SoHum Health is serving as the hub for administering COVID-19 vaccine to the Southern Humboldt community. Vaccination of local volunteer fire agencies and other healthcare providers is beginning this week. The first dose of the 2-part Pfizer vaccine has already been administered to almost 70 percent of Jerold Phelps Community Hospital employees and skilled nursing residents on a voluntary basis. SoHum Health has vaccinated staff members from Singing Trees Recovery Center as well.
In preparation for the COVID-19 vaccine to become available to Southern Humboldt community members, SoHum Health is asking all those who are interested in getting the vaccine to fill out an online form at: sohumhealth.org/vaccine. Regardless of whether you are already a patient of SoHum Health, those who fill out the form will be contacted as soon as the vaccine becomes available.
The United States is currently in Tier-1 for COVID-19 vaccine distribution. Tier-1 includes all healthcare employees, first responders, and employees and residents of skilled nursing and long-term care facilities. Later Tiers include vaccinations for those with certain risk factors including health conditions and age. Details on the order in which certain community members will be offered the vaccine has not been released as yet. By filling out the online interest form, those who wish to get the vaccine will be contacted as soon as it becomes available to them.
For information about COVID-19 practices, testing, and vaccine distribution at SoHum Health visit sohumhealth.org, call (707) 923-3921, or email inquire@shchd.org.
Press release from the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office:
On Dec. 30, 2020, at about 11:30 a.m., Humboldt County Sheriff’s deputies were dispatched to an elementary school on the 4000 block of Fieldbrook Road in Fieldbrook for the report of a burglary.
According to an employee of the school, two unknown suspects forced entry into a garage at the school during the night of December 29, stealing a van, tools and other items.
On Jan. 1, 2021, Sheriff’s deputies received information connecting 35-year-old Troy Curtis McCluskey to the burglary. Upon further investigation, deputies learned that McCluskey had five outstanding warrants for his arrest. At about 9 p.m. that evening, deputies on patrol in the area of G and 1st Streets in Blue Lake located a vehicle being driven by McCluskey and in violation of a vehicle code. Deputies conducted a traffic stop on McCluskey and took him into custody on his warrants without incident. During a search of McCluskey’s vehicle, deputies recovered multiple items reported stolen from the school.
McCluskey was booked into the Humboldt County Correctional Facility on fresh charges of possession of stolen property (PC 496(a)), in addition to his warrants for burglary (PC 459/461(b)), possession of stolen property (PC 496(a)), felon in possession of a firearm (PC 29800(a)(1)), possession of a controlled substance (HS 11377(a)), driving with a suspended license (VC 14601.1(a)), violation of probation (PC 1203.2(a)(2)) and hit and run (VC 20002(a)(1)).
The stolen vehicle remains outstanding at this time and is described as a gray 2004 Chevrolet AstroVan with a California Exempt License plate number 1187988.
Additionally, the second suspect remains outstanding and has not been identified at this time.
This case is still under investigation. Anyone with information about this case or related criminal activity is encouraged to call the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office at (707) 445-7251 or the Sheriff’s Office Crime Tip line at (707) 268-2539.
The room where the fire occurred. | Photos provided by the Arcata Fire District.
Correction: This article initially stated that the gunshot victim was a 21-year-old woman. APD confirmed with the Outpost today that the info initially given was incorrect. The victim was actually a 22-year-old man. The Outpost regrets this error.
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A 30-year-old Arcata man died yesterday after an early-morning standoff with police at the Motel 6 on the 4700 block of Valley West Boulevard.
Sgt. Chris Ortega of the Arcata Police Department told the Outpost that the man initially shot a Motel 6 employee in the foot at approximately 3 a.m. before setting his motel room ablaze and turning the gun on himself.
“Officers immediately contacted [the unnamed shooter] who was brandishing a handgun from inside one of the rooms, which he had also set on fire,” Ortega said. “During the brief interaction with the officers, the male shot himself and was pronounced deceased at the scene.”
The motel employee, a 21-year-old woman 22-year-old man from Arcata, received treatment at Mad River Community Hospital for a minor gunshot wound and was released from the hospital that same day. No other injuries were reported as a result of the standoff.
Sgt. Ortega said that the man had reportedly been staying at the motel for less than a week and was acting manically prior to the shooting.
