom administration may have also based the decision on a consideration of need.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>California’s \u003ca href=\"https://calbudgetcenter.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/CA-Budget-Center-SSI-SSP-IB_Chart-4.-SSP-Individual-Grant-Up-to-FPL-Bar-Chart.png\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">SSI recipients live in poverty by definition\u003c/a>. Elderly, blind and disabled people can only qualify if they have extremely low income and wealth, and they typically receive just $954.72 per month.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On the other hand, people with sufficient work history can qualify for monthly SSDI payments based on their former wages, with the \u003ca href=\"https://www.ssa.gov/OACT/ProgData/icp.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">average national benefit at $1,280\u003c/a> per month.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Still, California’s SSDI recipients often face steep financial challenges. They are more than twice as likely to live in poverty compared to the rest of the population, according to calculations by Andrew Houtenville, an economist at the Institute on Disability at the University of New Hampshire. And people with disabilities often have to cover expensive medical equipment, appointments with specialists and drugs out-of-pocket.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Imparato acknowledged that the state was “trying to make hard decisions quickly” but “including everyone on SSDI probably would have been a more equitable thing to do than excluding them because you don’t have access to their program or because it’s not a means-tested program.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There are some signs that lawmakers could still include SSDI recipients. Newsom’s proposed expansion of the Golden State Stimulus still requires approval from state legislators. Though they passed a placeholder budget to meet a June 15 deadline, state lawmakers continue to disagree with Newsom over how much surplus money the state has at its disposal and how to spend it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>According to a legislative staffer familiar with ongoing budget negotiations, some members of the Legislature are pushing the Newsom administration to expand eligibility for the Golden State Stimulus payments to Californians on SSDI, among other groups.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>The Evolution of the Golden State Stimulus\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Eligibility for Newsom’s Golden State Stimulus has gone through several twists and turns. In January, \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/california-divide/2021/01/newsom-wants-extra-600-stimulus-for-low-wage-californians/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Newsom announced a $2.4 billion plan to send $600 Golden State Stimulus checks\u003c/a> to approximately 4 million low-income workers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postID=news_11874637 hero='https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/05/RS49132_013_SanFrancisco_MEDADairoRomero_05192021-qut-1020x680.jpg']By February, with the \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/GavinNewsom/status/1357089574288117760?s=20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">state’s revenue estimates swelling\u003c/a>, the Legislature negotiated and approved an even more generous \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/california-divide/2021/02/california-600-stimulus-checks-undocumented-workers/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">$3.8 billion stimulus payment plan that included extra aid for undocumented workers\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Under this plan, the state also sent $600 payments to certain Californians living in poverty — regardless of whether they work. That included very low-income families with children enrolled in CalWORKs, as well as recipients of SSI or the state’s alternative for some immigrant groups, known as the \u003ca href=\"https://www.cdss.ca.gov/inforesources/cash-assistance-for-immigrants\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Cash Assistance Program for Immigrants\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It took Charis Hill several days of searching online and contacting their state assemblymember to discover that they did not automatically qualify. A Sacramento-based disability activist who lives on $1,027 per month from SSDI, Hill eventually deduced that they could qualify not because they were disabled, but rather because they had done freelance writing and speaking last year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Hill would have to file taxes, something they hadn’t done in years because their earned income is far below the filing requirement. They decided it was worth it. Their expenses have jumped during the pandemic, especially as they’ve opted for grocery deliveries instead of shopping in stores because they are immunocompromised.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Hill said that, unlike many disabled people, they were fortunate to have internet access and a friend who could help them file their taxes. They were lucky to be able to work last year despite experiencing constant pain and fatigue from an inflammatory condition called axial spondyloarthritis. But, they said, it’s wrong that the Golden State Stimulus program is “basing a disabled person’s value on their ability to work.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11879468\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11879468\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/20210620_CalMatters_CharisHill_0075_A-scaled-1-800x533.jpeg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"533\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/20210620_CalMatters_CharisHill_0075_A-scaled-1-800x533.jpeg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/20210620_CalMatters_CharisHill_0075_A-scaled-1-1020x680.jpeg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/20210620_CalMatters_CharisHill_0075_A-scaled-1-160x107.jpeg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/20210620_CalMatters_CharisHill_0075_A-scaled-1-1536x1024.jpeg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/20210620_CalMatters_CharisHill_0075_A-scaled-1.jpeg 1568w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Charis Hill, a disability activist based in Sacramento, was able to get the Golden State Stimulus because they did some freelance work in 2020. But Hill says that it’s unfair that most Californians receiving federal disability insurance don’t currently qualify. \u003ccite>(Salgu Wissmath/CalMatters)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>When Newsom proposed a \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/california-divide/2021/05/newsom-proposes-expanding-golden-state-stimulus-to-middle-class/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">second round of Golden State stimulus payments aimed at California’s middle class\u003c/a> in May, Hill was hopeful that other SSDI recipients would finally be able to benefit, too. However, as the details of Newsom’s plan emerged, there was still no mention of SSDI recipients.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s really hard to see and read coverage of Newsom touting how great this is for middle-class people,” said Hill, when people with disabilities are “some of the most impoverished people in the whole country.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Financial Burden Can Fall to Caretakers\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Sydney Chandler manages the finances and health care of her cousin, Chris Batiste, who is paralyzed. Batiste breathes through an apparatus and communicates with Chandler through a laptop, blinks and head movements.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside label=\"related coverage\" tag=\"disability-rights\"]Chandler, who is a Los Angeles-based writer, said she was livid to learn that SSDI recipients were left out of the state stimulus. To her, it was just another obstacle in the arbitrary and bureaucratic maze that people with disabilities face in trying to attain a liveable income.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Caretakers often carry a significant financial burden. Batiste receives $975 per month in SSDI, and Chandler said she contributes over $1,000 more each month to help cover his rent and full-time nursing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If it wasn’t for me, he would be one of the homeless,” Chandler said, “and you’re telling me that you couldn’t set up a portal for SSDI (recipients) to input their information?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This article is part of the California Divide, a collaboration among newsrooms examining income inequality and economic survival in California.