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While US summer surge is waning, more mandates in the works

COVID-19 deaths in the U.S. are coming down again, hospitalizations are dropping, and new cases per day are about to dip below 100,000 for the first time in two months — all signs that the summer surge is waning. Not wanting to lose momentum, government leaders and employers are looking to ...

Los Angeles OKs one of strictest US vaccination mandates

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Los Angeles leaders on Wednesday approved one of the nation’s strictest vaccine mandates — a sweeping measure that requires the shots for everyone entering bars, restaurants, nail salons, gyms or even a Lakers game. The City Council voted 11-2 in favor of the ordinance that will require proof of full vaccination starting Nov. 4. The move came after the council postponed a vote last week to deal with concerns ranging from who could be fined for violations to whether employees could end up in fist-fights when they have to serve as vaccine door monitors. Some ...

Kaiser Permanente suspends 2,200 unvaccinated employees

OAKLAND, Calif. (AP) — Health care giant Kaiser Permanente has put more than 2,200 employees nationwide on unpaid leave who have chosen not to get vaccinated against the coronavirus — a little over 1% of its workforce. The employees have until Dec. 1 to get vaccinated to be able to return to work and those who choose not to will be terminated, the company said. Kaiser said its overall vaccination rate stands at 92%. “We hope none of our employees will choose to leave their jobs rather than be vaccinated, but we won’t know with certainty until then,” Kaiser said in a ...

Vaccines are here. School’s open. Some parents still agonize

PHOENIX (AP) — Eight days into the school year, all five of Amber Cessac’s daughters, ages 4 to 10, had tested positive for COVID-19. Having them all sick at once and worrying about long-term repercussions as other parents at their school, and even her own mother, downplayed the virus, ...

J&J seeks US clearance for COVID-19 vaccine booster doses

WASHINGTON — Johnson & Johnson asked the Food and Drug Administration on Tuesday to allow extra shots of its COVID-19 vaccine as the U.S. government moves toward expanding its booster campaign to millions more vaccinated Americans. J&J said it filed a request with the FDA to authorize boosters for people 18 and older who previously received the company’s one-shot vaccine. While the company said it submitted data on several different booster intervals, ranging from two to six months, it did not formally recommend one to regulators. Last month, the FDA authorized booster shots of ...

COVID spike pushes Alaska’s health care system to brink

TANACROSS, Alaska (AP) — One Alaska Native village knew what to do to keep out COVID-19. They put up a gate on the only road into town and guarded it round the clock. It was the same idea used a century ago in some isolated Indigenous villages to protect people from outsiders during another deadly pandemic — the Spanish flu. It largely worked. Only one person died of COVID-19 and 20 people got sick in Tanacross, an Athabascan village of 140 whose rustic wood cabins and other homes are nestled between the Alaska Highway and Tanana River. But the battle against the coronavirus ...