A massive storm rolled into northern California on Thursday, knocking out power, flooding highways and toppling trees.
Strong winds contributed to the death of a 40-year-old homeless man who had been sleeping on a trail when a tree fell on him. An elementary school student survived in what local officials called a miracle after an 80-foot tree fell on him. He is listed in good condition at a hospital.
“It’s a big storm, as we expected, and it’s headed south with very powerful winds and heavy rainfall,” National Weather Service meteorologist Will Pi told Fox News.
Parts of Southern California that are prone to mudslides have been evacuating ahead of the storm. At least one apartment complex was entirely evacuated because of previous slides in the area. Lumberjacks in the San Bernardino National Forest were putting concrete weights on lumber stacks to keep them from collapsing from the high winds.
Many stores have been blocking their doors with sandbags in anticipation of flooding.
California officials are concerned about the San Bernardino Mountains because of the wildfires in the last few years that has devastated the vegetation and made the land primed for major mudslides.
The storm is also expected to dump feet of snow in the mountains and ski resort operators say they expect to have over three feet of new snow by the weekend.
Protesters upset over the death of a convicted criminal while he had been resisting arrest and another who attempted to take a police officer’s gun to shoot him blocked a California highway for hours Monday night.
The protesters had been marching through Berkeley in a mostly peaceful protest although some businesses suffered broken storefront windows. After a short time, the protesters jumped a fence and blocked Interstate 80.
The protesters continued to block the highway despite a heavy police presence forcing police to stop traffic on the highway for the safety of the protesters.
The protesters were shouting, “Shut it down for Michael Brown.”
The protesters also forced an Amtrak train to stop. The California Highway Patrol said they arrested over 150 protesters on a variety of charges.
Despite the damage and delays caused to others not connected to the Michael Brown or Eric Garner situations, protesters continued to insist the protests were only peaceful.
“I want to tell you this is a peaceful protest,” said Nisa Dang, an African-American student at U.C. Berkeley. “I want to also say this is a protest for black students, for black bodies. If they want to take the lead, let them take the lead.”
Berkeley’s mayor told the New York Times he was disappointed in the protests.
“It’s ironic that the place with probably the strongest supporters is being trashed,” said Tom Bates. “What we have are a lot of people who are outside agitators who want to disrupt and cause violence with the police.”
“[I am] totally devastated and disappointed,” Bates added. “What could have been peaceful deteriorated into people attacking the police and doing damage.”
The CDC is confirming that California is in the midst of a whooping cough outbreak.
Doctors say that the outbreak is the worst in 70 years and there is over 1,000 more cases than the last major outbreak in 2010. Over 9,900 cases have been reported and confirmed as of November 26th.
The disease, known as pertussis, is caused by bacteria and is known to run on a 3 to 5 year peak cycle.
“The last time a series of outbreaks occurred across the country, California started the parade,” said Dr. William Schaffner, chairman of preventive medicine at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, told ABC News. “And so this is a harbinger we are fearful of.”
The CDC says that 50 percent of children under a year old who catch the disease need to be hospitalized and up to 2 percent die.
The CDC is requesting that all pregnant women be injected with the whooping couch vaccine with the hope that the injection will pass the protection from mother to child.
Religious freedom attorneys have filed a lawsuit in California aimed at protecting the religious freedom of a first grade student who was harassed by his school for handing out candy canes last Christmas with a message of Jesus.
Isaiah Martinez was told by his teacher “Jesus is not allowed in school” and prohibited from handing out the candy canes.
Advocates for Faith & Freedom filed suit in U.S. District Court to prohibit the West Covina Unified School District from stopping Isaiah’s distribution of the candy canes this year.
“The school has neglected to correct its actions, and after exhausting all options to avoid a lawsuit we were left with no choice but to file a complaint in federal court. We are asking the court to protect Isaiah’s rights and the rights of others like him from having their religious speech censored. Students do not shed their First Amendment rights just because they enter into a classroom,” attorney Robert Tyler said.
There has been no official statement from the school, however attorney James Long with the AFF says the school has made it clear they want only “religious neutrality.”