Approximately 10 rounds were discharged from the shooter’s room during the standoff. However, Sgt. Ortega said that an undetermined number of shots were loose rounds set off by the fire.
Smoke pours from the motel’s attic space after crews extinguished the fire.
Arcata Fire District Chief Justin McDonald said that no bullets were discharged while firefighters were on scene.
“The situation was rapidly unfolding and went from a law enforcement scene to the room being on fire,” MacDonald said. “Due to heat, the ammunition in the room was popping off. When our firefighters were there, all of that had already transpired. As soon as we got on scene, fire hoses were pulled off and we started to extinguish the fire.”
McDonald said that firefighters had the blaze under control within 10 minutes of arriving on scene. The ignition source of the fire is still under investigation and firefighters are still tallying the motel’s estimated damages.
“We had one motel room that was completely destroyed, two others that had water damage and one more that had smoke damage behind it,” McDonald said.
APD, AFD, the Humboldt State University Police Department, the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office, Arcata Mad River Ambulance, Humboldt Bay Fire and the Blue Lake, Westhaven and Fieldbrook Volunteer Fire Departments all responded to the scene.
Press release from the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office:
On Dec. 27, 2020, at about 5:30 p.m., Humboldt County Sheriff’s deputies responded to the 3800 block of Walnut Drive, in the county’s jurisdiction of Eureka, to serve a Ramey Warrant for the improper use of 9-1-1.
The suspect, 67-year-old Magdeline Pereira, was wanted on charges of making annoying/harassing phone calls to 9-1-1 after making over 100 non-emergency calls to the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office’s Emergency Communications Center via 9-1-1.
Pereira was taken into custody without incident and booked into the Humboldt County Correctional Facility on 13 counts of annoying/harassing phone calls to 9-1-1 (PC 653X(A)).
The Sheriff’s Office would like to remind the public that utilizing 9-1-1 for non-emergency purposes, including to harass dispatchers, is a misdemeanor punishable by a fine of up to $1,000, imprisonment in a county jail for up to six months, or both. While we recognize unintentional 9-1-1 calls do occasionally happen, often resulting in a verbal warning, abuse of the system is documented and will be forwarded to the District Attorney’s Office for prosecution.
The public is encouraged to utilize the Sheriff’s Office Main Line, 707-445-7251, for all non-emergency calls.
As California continues to ride its worst wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, public health officials have more unsettling news: Four cases of a worrisome, potentially more infectious new coronavirus variant have been detected in California.
The new strain, first detected in the United Kingdom, also has been seen in Colorado and Florida and 33 other countries.
Last week, San Diego County reported it had identified the new variant, called B.1.1.7, in a 30-year-old man with no travel history. Gov. Gavin Newsom announced the discovery in a live streamed event with Dr. Anthony Fauci, a leading national voice in the pandemic. Over the weekend, San Diego county health officials reported three additional cases.
Fauci said this news was expected, since international travel is ongoing and viruses generally mutate. “RNA viruses, they make a living out of mutating,” he said. “The more you replicate the more you mutate.”
However, the lack of travel history in the San Diego case is an indicator that the new form of the virus is circulating among the community, health officials there said.
“What’s really important is that detecting this lineage here doesn’t really change what we need to do other than we need to do it better,” Dr. Kristian Andersen, an infectious disease and genomics expert at Scripps Research in San Diego, said in a news conference. That includes wearing masks and maintaining social distance.
Here’s what Californians need to know about the new coronavirus strain.
How was it discovered?
The new virus variant was first reported by England’s public health agency following a surge of cases in the southeastern part of the country. The first two samples were discovered in Kent and in London in September.
While mutations in viruses are common, this particular strain stood out because it carries more genetic changes than is typical, according to researchers.
What’s the concern with this coronavirus variant?
Public health officials say the new strain seems to be more easily transmitted than the standard form of the virus. This means people who are exposed are more likely to become infected.
Dr. Mark Ghaly, California’s health secretary, explained it like this in a recent news conference: “For COVID to enter a human cell, it needs to bind to a receptor, a sort of front door on a human cell,” he said. “And the new, mutated COVID virus seems to bind a little tighter, a little more easily and enter the cell of the human body easier than our current COVID virus.”
It remains unclear how this mutant form of the virus has contributed to the current surge in California. Officials have said its prevalence here is still likely low. On Dec. 21, Ghaly said that California had been checking thousands of specimens daily over the last month, looking for mutations.