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"title": "Some Disabled Californians Feel Abandoned by Newsom’s Golden State Stimulus | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cem>Lea este artículo en \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/calmatters-en-espanol/2021/06/algunos-californianos-discapacitados-se-sienten-abandonados-por-el-estimulo-golden-state-de-newsom/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">español\u003c/a>.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A $600 check would go a long way for Janet Clendenin.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The costs of the sugar-free foods she buys to manage her diabetes have risen sharply in South Lake Tahoe during the pandemic, Clendenin said. She usually has to crisscross the picturesque region by bus to find discounts at Dollar Tree, Grocery Outlet and Walmart.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So when she learned about Gov. Gavin Newsom’s plan to send $600 payments to the lowest-income Californians in February, Clendenin felt relief.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Then came frustration.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Clendenin scoured the news for \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/california-divide/2021/02/california-golden-state-stimulus-600-check/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">details on eligibility\u003c/a>. She learned that she could have qualified if she worked in 2020. But a constellation of diabetes, arthritis, migraines, back injuries and nerve pain made work impossible about six years ago. Given her disabilities, she could also have qualified if only she received Supplemental Security Income, a federal safety-net program for elderly, blind and disabled people with limited income.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But nowhere could Clendenin find mention of Social Security Disability Insurance, the other main federal program for people with disabilities, which sends her $1,056 a month.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I couldn’t believe that we were left out,” said Clendenin. “How unfair is that?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s a sentiment shared by many Californians on federal disability insurance, who have asked why Newsom’s stimulus payments skipped them over.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While California lawmakers automatically sent checks to 1.2 million people who receive SSI, the 1.2 million Californians on SSDI only qualify if they had income from work in 2020. But that’s rare — \u003ca href=\"https://www.cbpp.org/research/social-security/paul-n-van-de-water-promoting-opportunity-for-social-security-disability\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">research shows\u003c/a> that \u003ca href=\"https://www.ssa.gov/disabilityresearch/documents/TTW5_Brief_2_DIcohort_REV2.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">fewer than 1 in 5 SSDI recipients work during a typical year\u003c/a>, often because they are limited by their disabilities or risk losing their benefits if they work too much.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Disability advocates say it’s the latest example of the state abandoning some of its most vulnerable residents during the pandemic, after having directed medical health providers to \u003ca href=\"https://www.sacbee.com/article243474286.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">ration COVID-19 care to elderly and less-healthy people\u003c/a> last spring and \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/health/coronavirus/2021/02/covid-advisory-group-rejects-higher-vaccine-priority-for-disabled-californians-and-those-with-chronic-conditions/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">deprioritize people with disabilities for vaccines\u003c/a> earlier this year — both policies that were \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/health/coronavirus/2021/02/california-shifts-priorities-vaccine-chronic-conditions/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">reversed after considerable outcry\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Overall the state has been uneven in how it’s helped people with disabilities navigate the pandemic,” said Andrew Imparato, executive director of Disability Rights California. “A lot of people with disabilities have had to fend for themselves.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Department of Finance spokesperson H.D. Palmer cites logistical challenges. California maintains an up-to-date list of residents who get SSI \u003ca href=\"https://www.cdss.ca.gov/inforesources/ssi-ssp\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">because the state supplements the federal benefit by a few hundred dollars\u003c/a>, but doesn’t have access to the same information for SSDI.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Trying to include SSDI … would be a time-consuming and laborious process with the feds that doesn’t line up with the intent of (the Golden State Stimulus) — to get immediate relief to Californians with whom we have an existing relationship,” Palmer wrote in an email.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>‘Make Hard Decisions Quickly’\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>The Newsom administration may have also based the decision on a consideration of need.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>California’s \u003ca href=\"https://calbudgetcenter.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/CA-Budget-Center-SSI-SSP-IB_Chart-4.-SSP-Individual-Grant-Up-to-FPL-Bar-Chart.png\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">SSI recipients live in poverty by definition\u003c/a>. Elderly, blind and disabled people can only qualify if they have extremely low income and wealth, and they typically receive just $954.72 per month.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On the other hand, people with sufficient work history can qualify for monthly SSDI payments based on their former wages, with the \u003ca href=\"https://www.ssa.gov/OACT/ProgData/icp.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">average national benefit at $1,280\u003c/a> per month.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Still, California’s SSDI recipients often face steep financial challenges. They are more than twice as likely to live in poverty compared to the rest of the population, according to calculations by Andrew Houtenville, an economist at the Institute on Disability at the University of New Hampshire. And people with disabilities often have to cover expensive medical equipment, appointments with specialists and drugs out-of-pocket.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Imparato acknowledged that the state was “trying to make hard decisions quickly” but “including everyone on SSDI probably would have been a more equitable thing to do than excluding them because you don’t have access to their program or because it’s not a means-tested program.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There are some signs that lawmakers could still include SSDI recipients. Newsom’s proposed expansion of the Golden State Stimulus still requires approval from state legislators. Though they passed a placeholder budget to meet a June 15 deadline, state lawmakers continue to disagree with Newsom over how much surplus money the state has at its disposal and how to spend it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>According to a legislative staffer familiar with ongoing budget negotiations, some members of the Legislature are pushing the Newsom administration to expand eligibility for the Golden State Stimulus payments to Californians on SSDI, among other groups.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>The Evolution of the Golden State Stimulus\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Eligibility for Newsom’s Golden State Stimulus has gone through several twists and turns. In January, \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/california-divide/2021/01/newsom-wants-extra-600-stimulus-for-low-wage-californians/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Newsom announced a $2.4 billion plan to send $600 Golden State Stimulus checks\u003c/a> to approximately 4 million low-income workers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>By February, with the \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/GavinNewsom/status/1357089574288117760?s=20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">state’s revenue estimates swelling\u003c/a>, the Legislature negotiated and approved an even more generous \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/california-divide/2021/02/california-600-stimulus-checks-undocumented-workers/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">$3.8 billion stimulus payment plan that included extra aid for undocumented workers\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Under this plan, the state also sent $600 payments to certain Californians living in poverty — regardless of whether they work. That included very low-income families with children enrolled in CalWORKs, as well as recipients of SSI or the state’s alternative for some immigrant groups, known as the \u003ca href=\"https://www.cdss.ca.gov/inforesources/cash-assistance-for-immigrants\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Cash Assistance Program for Immigrants\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It took Charis Hill several days of searching online and contacting their state assemblymember to discover that they did not automatically qualify. A Sacramento-based disability activist who lives on $1,027 per month from SSDI, Hill eventually deduced that they could qualify not because they were disabled, but rather because they had done freelance writing and speaking last year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Hill would have to file taxes, something they hadn’t done in years because their earned income is far below the filing requirement. They decided it was worth it. Their expenses have jumped during the pandemic, especially as they’ve opted for grocery deliveries instead of shopping in stores because they are immunocompromised.