What’s Next for Cabins in Santa Anita Canyon Affected by the Bobcat Fire?
California Launches App to Alert Users of Potential COVID-19 Exposure P7
P3
COMPLIMENTARY COPY
Go to MontereyParkPress.com for Monterey Park Specific News THURSDAY, DECEMBER 10 - DECEMBER 16, 2020
Local. Relevant. Trusted.
Some Southern Californians Readjust and Others Defy New Restrictions from the State
Since 1996
VOL. 8, NO. 49
Dodger Stadium Considered for COVID-19 Vaccine Distribution Site
Terry MILLER tmiller@beaconmedianews.com
W
ith Los Angeles County now reporting on average nearly 9,000 new coronavirus cases per day and the region’s ICU capacity dropping below 15%, which triggered the state’s new stay-at-home order on Sunday, restaurants in Pasadena had no choice but to comply and cease outdoor dining. Last weekend, Old Pasadena’s Colorado Boulevard experienced wall-to-wall people and extraordinarily long lines to dine in the only city in the county that allowed outdoor dining. In fact, some businesses were forced to stop serving as they ran out of food. People traveled from all over Los Angeles County to experience what some coined “The Last Supper” — a Biblical nod to the pending major shutdown which took effect in the city at 10 p.m. on Sunday. What a difference a day or two makes. Walking the streets on Tuesday at lunchtime one could only find boarded up businesses and the normally bustling Old Pasadena looking more like a ghost town. A few businesses were open for takeout but there were very few people walking about, other than a few delivery people picking up orders
Health care workers will be the first to receive the vaccine. | Photo courtesy of CDC
Terry MILLER tmiller@beaconmedianews.com
O The once bustling Colorado Boulevard in Old Pasadena is now essentially a ghost town. | Photo by Terry Miller / Beacon Media News
to go. Several businesses — replete with plywood — seem to anticipate continued danger. In Monrovia, some have taken to buying takeout and eating while sitting on city benches as if to thumb their collective noses at the state for the restrictions than many people feel are more punitive than necessary, especially those constraints attached to restaurants already suffering. California's latest restrictions have been criticized by small business owners who have criticized lawmakers for what they believe to be arbitrary restrictions. For example, Los Angeles restaurant owner Angela Marsden’s viral video drew considerable atten-
tion this week for showing a film crew’s outdoor dining area across from her shuttered eatery. According to reporting from The New York Times, “The county health department noted in a statement that film crews are regularly tested for the virus and that, unlike at restaurants, people do not mingle for ‘extended periods of time without their face covering.’ Audiences are not allowed at film sites under the county’s guidelines.” Furthermore, the guidelines stipulate that “Employees are prohibited from eating or drinking anywhere other than in designated areas to assure that masks are worn consistently and correctly. Cast and crew must eat and drink at
designated set areas with staggered schedules.” Since March, an undetermined number of eateries have shuttered altogether in the growing wake of the pandemic. According to the National Restaurant Association, more than 110,000 restaurants have closed permanently or long-term across the U.S. due to the pandemic. Bloomberg’s Carolina Gonzalez reports that “The Washingtonbased trade group shared the latest results with Congressional leaders in an attempt to secure financial support for a sector rocked by rising costs and falling sales.” Read More on our website under NEWS
scar-winner Sean Penn's nonprofit group, Community Organized Relief Effort (CORE), that runs the COVID-19 testing site at Dodger Stadium hopes to increase testing capacity there and get it ready for vaccine distribution, according to a local news report for KABC. The first COVID-19 vaccine, from Pfizer, is slated to appear before a U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) committee for approval Thursday. Pfizer and BioNTech say its final analysis found 95% effectiveness of its vaccine with no safety concerns. However, CNN reports that after two health care workers “responded adversely” to the vaccine, UK health officials warned Wednesday that people with a “significant history of allergic reactions" should not be given the shot. Moderna, with a 94.5% effective vaccine, is expected to seek an emergency use authorization from the FDA after Pfizer. “The experimental
vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna, technically called BNT162b2 and mRNA-1273 respectively, are created synthetically using messenger Ribonucleic acid (or mRNA). RNA and DNA (Deoxyribonucleic) are nucleic acids that carry genetic instructions for creating life,” explains Justin Vallejo of The Independent. “Rather than injecting an organic version of the virus to generate an immune response, mRNA contains snippets of the coronavirus spike protein's genetic code that tells the body's cells to produce a small facsimile of that spike protein, which kickstarts the immune system to produce antibodies,” the Vallejo writes. If the FDA approves an emergency use authorization for the Pfizer vaccine, Governor Gavin Newsom said the first anticipated 327,000 vaccine doses from the company could be arriving in California five days later. Health care workers are slated to receive the first doses and it will be a few months before the entire populace can be inoculated.