“We’re concerned because of the unknowns,” Ghaly said. “We’re concerned that we aren’t sure how this impacts the broadscale efforts to contain and mitigate the virus as it exists now.”
What is California doing in response?
The California Department of Public Health said health care providers are collecting specimens for genetic sequencing, and the state is analyzing samples suspected of being variant strains.
“As variants and mutations are found, that information is used to inform public health decisions and critical information is shared with the public,” the department said in an email.
Two variants that share some mutations with the UK variant also have been reported in South Africa and Nigeria, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
“We know there’s more. We don’t know how many,” said Andersen, the infectious disease expert in San Diego. “Its prevalence for now is relatively low.”
Will it make me more sick?
Right now, there’s no evidence that this new COVID variant has a higher fatality rate or causes more severe illness than the currently predominant strain, according to the CDC. A recent UK government study compared patients infected with the new variant to those with the predominant strain and found no statistically significant differences in severity of illness, deaths or reinfection. Scientists around the world are still studying the UK variant, however, and more answers may come soon.
Will currently authorized vaccines protect against this new strain?
Scientists believe they will. Fauci told Newsom last week that the variant “doesn’t seem to evade the protection that’s afforded by the antibodies that are induced by vaccines.” But scientists are testing the variant against the currently authorized vaccines made by Pfizer and Moderna.
The CEO of AstraZeneca, which is developing another COVID-19 vaccine candidate, told the London Times that the company’s scientists believe the vaccine will protect against the new variant. But some scientists believe it’s possible that the UK variant, or future variants, may prove tougher for vaccines to overcome.
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CalMatters COVID-19 coverage, translation and distribution is supported by generous grants from the Blue Shield of California Foundation, the California Wellness Foundation and the California Health Care Foundation.
CALmatters.org is a nonprofit, nonpartisan media venture explaining California policies and politics.
Press release from the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office:
On Dec. 28, 2020, at about 4:55 p.m., Humboldt County Sheriff’s deputies were dispatched to a business on the 38900 block of State Highway 299 in Willow Creek for the report of a disturbance occurring inside.
Upon further investigation, deputies learned that a male suspect, later identified as 22-year-old Thomas William Carlson, had reportedly approached three male victims outside of the business. At some point Carlson and the men became involved in an altercation, during which time Carlson reportedly retrieved a hatchet and began threatening the victims. Carlson then reportedly stole a backpack from the men and fled into the business. The three victims reportedly followed Carlson into the business to retrieve the stolen property, at which time law enforcement was contacted.
Carlson was taken into custody without further incident and was booked into the Humboldt County Correctional Facility on charges of robbery (PC 211), assault with a deadly weapon other than a firearm (PC 245(A)(1)) and criminal threats (PC 422).
Anyone with information about this case or related criminal activity is encouraged to call the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office at (707) 445-7251 or the Sheriff’s Office Crime Tip line at (707) 268-2539.
The Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office needs the public’s help to locate missing person Heather Marie White.
Heather Marie White. | HCSO
White, age 36, was reported missing to the Rio Dell Police Department after she was last seen exiting a vehicle approximately 4 miles up Monument Road on December 27, 2020. White reportedly was in an altercation with an occupant of the vehicle and left on foot, walking west on the road. She has not been seen or heard from since.
In the afternoon of January 2, 2021, the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office was contacted by the Rio Dell Police Department regarding White’s missing person status and last known whereabouts.
On January 3, the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Special Services Unit, along with the Sheriff’s Search and Rescue Posse and the United States Coast Guard (USCG) Sector Humboldt Bay conducted a search of the area in which White was last seen. Teams searched the area utilizing trained ground crews, a USCG helicopter and utility terrain vehicles. Teams were unable to locate White, nor any further information regarding her possible whereabouts, following an extensive search.
Heather White is described as a white female, approximately 5 feet 6 inches tall, 180 pounds, with dyed magenta hair and green eyes. White was last seen wearing a green and blue jacket, and blue jeans.
This investigation is ongoing. Anyone with information for the Sheriff’s Office regarding White’s possible whereabouts should call the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office at (707) 445-7251.
The Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office would like to thank the Sheriff’s Search and Rescue Posse and the United States Coast Guard Sector Humboldt Bay for their assistance with this search.
