Seniors Living Alone with Cognitive Impairment Hit Hard by COVID-19 Pandemic
The COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated isolation and fears for one very vulnerable group of Americans: the 4.3 million older adults with cognitive impairment, who live alone.
As the coronavirus continues to claim more lives and upend others, researchers led by UC San Francisco are calling for tailored services and support for older adults living alone with memory issues, who are experiencing extreme isolation, and are exposed to misinformation about the virus and barriers to accessing medical care.
In their qualitative study, researchers interviewed 24 San Francisco Bay Area residents, whose average age was 82. Of these, 17 were women, and 13 were either monolingual Spanish-speakers or Cantonese speakers; 18 were widowed or divorced; 10 depended only on the in-person care of their family, eight only on in-person home care aides and six on both family and aides. Findings appear in The Gerontologist on Jan.
Ucsf Frontline Workers Begin Receiving 2Nd Doses Of Pfizer Vaccine
Bay City News Service
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SAN FRANCISCO (BCN)
Some 10,000 frontline workers at University of California at San Francisco are beginning to receive their second dose of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine starting Thursday, UCSF officials said.
The workers who have already received the vaccine include UCSF and UCSF Benioff Children s Hospital Oakland employees at the highest risk of exposure, such as nurses, doctors, custodial workers, respiratory therapists and phlebotomists.
As UCSF continues to administer the vaccine, it s expecting to vaccinate a total of 21,500 employees. UCSF currently has the capacity to vaccinate 1,100 people per day and is hoping to increase that number in the coming weeks, provided that supplies remain available.
San Francisco health officials gave an update on the stay-at-home order, quarantine rules, COVID-19 cases, coronavirus hospitalizations and the vaccine rollout in the city at a Tuesday press conference.
Los Angeles County reported another 20,414 new cases of COVID-19 and 207 additional deaths Friday, although 40 of the deaths were from a backlog associated with a Spectrum outage and holiday reporting delays. That s because a lot of people are closed for the holidays in terms of labs so they are not reporting these numbers until people open back up next week. So, what will happen probably next week is a huge bump in cases, said Dr. Chin-Hong.
In March, medical experts met to discuss a response plan for an unprecedented rise in cases. Dr. Peter Chin-Hong says those meetings equipped them for what could take place in the upcoming weeks.