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Hill said that, unlike many disabled people, they were fortunate to have internet access and a friend who could help them file their taxes. They were lucky to be able to work last year despite experiencing constant pain and fatigue from an inflammatory condition called axial spondyloarthritis. But, they said, it’s wrong that the Golden State Stimulus program is “basing a disabled person’s value on their ability to work.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11879468\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11879468\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/20210620_CalMatters_CharisHill_0075_A-scaled-1-800x533.jpeg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"533\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/20210620_CalMatters_CharisHill_0075_A-scaled-1-800x533.jpeg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/20210620_CalMatters_CharisHill_0075_A-scaled-1-1020x680.jpeg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/20210620_CalMatters_CharisHill_0075_A-scaled-1-160x107.jpeg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/20210620_CalMatters_CharisHill_0075_A-scaled-1-1536x1024.jpeg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/20210620_CalMatters_CharisHill_0075_A-scaled-1.jpeg 1568w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Charis Hill, a disability activist based in Sacramento, was able to get the Golden State Stimulus because they did some freelance work in 2020. But Hill says that it’s unfair that most Californians receiving federal disability insurance don’t currently qualify. \u003ccite>(Salgu Wissmath/CalMatters)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>When Newsom proposed a \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/california-divide/2021/05/newsom-proposes-expanding-golden-state-stimulus-to-middle-class/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">second round of Golden State stimulus payments aimed at California’s middle class\u003c/a> in May, Hill was hopeful that other SSDI recipients would finally be able to benefit, too. However, as the details of Newsom’s plan emerged, there was still no mention of SSDI recipients.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s really hard to see and read coverage of Newsom touting how great this is for middle-class people,” said Hill, when people with disabilities are “some of the most impoverished people in the whole country.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch3>Financial Burden Can Fall to Caretakers\u003c/h3>\n\u003cp>Sydney Chandler manages the finances and health care of her cousin, Chris Batiste, who is paralyzed. Batiste breathes through an apparatus and communicates with Chandler through a laptop, blinks and head movements.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Chandler, who is a Los Angeles-based writer, said she was livid to learn that SSDI recipients were left out of the state stimulus. To her, it was just another obstacle in the arbitrary and bureaucratic maze that people with disabilities face in trying to attain a liveable income.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Caretakers often carry a significant financial burden. Batiste receives $975 per month in SSDI, and Chandler said she contributes over $1,000 more each month to help cover his rent and full-time nursing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If it wasn’t for me, he would be one of the homeless,” Chandler said, “and you’re telling me that you couldn’t set up a portal for SSDI (recipients) to input their information?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This article is part of the California Divide, a collaboration among newsrooms examining income inequality and economic survival in California.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cp>Laura, 76, has not seen a doctor for years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The former farmworker, who did not want her last name used because of her immigration status, said she is losing her eyesight and her feet are often swollen and in pain.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A grandmother, Laura also suffers from headaches and shortness of breath, months after she became seriously ill with COVID-19 during the winter surge. Through it all, she has relied on home remedies and not sought medical care because she lacks health insurance, she said, in Spanish.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I don’t have any money. And at my age, there’s no work,” said Laura, who picked watermelon, zucchini, pumpkin and other crops for more than 20 years in fields in Southern California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But Laura may soon get access to the medical services she desperately needs, at little or no cost.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>California is on the verge of a historic step to offer public health insurance to low-income undocumented older adults — a population that has been particularly vulnerable during the COVID-19 pandemic but left out of federal assistance programs and other safety nets.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Gov. Gavin Newsom and legislative leaders are expected to announce an expansion to the Medi-Cal program in the coming days as part of a final deal on the state budget, according to advocates and legislative aides.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The most recent negotiations in Sacramento have centered on the lower age limit for those who will be newly eligible: 50 and older, as lawmakers have previously proposed; 60 and older, as Newsom offered; or somewhere in between.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We are as certain as we can be that there will be something that comes into the final budget,” said Sarah Dar, who directs health and public benefits policy at the California Immigrant Policy Center. “And it’s really just a matter of ‘What’s the age they land on?‘”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Luz Gallegos, director of TODEC, a legal center and immigrant justice organization\"]‘California continues to step up and defend all Californians, especially those who are most vulnerable, who don’t have any access to safety nets, but who contribute to our state economy, have been paying taxes… and have seen nothing in return.’[/pullquote]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 2014, then-state Sen. Ricardo Lara introduced the first (unsuccessful) \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billAnalysisClient.xhtml?bill_id=201320140SB1005\">bill\u003c/a> to make undocumented immigrants eligible for public health coverage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since then, California has enrolled undocumented children in full-scope Medi-Cal, offering free or low-cost preventative care, doctor visits, prescriptions, dental care, vision care and other services. Last year, the state became the first in the nation to offer health coverage to undocumented young adults through age 25.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But more than 1.3 million undocumented Californians are projected to lack health insurance next year, remaining the largest uninsured group in the state, according to a \u003ca href=\"https://laborcenter.berkeley.edu/undocumented-californians-projected-to-remain-the-largest-group-of-uninsured-in-the-state-in-2022/\">report\u003c/a> by the UC Berkeley Labor Center.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Estimates vary, but depending on the final age cutoff that Newsom and legislative leaders decide for this year’s budget, roughly 80,000 to more than 200,000 undocumented Californians could gain access to Medi-Cal, including many who have worked essential jobs that are key to the state’s economy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Immigrant and health advocates who have pushed California for years to extend health coverage to undocumented immigrants savored the realization that finally, older adults will most likely be eligible for coverage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“At last, justice does prevail. We are in a historic moment as Californians,” said Luz Gallegos, the executive director of TODEC, a legal center and immigrant justice organization in the Inland Empire and Coachella Valley.