Vaccines

What a difference a year makes. On Wednesday, not long after the country’s first known case of the omicron COVID-19 variant was confirmed in San Francisco, Gov. Gavin Newsom held a press conference to promote vaccines and booster shots — and to reassure weary Californians that more lockdowns are unlikely. Newsom: “There’s more panic than […]

President Joe Biden on Monday reassured Americans that the omicron variant “is a cause for concern, not a cause for panic” — raising questions about the strategy Gov. Gavin Newsom will employ to respond to a form of COVID-19 about which much remains unknown. The governor, who returned to California late Sunday night after a […]

The omicron variant has just entered the U.S., and California is already bracing for a surge in COVID cases.

Citing a possible surge in COVID cases and short-staffed hospitals, Newsom extended parts of his emergency order through March 2022.

Will California’s strict vaccine rules help bring an end to the pandemic that has disproportionately ravaged communities of color — or further entrench and widen those longstanding disparities? Answering that question is an increasingly urgent task for elected leaders and public health officials: Starting today, customers must show proof of vaccination or a negative COVID-19 […]

Welcome to California’s vaccine rollout, part two: the booster and kids edition. Gov. Gavin Newsom on Wednesday received a booster shot of the Moderna vaccine, about seven months after getting the single-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine. The move reflects the “mix-and-match” strategy approved late last week by federal regulators and a group of Western public […]

Today, thousands of California parents are expected to keep their kids home from school as part of a statewide protest against Gov. Gavin Newsom’s recently announced student vaccine mandate. Around 2,500 people are slated to protest in front of the state Capitol building in Sacramento for an event called “Our Children, Our Choice,” according to […]

Today marks a massive inflection point in California’s pandemic response. The state is shifting from a phase of protection — marked by the implicit recognition that people had very little control over COVID-19 — to one of action, underscoring that vaccines are free, widely available to most of the population and key to bringing the […]

As the state’s COVID-19 vaccination mandate kicks in Thursday, several large hospital systems say 90% or more of their employees are vaccinated. But they don’t have to provide data to the state unless asked.

The politically powerful prison guards’ union and Gov. Gavin Newsom have resisted a COVID vaccine mandate, despite growing outbreaks.