scott_wiener

Yes, we need to be flexible and allow students to participate. Even if they’re not interacting with patients, they can provide significant administrative support to free up other resources. They’re a major untapped resource.

I believe that a very large percentage of San Franciscans are complying with the shelter in place order. I’ve also gone to various parks to take walks or run, and I’ve not seen violations - no crowding and people maintaining space even on running tracks. While there certainly are violations - and we’ve seen videos on social media - I think that’s the exception not the rule. I also think that the message takes a while to sink in, particularly among young people who think they’re invincible. It’s sinking in now. I think we will see more proactive enforcement - not to cite or arrest people but to tell people to disperse.

Supermarkets and pharmacies also need to create systems to ensure social distancing. That seems to be a work in progress, particularly for supermarkets, but progress is being made.

The city is creating temporary housing for homeless people - places where they aren’t packed with other people. And for homeless people who are ill but not ill enough to be hospitalized, they’re being discharged to rented hotel rooms, paid for by the city.

Regarding #1, it’s too soon to say. It depends on the trajectory of the pandemic over the coming months and into next year, the availability of effective treatments, and a vaccine. There may be very few permanent changes, or there may be more. It’s too soon to say.

Regarding #2: Our housing work questions some basic long-term assumptions about how land use and development work in California. We’re trying to change the status quo. Whenever you try to change the status quo, there’s always significant pushback and it can take years. With that said, we’ve made tremendous progress over the past few years, including advancing ideas that would have been dead on arrival even 5 years ago. I’m optimistic about our future prospects. Hang in there, and thanks for the support!!

The entire country, frankly, is behind on testing due to the CDC and FDA’s epics mishandling of testing. But we are catching up. California has been significantly accelerating testing over the past few days, including a significant expansion of non-hospital testing sites. Kaiser, Sutter, and others are ramping up their own testing. And more and more outdoor sites are being identified for mobile testing. It’s hard to overstate how damaging the testing debacle has been - it’s played a significant role in allowing this pandemic to rage out of control in parts of our country - but it’s being resolved.

This points to a larger issue: This country hasn’t taken public health infrastructure seriously enough. The federal government - and Trump in particular - have hollowed out various federal public health functions at CDC, NIH, and NSA. That’s made us less prepared. We also need to invest significantly in the California Department of Public Health, which will need more resources. Fortunately, the San Francisco Department of Public Health is the best in the nation, and because of our experience with HIV/AIDS in the 1980s and 1990s, San Francisco has prioritized this critical function.