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“California continues to step up and defend all Californians, especially those who are most vulnerable, who don’t have any access to safety nets, but who contribute to our state economy, have been paying taxes … and have seen nothing in return,” she added.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11879325\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1242px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11879325\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Gallegos.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1242\" height=\"806\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Gallegos.jpg 1242w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Gallegos-800x519.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Gallegos-1020x662.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Gallegos-160x104.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1242px) 100vw, 1242px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Luz Gallegos works on COVID-19 vaccine outreach for farmworkers in Thermal, Calif. this spring. \u003ccite>(Courtesy TODEC)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The governor’s budget \u003ca href=\"http://www.ebudget.ca.gov/2021-22/pdf/Revised/BudgetSummary/HealthandHumanServices.pdf\">revision\u003c/a> from May includes nearly $860 million in annual state funds to expand Medi-Cal to low-income undocumented adults age 60 and older, with some of that funding available next year. The Legislature’s \u003ca href=\"https://abgt.assembly.ca.gov/sites/abgt.assembly.ca.gov/files/Floor%20Report%20of%20the%202021-22%20Budget%20-%20%28June%2011%2C%202021%20Version%29.pdf\">proposal\u003c/a> dedicates $1.3 billion in annual funds to cover undocumented adults age 50 and older once the program is fully established.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside label='Related Coverage' tag='undocumented-immigrants']Gallegos, who was born in the U.S. to farmworker immigrant parents, said this likely win is personal for her. In recent years, her undocumented uncle died from cancer, she said, after he delayed seeking medical care because he was uninsured. During the pandemic, farmworkers she knows died from COVID-19 while several others became ill with the virus.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We honor their lives by continuing the struggle so we don’t see no more lives taken away from our communities,” said Gallegos, her voice breaking.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Currently, low-income undocumented immigrants who are 26 and older are eligible for limited Medi-Cal, which only covers health care emergencies or prenatal care if they are pregnant. Undocumented immigrants are excluded from the Affordable Care Act, and cannot purchase coverage through Covered California, the state’s ACA health exchange.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If they are not insured by an employer or able to purchase a private plan, they must generally rely on county health programs, which vary greatly throughout the state.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Last year, Gov. Newsom \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11814885/as-pandemic-batters-californias-economy-plan-to-insure-undocumented-seniors-in-doubt\">proposed\u003c/a> offering full-scope Medi-Cal to undocumented seniors age 65 and older. But the plan didn’t go through, as the state projected a severe economic downturn and tax losses in the billions of dollars.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But the financial picture for California is starkly different this year, with the state logging an eye-popping budget surplus of \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11874125/californias-historic-budget-surplus-is-it-76-billion-or-38-billion\">$76 billion\u003c/a>. In addition, the pandemic highlighted how “interconnected” public health really is, with all of us having to think about whether people around us wore masks, stood far enough apart, or were vaccinated, said Dar, with the California Immigrant Policy Center.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“And so to give health care access to this community would mean a healthier and stronger state for all Californians,” said Dar. “Increased productivity, better health outcomes, better public health.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some opponents have argued that funds to provide health coverage to undocumented people would be better spent on other needs, such as helping struggling U.S. citizens afford their own health insurance.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>About two in three Californians support the idea of providing health coverage to undocumented immigrants, according to a \u003ca href=\"https://www.ppic.org/wp-content/uploads/ppic-statewide-survey-californians-and-their-government-march-2021.pdf\">recent survey\u003c/a> by the Public Policy Institute of California. But many Republicans oppose it, with nearly eight in 10 saying that they are not in favor.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This year, Illinois became the \u003ca href=\"https://www.povertylaw.org/article/health-coverage-available-to-undocumented-seniors-in-illinois/#:~:text=Fortunately%2C%20Illinois%20has%20become%20the,citizens%20age%2065%20or%20older.\">first state\u003c/a> to extend health insurance to undocumented seniors age 65 and older.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Former farmworker Laura hopes she will gain access to health coverage — and low-cost medical care — in California, where she has lived since the late 1980s, most recently in Riverside county.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It would help me a lot to go to the doctor and get my eyes checked out,” Laura said. “It would be the best.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Laura, 76, has not seen a doctor for years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The former farmworker, who did not want her last name used because of her immigration status, said she is losing her eyesight and her feet are often swollen and in pain.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A grandmother, Laura also suffers from headaches and shortness of breath, months after she became seriously ill with COVID-19 during the winter surge. Through it all, she has relied on home remedies and not sought medical care because she lacks health insurance, she said, in Spanish.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I don’t have any money. And at my age, there’s no work,” said Laura, who picked watermelon, zucchini, pumpkin and other crops for more than 20 years in fields in Southern California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But Laura may soon get access to the medical services she desperately needs, at little or no cost.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>California is on the verge of a historic step to offer public health insurance to low-income undocumented older adults — a population that has been particularly vulnerable during the COVID-19 pandemic but left out of federal assistance programs and other safety nets.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Gov. Gavin Newsom and legislative leaders are expected to announce an expansion to the Medi-Cal program in the coming days as part of a final deal on the state budget, according to advocates and legislative aides.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The most recent negotiations in Sacramento have centered on the lower age limit for those who will be newly eligible: 50 and older, as lawmakers have previously proposed; 60 and older, as Newsom offered; or somewhere in between.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We are as certain as we can be that there will be something that comes into the final budget,” said Sarah Dar, who directs health and public benefits policy at the California Immigrant Policy Center. “And it’s really just a matter of ‘What’s the age they land on?‘”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "‘California continues to step up and defend all Californians, especially those who are most vulnerable, who don’t have any access to safety nets, but who contribute to our state economy, have been paying taxes… and have seen nothing in return.’",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 2014, then-state Sen. Ricardo Lara introduced the first (unsuccessful) \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billAnalysisClient.xhtml?bill_id=201320140SB1005\">bill\u003c/a> to make undocumented immigrants eligible for public health coverage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since then, California has enrolled undocumented children in full-scope Medi-Cal, offering free or low-cost preventative care, doctor visits, prescriptions, dental care, vision care and other services. Last year, the state became the first in the nation to offer health coverage to undocumented young adults through age 25.