Mental health challenges + Sustainable housing fund + ‘Give for a Gay’ blood donation
Happy Wednesday, California. Do you have cabin fever? The governor says you have plenty of company:
THE TOLL ON MENTAL HEALTH
California Gov. Gavin Newsom took some time at the beginning of his #NewsomAtNoon press conference Tuesday to acknowledge something that we’re all feeling, some more than others: That staying at home for an extended period of time takes its toll on mental health.
“Some people are coping quite well, others are struggling understandably,” Newsom said.
Some are struggling with depression or anxiety, perhaps because of a layoff or work furlough or perhaps just because of the stress of the times they are living in, he said.
“I just want folks to know that staying at home doesn’t mean that you’re alone, that as a state we are here to do what we can to support you and to be there at a time of need,” Newsom said.
Newsom said he tasked California Surgeon General Nadine Burke Harris with developing a strategy to provide support to beleaguered Californians, including caregivers who are being pushed to their limits in the time of coronavirus.
“I’ve asked her to consider not only the physical health needs ... but the brain health needs, the mental health. After all, the brain is part of the body,” Newsom said.
The governor said that strategy has to focus not just on the mental health needs of adults, but also of children, many of whom he said manifest stress differently than adults do.
Newsom used the occasion to mention his daughter, who was upset at being told she likely wouldn’t be able to see her friends at school this year.
“Our children are most vulnerable because they’re not able to communicate as effectively as many of the adults and caregivers,” he said.
The governor pointed to the suite of resources currently collected at covid19.ca.gov, including several hotlines for mental health emergencies and non-emergencies.
Newsom’s remarks drew praise from the County Behavioral Health Directors Association of California.
“As we work together to address the physical health aspects of this pandemic, it is important to acknowledge the parallel behavioral health epidemic which is resulting from the public health crisis and will continue as an ongoing need,” the group said in a statement.
“County behavioral health departments are on the frontlines providing for the mental health and substance use disorder service needs of vulnerable Californians served by the public behavioral health system. Our counties operate many of the crisis and warm line resources linked to on the state’s COVID-19 resource site and stand prepared to link Californians to trusted behavioral health resources.”
A reminder: The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline provides confidential assistance to anyone in crisis and their loved ones through a live chat and free 24-hour hotline: 800-273-8255. WellSpace Health operates the Sacramento region’s 24-hour hotline: 916-368-3111 or text HOPE to 916-668-4226.
NO MORE ‘BUSINESS AS USUAL’
A handful of Democratic lawmakers requested in a letter to the Legislature’s budget chairs on April 3 to support a bill this year that establish ongoing funds that could reach up to $2 billion for affordable housing.
Senate Bill 795 is similar to a bill that Sen. Jim Beall, D-San Jose, wrote last year.
Beall co-signed the letter with Senators Anthony Portantino, Mike McGuire, Cathleen Galgiani, Ash Kalra, Henry Stern, and Assemblymen Robert Rivas and Ash Kalra. The members represent, among others, districts from the Central Valley to San Francisco and the Los Angeles area.
“Throughout the State, cities simply do not have enough affordable housing available to low- and very- low income households,” they wrote. “Last year’s housing efforts, mirrored previous efforts in terms of funding and strategy. Despite significant multi-billion dollar, one-time investments as well as the establishment of penalties for negligent cities, California’s homeless population rose again last year.”
Newsom rejected SB 795’s predecessor last year, citing financial considerations.
“Legislation with such a significant fiscal impact needs to be part of budget deliberations so that it can be considered in light of other priorities,” Newsom wrote in his veto message.
Beall, who is the lead author, has been a long time proponent of ongoing funding for affordable housing initiatives. He said SB 795 would create a “sustainable state fund source” for helping “California’s most vulnerable families” and create new jobs, through a partnership that allows local officials to oversee the financial logistics.
“An on-going investment in housing production will be difficult in today’s fiscal climate,” Beall said in a Tuesday statement. “But we can’t continue to operate business as usual.”
‘GIVE FOR A GAY’
Sen. Scott Wiener, D-San Francisco, has grown increasingly frustrated with a federal law that he’s called “irrational” and “discriminatory” because it prevents him, a gay man, from donating blood.
Gay and bisexual men who have been sexually active within the last year are not not allowed to give blood under the Food and Drug Administration’s donation guidelines, established during the HIV and AIDS crisis. Wiener said the disparity is even greater now that researchers are collecting plasma from COVID-19 survivors to better determine potential treatments for the virus.
“This is now undermining our ability to effectively confront the COVID-19 emergency,” Wiener said at a Tuesday press conference. “And the FDA needs to get out of 1985 and come into 2020 with our modern technology and our modern understanding of HIV and end this ban.”
Wiener on Tuesday announced a “Give for a Gay” initiative set up to encourage anyone able to give blood to do so on behalf of the demographic who can’t. San Francisco Mayor London Breed donated on Wiener’s behalf.
The senator later followed his press conference with a letter to the FDA that urged the department to consider allowing gay and bisexual men who have recovered from the virus to donate plasma, expanding on his letter last week to the agency asking for a total ban of the rule.
The FDA did relax the rules last week, lowering the “recommended deferral period” for men who’ve had sex with other men from a year to three months.
“Based on recently completed studies and epidemiologic data, the FDA has concluded that current policies regarding certain donor eligibility criteria can be modified without compromising the safety of the blood supply,” the agency said.
QUOTE OF THE DAY
“It’s bending, but it’s also stretching.”
- Gov. Gavin Newsom during a Tuesday briefing about California’s ability to flatten its coronavirus infection curve.
Best of the Bee:
Californians’ efforts to stay at home and limit physical contact are flattening the coronavirus infection curve, but also pushing the peak of infection further into the future, Gov. Gavin Newsom said Tuesday, by Sophia Bollag
Hundreds of thousands of Californians have already lost their employer-sponsored health insurance since the coronavirus outbreak upended the national economy, and millions more could follow, according to a new study by a health care consulting firm, by Hannah Wiley
Fifty-three people who work at California state prisons have tested positive for COVID-19, according to new figures released on Sunday, by Wes Venteicher