Culver City Coronavirus: Most Of First Responders Now Vaccinated

CULVER CITY, CA —Some good news for Culver City: 92% of the Culver City Fire Department’s first responders have received both doses of the COVID-19 vaccine. However, no vaccination location is available yet in Culver City.

This high vaccination rate provides another layer of protection to Culver City firefighters and the Culver City community, city officials said this week.

"CCFD is grateful to Southern California Hospital at Culver City in partnering with the Fire Department," officials said.

"The city continues to work with Public Health to set up a local vaccination site," city officials said in a statement. "In the meantime, several Culver City firefighters have volunteered their off-duty time to assist at the five county vaccine distribution centers."

Some relief is also coming for Southern California Hospital at Culver City and front-line health care workers in Los Angeles County, health officials announced this week, as hospitalizations have started to decline across the county.

It’s a striking difference from the surge the Culver City hospital has seen in recent weeks with an increased number of COVID-19 patients from earlier this month and in December.

The Los Angeles County Department of Public Health has confirmed 262 new deaths and 8,512 new cases of confirmed COVID-19. There are currently 7,263 people currently hospitalized with COVID-19, and 23% of these people are in the ICU. To date, Public Health has identified 1,046,021 positive cases of COVID-19 across all areas of L.A. County and a total of 14,641 deaths. Last week, the seven-day average of new cases was 15,182. This week, the seven-day average of cases is 10,560, a decrease of 30 percent. Hospitalizations have also decreased this week, down 7 percent since last week Thursday.

Hospital staff is managing with a variety of resources, hospital officials told Patch.

"Although this is a challenging time for all hospital staffs, we are continually amazed at the personal sacrifices our staff makes to care for our Culver City community," officials said.

"They truly are frontline heroes. To support them, we have a large stock of PPE, provide regular testing, offer vaccinations, and provide free hotel rooms for those who don’t want to go home and potentially expose family members."

These moves have helped staff at Southern California Hospital at Culver City manage the tough job.

“It clearly demonstrated to me that this is more than just a job for our employees,” CEO Mike Klepin told Patch. “It’s a commitment to take care of our community, and it showed every time they came into work.”

The battle isn't just among health care workers but also cleaning staff at the hospital, Klepin said.

“Housekeeping went through extensive training on the new standards for deep cleaning and disinfection to prevent the spread of COVID-19," Klepin said. "Case management and social work came up with solutions to the many issues that tend to arise in a rapidly evolving healthcare environment. Administration found ways to acquire more staff when needed and help employees take days off to prevent burnout."

The hospital layout has also changed amid the pandemic.

“We also created a COVID wing on our behavioral health unit to help COVID-positive patients continue with their mental health care," Klepin said.

This week, Los Angeles County residents who are 65 years old and older can now register for COVID-19 vaccination appointments.

The vaccine supply is still extremely limited, and Los Angeles County continues to urge people to stay patient as the county works urgently with both the federal and state government to expand capacity and supply in the weeks ahead.

The county has opened five large capacity vaccination sites across the County. These large-scale vaccination sites started operating Tuesday and will be able to vaccinate approximately 4,000 people per day at each site, significantly increasing the number of people vaccinated. The large-scale vaccination sites will aim to vaccinate 500,000 Los Angeles County residents in a month.

People can visit the Vaccinate LA County website to learn more about the vaccine, the vaccination distribution process, and to schedule your appointment.

Due to demand, the statewide vaccine reservation system went down for several hours Tuesday afternoon. Thousands of people did schedule vaccination appointments despite the technical problems. Public Health could add additional slots later this week and additional slots may open if people cancel their appointments. Continue to check the Vaccinate LA County website for updates.

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