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But more than 1.3 million undocumented Californians are projected to lack health insurance next year, remaining the largest uninsured group in the state, according to a \u003ca href=\"https://laborcenter.berkeley.edu/undocumented-californians-projected-to-remain-the-largest-group-of-uninsured-in-the-state-in-2022/\">report\u003c/a> by the UC Berkeley Labor Center.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Estimates vary, but depending on the final age cutoff that Newsom and legislative leaders decide for this year’s budget, roughly 80,000 to more than 200,000 undocumented Californians could gain access to Medi-Cal, including many who have worked essential jobs that are key to the state’s economy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Immigrant and health advocates who have pushed California for years to extend health coverage to undocumented immigrants savored the realization that finally, older adults will most likely be eligible for coverage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“At last, justice does prevail. We are in a historic moment as Californians,” said Luz Gallegos, the executive director of TODEC, a legal center and immigrant justice organization in the Inland Empire and Coachella Valley.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“California continues to step up and defend all Californians, especially those who are most vulnerable, who don’t have any access to safety nets, but who contribute to our state economy, have been paying taxes … and have seen nothing in return,” she added.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11879325\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 1242px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11879325\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Gallegos.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1242\" height=\"806\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Gallegos.jpg 1242w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Gallegos-800x519.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Gallegos-1020x662.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Gallegos-160x104.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1242px) 100vw, 1242px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Luz Gallegos works on COVID-19 vaccine outreach for farmworkers in Thermal, Calif. this spring. \u003ccite>(Courtesy TODEC)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The governor’s budget \u003ca href=\"http://www.ebudget.ca.gov/2021-22/pdf/Revised/BudgetSummary/HealthandHumanServices.pdf\">revision\u003c/a> from May includes nearly $860 million in annual state funds to expand Medi-Cal to low-income undocumented adults age 60 and older, with some of that funding available next year. The Legislature’s \u003ca href=\"https://abgt.assembly.ca.gov/sites/abgt.assembly.ca.gov/files/Floor%20Report%20of%20the%202021-22%20Budget%20-%20%28June%2011%2C%202021%20Version%29.pdf\">proposal\u003c/a> dedicates $1.3 billion in annual funds to cover undocumented adults age 50 and older once the program is fully established.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Gallegos, who was born in the U.S. to farmworker immigrant parents, said this likely win is personal for her. In recent years, her undocumented uncle died from cancer, she said, after he delayed seeking medical care because he was uninsured. During the pandemic, farmworkers she knows died from COVID-19 while several others became ill with the virus.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We honor their lives by continuing the struggle so we don’t see no more lives taken away from our communities,” said Gallegos, her voice breaking.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Currently, low-income undocumented immigrants who are 26 and older are eligible for limited Medi-Cal, which only covers health care emergencies or prenatal care if they are pregnant. Undocumented immigrants are excluded from the Affordable Care Act, and cannot purchase coverage through Covered California, the state’s ACA health exchange.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If they are not insured by an employer or able to purchase a private plan, they must generally rely on county health programs, which vary greatly throughout the state.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Last year, Gov. Newsom \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11814885/as-pandemic-batters-californias-economy-plan-to-insure-undocumented-seniors-in-doubt\">proposed\u003c/a> offering full-scope Medi-Cal to undocumented seniors age 65 and older. But the plan didn’t go through, as the state projected a severe economic downturn and tax losses in the billions of dollars.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But the financial picture for California is starkly different this year, with the state logging an eye-popping budget surplus of \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11874125/californias-historic-budget-surplus-is-it-76-billion-or-38-billion\">$76 billion\u003c/a>. In addition, the pandemic highlighted how “interconnected” public health really is, with all of us having to think about whether people around us wore masks, stood far enough apart, or were vaccinated, said Dar, with the California Immigrant Policy Center.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“And so to give health care access to this community would mean a healthier and stronger state for all Californians,” said Dar. “Increased productivity, better health outcomes, better public health.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some opponents have argued that funds to provide health coverage to undocumented people would be better spent on other needs, such as helping struggling U.S. citizens afford their own health insurance.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>About two in three Californians support the idea of providing health coverage to undocumented immigrants, according to a \u003ca href=\"https://www.ppic.org/wp-content/uploads/ppic-statewide-survey-californians-and-their-government-march-2021.pdf\">recent survey\u003c/a> by the Public Policy Institute of California. But many Republicans oppose it, with nearly eight in 10 saying that they are not in favor.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This year, Illinois became the \u003ca href=\"https://www.povertylaw.org/article/health-coverage-available-to-undocumented-seniors-in-illinois/#:~:text=Fortunately%2C%20Illinois%20has%20become%20the,citizens%20age%2065%20or%20older.\">first state\u003c/a> to extend health insurance to undocumented seniors age 65 and older.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Former farmworker Laura hopes she will gain access to health coverage — and low-cost medical care — in California, where she has lived since the late 1980s, most recently in Riverside county.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It would help me a lot to go to the doctor and get my eyes checked out,” Laura said. “It would be the best.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"slug": "californians-can-now-get-digital-vaccine-cards",
"title": "Californians Can Now Get Digital Vaccine Cards",
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"headTitle": "Californians Can Now Get Digital Vaccine Cards | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>California on Friday announced it is offering residents a digital record of their coronavirus vaccination that they can use to access businesses or events that require proof of inoculation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The state’s public health and technology departments said the \u003ca href=\"https://myvaccinerecord.cdph.ca.gov/\">Digital COVID-19 Vaccine Record\u003c/a> tool will allow Californians to access their record from the state’s immunization registry. It will show the same information as the paper cards issued by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to document coronavirus vaccinations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We are better enabling Californians to verify their vaccination status to ensure our state is in a better position to encourage the best practices in reducing the spread of COVID-19,” said State Epidemiologist Dr. Erica Pan at a press call Friday morning.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As of Thursday, more than 19 million Californians have been fully vaccinated and 3.5 million partially vaccinated, according to the California Department of Public Health.