Church leaders question Newsom’s order + Is racism a public health crisis? + Testing priorities
Good morning and happy Wednesday! Let’s get right into it, shall we?
SOME CRITICIZE NEWSOM’S CHURCH ORDER
As California Gov. Gavin Newsom once again bars houses of worship in much of the state from conducting indoor religious services, some Christian leaders are critical of the governor’s decision.
The order restricting indoor worship services applies to any county on the state’s COVID-19 monitoring list; on Monday, Newsom said that encompasses 80 percent of Californians.
Jonathan Keller, president of the conservative California Family Council, said Newsom’s order shows that the governor “trusts big box stores like Costco and Target more than churches and synagogues.”
“Coupled with last week’s ban on singing during worship services, people of faith are increasingly alarmed by Sacramento’s disregard of their constitutional rights. We have to ask ourselves: where do we draw the line?” Keller said in a statement.
In Lodi, Pastor Jon Duncan of the Cross Culture Christian Center, which had defied Newsom’s previous order and continued to hold indoor services, said that the latest order conflicts with the First Amendment right to peaceably assemble and practice religion.
“We believe it’s God-given, as did the (Founding Fathers),” Duncan said.
Duncan said that church provides a necessary outlet for people who are feeling hopeless or depressed.
“People do need church. I think church is an essential service. I think it’s a necessary service,” he said.
Echoing that sentiment was Senate Republican Leader Shannon Grove, R-Bakersfield, who urged Newsom in a letter not to close down houses of worship.
“We must continue to work to protect public safety and health. Effective and data-driven guidelines should be implemented, but a restriction on our First Amendment rights in the form of the government closing down houses of worship cannot be tolerated,” Grove said in the letter.
Read the full story here.
A PUBLIC HEALTH CRISIS
What more should Newsom do to address racism?
The groups Black Women for Wellness Action Project, California Black Women’s Health Project, Roots Community Health Center, Public Health Advocates, California Pan-Ethnic Health Network and 155 others have a suggestion: Declare racism a public health crisis.
“We urge the state to declare racism to be a statewide public health crisis, which would serve as an important first step in the state’s acknowledgment of its own racist history through the present day,and would establish specific commitments and measurable actions to begin to undo the racism that prevents all Californians, especially (Black and indigenous people of color), from achieving optimal health and well-being,” the group wrote in the 28-page letter.
The letter mentions that several municipal governments, including the cities of Goleta, Santa Barbara, San Luis Obispo, Morro Bay, Banning, Los Angeles and Riverside and the counties of San Bernardino and Santa Clara have already declared racism to be a public health crisis.
The letter states that such a declaration would only serve as a first step to further action.
“We recommend intentional and transparent consultation with directly impacted Californians and community leaders in decision making around police reform and jail reform that will center racial equity. We call for immediate public health intervention against current racist, violent, and discriminatory acts at all levels including by law enforcement. We encourage deep reflection on the state’s internal and external policies and procedures with an anti-racism lens. We urge concrete state and local budgetary commitments to reinvest in community healing and health. The current moment calls for nothing less,” the letter concluded.
CALIFORNIA UNVEILS COVID-19 TESTING PRIORITIES
Via Sophia Bollag...
Hospitalized people with COVID-19 symptoms will be the first priority for testing under new California guidelines released Tuesday, followed by medical workers in the second tier and teachers and service workers in the third.
The new priority system comes as the state experiences a dramatic rise in coronavirus cases and the state runs low on testing supplies, causing bottlenecks for testing and forcing people to wait longer for results, California Health and Human Services Secretary Dr. Mark Ghaly said.
Under the new guidelines, hospitalized patients and people who have been in close contact with someone who has tested positive will be in the top tier.
Other people with COVID-19 symptoms and workers in group living facilities like homeless shelters, nursing homes and jails will be in the next tier, along with medical workers. Teachers, service workers and food industry workers are in the third tier, while everyone else is in the fourth, according to the guidelines.
The tiers will guide not only who is prioritized for testing, but also whose test results are processed fastest by labs, Ghaly said.
Read the full story here.
QUOTE OF THE DAY
“I find it amusing that now that there are more women and women of color elected, *some* people chose to call me by my first name, not my office title, while *AT THE SAME TIME*, call men by their title and not their first name. HMMM.”
– Assemblywoman Wendy Carrillo, D-Los Angeles, via Twitter.
Best of the Bee:
A Tulare man who allegedly marketed a fake cure for COVID-19 was arrested Tuesday and charged with mail fraud and selling a misbranded drug, according to the Department of Justice, via Kate Irby.
Health officials think birthday parties and graduations may be to blame for a growing majority of cases in Sacramento County among young adults, via Michael McGough.
Without a definitive statewide decision on whether schools should reopen their physical doors during the coronavirus outbreak this fall, each California district is pursuing its own path, via Hannah Wiley.