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>To \u003ca href=\"https://myvaccinerecord.cdph.ca.gov/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">receive their digital vaccine record\u003c/a>, users will input their name, date of birth and email or phone, and they will be asked to create a 4-digit PIN. The record will include a QR code and users can save it to their phones.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>https://twitter.com/CAPublicHealth/status/1405938234283249664?s=20\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The digital vaccine card is free and acts as a backup in case people lose or damage their paper CDC card.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>State officials acknowledged at a press call Friday morning that some Californians — likely fewer than 10% — will encounter some difficulty in obtaining their digital record because of outdated contact information or for other reasons.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Those experiencing problems can call the COVID-19 Hotline at 1-833-422-4255 or get help through the website’s \u003ca href=\"https://chat.myturn.ca.gov/?id=17\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">virtual assistant\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Following a drop in coronavirus cases and rise in vaccinations, California this week lifted a slew of pandemic-related restrictions. Vaccinated people are no longer required to wear masks at most indoor locations, though the unvaccinated still must do so. Everyone must continue to wear masks in some places, such as on mass transit and in health facilities.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Additionally, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11878490/california-drops-workplace-mask-rule-for-vaccinated-workers\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">vaccinated employees can unmask in workplaces\u003c/a>. State workplace regulators on Thursday approved revised rules allowing fully vaccinated employees the same freedoms on and off the job, including ending most mask and physical distancing requirements. Newsom immediately issued an executive order waiving the usual 10-day legal review and allowing the changes to take effect as soon as they are filed with the secretary of state.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postID=news_11878490 hero='https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/Getty-workplacemasks-1020x625.jpg']The rules apply in almost every workplace in the state, including offices, factories and retailers. They come after weeks of confusion as the California Occupational Safety and Health Standards Board flip-flopped over changes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The measures adopted in a 5-1 vote, with one member absent, now conform with general state guidelines that took effect Tuesday by ending most mask rules for vaccinated people. Employers can require workers to show proof of vaccination or allow them to self-report and keep a record.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Unvaccinated workers are still required to wear masks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Everybody, regardless of vaccination status, must wear masks on mass transit and in health facilities.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>What constitutes proof of vaccination has also prompted confusion: Will only paper cards do, or can photos of the cards or digital confirmations do?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>California already has a confidential public health database on the tens of millions of people who’ve been vaccinated. Earlier this week, Gov. Gavin Newsom said the state was working on a way for people to show that they have been vaccinated without having to carry their paper card but denied calling the electronic verification system a “vaccine passport.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postID=news_11877048 hero='https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/GettyImages-1210618045-1-1020x680.jpg']About two dozen states have banned state-required vaccine passports and some, including Texas, also barred businesses from requiring vaccinations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Newsom on Monday noted that the electronic verification system isn’t mandatory.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s not a passport, it’s not a requirement,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Under the workplace rule changes, employers also have the right to require everyone to remain masked — vaccinated or not. And vaccinated employees will still be able to \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11877048/californias-mask-mandate-ends-june-15-heres-why-some-fully-vaccinated-people-will-keep-wearing-them\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">wear masks if they choose\u003c/a> without facing retaliation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside label=\"related coverage\" tag=\"mask-mandate\"]The changes also end physical distancing in workplaces except for certain workers during major outbreaks. Vaccinated employees won’t need to be tested or quarantine unless they show symptoms, even if they have close contact with an infected person.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The California Chamber of Commerce, which represents more than 14,000 members, said the changes “will help employers move forward and fully reopen.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“What’s very difficult is to figure out what the balance is so that we’re doing the most good for the most people, but not at all dismissing the vulnerable in our population,” said Chris Laszcz-Davis, a management representative on the Cal/OSHA Standards Board.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But board member Laura Stock, an occupational safety expert who cast the lone opposition vote, warned that the pandemic is not over.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This has real consequences that people can get sick and die due to exposure in the workplace,” Stock said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>KQED’s Julie Chang contributed to this report.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>California on Friday announced it is offering residents a digital record of their coronavirus vaccination that they can use to access businesses or events that require proof of inoculation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The state’s public health and technology departments said the \u003ca href=\"https://myvaccinerecord.cdph.ca.gov/\">Digital COVID-19 Vaccine Record\u003c/a> tool will allow Californians to access their record from the state’s immunization registry. It will show the same information as the paper cards issued by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to document coronavirus vaccinations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We are better enabling Californians to verify their vaccination status to ensure our state is in a better position to encourage the best practices in reducing the spread of COVID-19,” said State Epidemiologist Dr. Erica Pan at a press call Friday morning.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As of Thursday, more than 19 million Californians have been fully vaccinated and 3.5 million partially vaccinated, according to the California Department of Public Health.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>To \u003ca href=\"https://myvaccinerecord.cdph.ca.gov/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">receive their digital vaccine record\u003c/a>, users will input their name, date of birth and email or phone, and they will be asked to create a 4-digit PIN. The record will include a QR code and users can save it to their phones.\u003c/p>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\n\u003cp>The digital vaccine card is free and acts as a backup in case people lose or damage their paper CDC card.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>State officials acknowledged at a press call Friday morning that some Californians — likely fewer than 10% — will encounter some difficulty in obtaining their digital record because of outdated contact information or for other reasons.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Those experiencing problems can call the COVID-19 Hotline at 1-833-422-4255 or get help through the website’s \u003ca href=\"https://chat.myturn.ca.gov/?id=17\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">virtual assistant\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Following a drop in coronavirus cases and rise in vaccinations, California this week lifted a slew of pandemic-related restrictions. Vaccinated people are no longer required to wear masks at most indoor locations, though the unvaccinated still must do so. Everyone must continue to wear masks in some places, such as on mass transit and in health facilities.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Additionally, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11878490/california-drops-workplace-mask-rule-for-vaccinated-workers\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">vaccinated employees can unmask in workplaces\u003c/a>. State workplace regulators on Thursday approved revised rules allowing fully vaccinated employees the same freedoms on and off the job, including ending most mask and physical distancing requirements. Newsom immediately issued an executive order waiving the usual 10-day legal review and allowing the changes to take effect as soon as they are filed with the secretary of state.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>The rules apply in almost every workplace in the state, including offices, factories and retailers. They come after weeks of confusion as the California Occupational Safety and Health Standards Board flip-flopped over changes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The measures adopted in a 5-1 vote, with one member absent, now conform with general state guidelines that took effect Tuesday by ending most mask rules for vaccinated people. Employers can require workers to show proof of vaccination or allow them to self-report and keep a record.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Unvaccinated workers are still required to wear masks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Everybody, regardless of vaccination status, must wear masks on mass transit and in health facilities.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>What constitutes proof of vaccination has also prompted confusion: Will only paper cards do, or can photos of the cards or digital confirmations do?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>California already has a confidential public health database on the tens of millions of people who’ve been vaccinated. Earlier this week, Gov. Gavin Newsom said the state was working on a way for people to show that they have been vaccinated without having to carry their paper card but denied calling the electronic verification system a “vaccine passport.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>About two dozen states have banned state-required vaccine passports and some, including Texas, also barred businesses from requiring vaccinations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Newsom on Monday noted that the electronic verification system isn’t mandatory.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s not a passport, it’s not a requirement,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Under the workplace rule changes, employers also have the right to require everyone to remain masked — vaccinated or not. And vaccinated employees will still be able to \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11877048/californias-mask-mandate-ends-june-15-heres-why-some-fully-vaccinated-people-will-keep-wearing-them\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">wear masks if they choose\u003c/a> without facing retaliation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>The changes also end physical distancing in workplaces except for certain workers during major outbreaks. Vaccinated employees won’t need to be tested or quarantine unless they show symptoms, even if they have close contact with an infected person.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The California Chamber of Commerce, which represents more than 14,000 members, said the changes “will help employers move forward and fully reopen.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“What’s very difficult is to figure out what the balance is so that we’re doing the most good for the most people, but not at all dismissing the vulnerable in our population,” said Chris Laszcz-Davis, a management representative on the Cal/OSHA Standards Board.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But board member Laura Stock, an occupational safety expert who cast the lone opposition vote, warned that the pandemic is not over.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This has real consequences that people can get sick and die due to exposure in the workplace,” Stock said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>KQED’s Julie Chang contributed to this report.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>California regulators on Thursday approved revised workplace pandemic rules that allow employees who are fully vaccinated against the coronavirus the same freedoms as when they are off the job, including ending most mask requirements.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The revised regulations approved by the governor-appointed California Occupational Safety & Health Standards Board come after weeks of confusion. The rules adopted in a 5-1 vote now conform with general state guidelines that took effect Tuesday by ending most mask rules for vaccinated people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Gov. Gavin Newsom immediately issued an executive order waiving the usual 10-day legal review. The new rules will take effect as soon as they are filed with the secretary of state.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I have a draft executive order ready to go immediately after they vote to make clarifications public and to provide more certainty,” Newsom said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The rules apply in almost every workplace in the state, including offices, factories and retailers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They are intended to ensure that workers are protected while businesses resume normal or near-normal activity, Eric Berg, deputy chief of research and standards for California’s Division of Occupational Safety and Health, known as Cal/OSHA, told the board.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Business groups had sought the changes, arguing that rules for businesses should conform with state guidelines patterned after the latest federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommendations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Board member Laura Stock, an occupational safety expert who cast the lone opposition vote, said that even though people are tired of restrictions, the pandemic is not over.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This has real consequences that people can get sick and die due to exposure in the workplace,” Stock said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She said the rules go too far by eliminating physical distancing and workplace partitions and allowing workers to self-report their vaccination status.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Mitch Steiger, a legislative advocate for the California Labor Federation, AFL-CIO, similarly objected that the measures “essentially pretend that the pandemic is over.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>David Thomas, the board’s chair, thanked who spoke in support or opposition to the rules and acknowledged that coming with up with latest iteration of the guidelines has not been easy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I do appreciate the time and concern and hours we’ve spent in these meetings to get to this conclusion, but I’d be remiss if I didn’t thank you guys, it’s a lot of work, and a lot of responsibility,” said Thomas.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside label=\"More coverage\" tag=\"face-masks\"]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The move comes after the board did a double-twisting backflip in recent weeks when it first postponed, then rejected, then adopted, then rescinded rules that would have allowed workers to forgo masks only if every employee in a room was fully vaccinated against the coronavirus.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Fully vaccinated employees will not need to wear masks, except in locations like mass transit and classrooms, where they are required for everyone, or in the event of outbreaks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Physical distancing also will end except for certain workers during major outbreaks. Vaccinated employees won’t need to be tested or quarantine unless they show symptoms, even if they have close contact with an infected person.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Employers must document that workers who skip masks indoors are indeed fully vaccinated. But employers have the choice of requiring workers to show proof of vaccination or allowing employees to self-report their status, with the employer keeping a record of who does the latter.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They also could decide to require everyone to remain masked — vaccinated or not. And vaccinated employees will still be able to wear masks if they choose without facing retaliation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The governor’s office released a statement saying the workplace regulations, initially implemented in November 2020, “remain an important component of the state’s ongoing response, providing balanced worker protections that support California’s continued progress in recovering from the pandemic.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Rob Lapsley, president of the California Business Roundtable, said the rules don’t fully conform to the state’s other standards. Others argued that they still will cause confusion.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s because of the requirement that employers provide masks and keep track of employees’ vaccination status, record-keeping that he and others said could create liability and privacy issues.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They do remain a significant barrier to fully reopening the economy,” Lapsley said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Katie Hansen, senior legislative director for the California Restaurant Association, said it is unrealistic to expect unvaccinated employees to remain masked until emergency work rules expire early next year, while others generally drop their face coverings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The California Chamber of Commerce took a milder approach, thanking Newsom for eliminating confusion by pledging to conform workplace rules with the state’s loosened pandemic precautions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That includes immediately ending social distancing obligations instead of waiting until July 31, as Cal/OSHA had initially proposed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The chamber also praised a rule change that will require employers to provide the most effective N95 masks for free to unvaccinated employees upon request.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But others objected that the rule still will require employers to stockpile masks and compete with health care workers, despite Newsom’s promise to provide a one-month supply of the masks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There were 700 California workplace outbreaks and more than 10,000 infections in the last 30 days, Cal/OSHA’s Berg said, but he said the N95s are the best alternative as other protections wane.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Robert Moutrie, a chamber of commerce policy advocate, called the latest proposal a “measured step” that opens too quickly for some businesses and not quickly enough for others.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>”But we do think that this is a good step in that direction,” Moutrie said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>KQED’s Alex Hall contributed to this report.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They are intended to ensure that workers are protected while businesses resume normal or near-normal activity, Eric Berg, deputy chief of research and standards for California’s Division of Occupational Safety and Health, known as Cal/OSHA, told the board.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Business groups had sought the changes, arguing that rules for businesses should conform with state guidelines patterned after the latest federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommendations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Board member Laura Stock, an occupational safety expert who cast the lone opposition vote, said that even though people are tired of restrictions, the pandemic is not over.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This has real consequences that people can get sick and die due to exposure in the workplace,” Stock said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She said the rules go too far by eliminating physical distancing and workplace partitions and allowing workers to self-report their vaccination status.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Mitch Steiger, a legislative advocate for the California Labor Federation, AFL-CIO, similarly objected that the measures “essentially pretend that the pandemic is over.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>David Thomas, the board’s chair, thanked who spoke in support or opposition to the rules and acknowledged that coming with up with latest iteration of the guidelines has not been easy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I do appreciate the time and concern and hours we’ve spent in these meetings to get to this conclusion, but I’d be remiss if I didn’t thank you guys, it’s a lot of work, and a lot of responsibility,” said Thomas.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The move comes after the board did a double-twisting backflip in recent weeks when it first postponed, then rejected, then adopted, then rescinded rules that would have allowed workers to forgo masks only if every employee in a room was fully vaccinated against the coronavirus.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Fully vaccinated employees will not need to wear masks, except in locations like mass transit and classrooms, where they are required for everyone, or in the event of outbreaks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Physical distancing also will end except for certain workers during major outbreaks. Vaccinated employees won’t need to be tested or quarantine unless they show symptoms, even if they have close contact with an infected person.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Employers must document that workers who skip masks indoors are indeed fully vaccinated. But employers have the choice of requiring workers to show proof of vaccination or allowing employees to self-report their status, with the employer keeping a record of who does the latter.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They also could decide to require everyone to remain masked — vaccinated or not. And vaccinated employees will still be able to wear masks if they choose without facing retaliation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The governor’s office released a statement saying the workplace regulations, initially implemented in November 2020, “remain an important component of the state’s ongoing response, providing balanced worker protections that support California’s continued progress in recovering from the pandemic.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Rob Lapsley, president of the California Business Roundtable, said the rules don’t fully conform to the state’s other standards. Others argued that they still will cause confusion.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s because of the requirement that employers provide masks and keep track of employees’ vaccination status, record-keeping that he and others said could create liability and privacy issues.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They do remain a significant barrier to fully reopening the economy,” Lapsley said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Katie Hansen, senior legislative director for the California Restaurant Association, said it is unrealistic to expect unvaccinated employees to remain masked until emergency work rules expire early next year, while others generally drop their face coverings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The California Chamber of Commerce took a milder approach, thanking Newsom for eliminating confusion by pledging to conform workplace rules with the state’s loosened pandemic precautions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That includes immediately ending social distancing obligations instead of waiting until July 31, as Cal/OSHA had initially proposed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The chamber also praised a rule change that will require employers to provide the most effective N95 masks for free to unvaccinated employees upon request.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But others objected that the rule still will require employers to stockpile masks and compete with health care workers, despite Newsom’s promise to provide a one-month supply of the masks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There were 700 California workplace outbreaks and more than 10,000 infections in the last 30 days, Cal/OSHA’s Berg said, but he said the N95s are the best alternative as other protections wane.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Robert Moutrie, a chamber of commerce policy advocate, called the latest proposal a “measured step” that opens too quickly for some businesses and not quickly enough for others.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>”But we do think that this is a good step in that direction,” Moutrie said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>KQED’s Alex Hall contributed to this report.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"checkPleaseReducer": {
"filterData": {
"region": {
"key": "Restaurant Region",
"filters": [
"Any Region"
]
},
"cuisine": {
"key": "Restaurant Cuisine",
"filters": [
"Any Cuisine"
]
}
},
"restaurantDataById": {},
"restaurantIdsSorted": [],
"error": null
},
"userAgentReducer": {
"userAgent": "Mozilla/5.0 AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko; compatible; ClaudeBot/1.0; +claudebot@anthropic.com)",
"isBot": true
},
"requestOutcomesReducer": {
"notFound": []
},
"navPromosReducer": {
"isFetching": false,
"fetchFailed": false,
"hasFetched": true,
"promos": {
"news": {},
"podcasts-radio": {},
"video-tv": {},
"events": {},
"support": {}
}
}
}