A series of rallies and strikes took place across the United States Wednesday as nurses spoke out about what they feel are insufficient measures taken for their protection when dealing with Ebola.
National Nurses United, a California-based union, said that hospitals do not have enough hazardous materials outfits that leave no skin exposed to bodily fluids along with air purifying respirators to avoid accidental inhalation of particles.
“Inadequate preparedness for Ebola symbolizes the erosion of patient care standards generally,” National Nurses United spokesman Charles Idelson told Reuters on Tuesday.
Strikes began early in California on Tuesday with over 20,000 nurses taking part in the protests.
Over 100,000 joined the protests on Wednesday including a group that held a vigil outside the White House.
Two nurses who attended to Thomas Eric Duncan in Dallas became infected with the virus and hospital workers told media outlets there were times the nurses did not have adequate protection.
The U.S. Census Bureau released a report Thursday showing that 48 million Americans are living in poverty.
The report says that despite government programs that help the poor, even 16% of children are still living in poverty.
The report from the Census Bureau is different than the standard report because it takes into account living conditions when considering who is in poverty. So while the official national poverty line is $23,283 for a family of four, in major cities the measure could be $30,000 or more.
California’s poverty rate under the new stat review is 23.4%, meaning almost 1 in 4 Californians can’t afford to live in that state’s high costs of living. New York, Florida and 10 other states had increases in their poverty numbers with the new measure.
The biggest factor putting people into poverty is medical bills according to the report.
The mosquito that transmits yellow fever has been found in two locations in Los Angeles County California.
The aggressive mosquito is known for biting in the daytime and was found October 7th and 8th in Commerce and Pico Rivera.
The species, Aedes aegypti, transmits yellow fever along with others such as dengue fever and chikungunya.
“While these debilitating viruses, so far, aren’t locally transmitted in L.A. County, the mosquitoes that can transmit them are now here,” Susanne Kluh, the district’s director of scientific-technical services, said in a statement quoted by the LA Times. “Infected travelers can bring these viruses to Los Angeles County.”
The yellow fever mosquito thrives in urban environments and usually uses small, man-made containers to lay eggs.
Officials speculate the mosquitoes arrived in California through eggs on imported tires or plants.
A baby that was thrown into a trash dumpster by her 13-year-old mother is in good condition after being rescued by movement and rustling in a dumpster.
A man who was looking for recyclables in a dumpster at the Sunnyside apartment complex in Merced, California around 6 a.m. heard some rustling in the trash. At first he thought it was some kind of scavenger animal but when he saw it was a baby he began screaming.
The infant was covered in trash, gnats and flies. Jimmy Alvarez scooped up the child, cleaned her and wrapped her in his T-shirt until he could contact authorities.
“I think she was going to die if we had not found her,” Annett Alvarez told KRCA.
The Los Angeles Time says police tracked down the girl through tips from the public. The mother of the teen said she did not even know her daughter was pregnant. The teen has not yet been charged with any crime but is in the care of Child Protective Services.
Seven California churches have filed suit against the state because they are being forced to pay for abortions.
The California Department of Managed Health Care sent letters to seven insurance companies that refused to offer abortion coverage.
“Abortion is a basic health care service,” director Michelle Rouillard wrote to the seven insurance companies that refused to offer coverage.“All health plans must treat maternity services and legal abortion neutrally.”
The Life Legal Defense Foundation and the Alliance Defending Freedom are defending the churches, claiming the state’s mandate is a violation of the federal Weldon Amendment, which says a state can be forfeited of certain funds if they discriminate against a healthcare provider who does not pay for abortions.
“Forcing a church to be party to elective abortion is one of the utmost-imaginable assaults on our most fundamental American freedoms,” ADF Senior Counsel Casey Mattox also stated in a press release about the matter on Thursday. “California is flagrantly violating the federal law that protects employers from being forced into having abortion in their health insurance plans. No state can blatantly ignore federal law and think that it should continue to receive taxpayer money.”
A publicly funded California university is offering a free online class to promote abortion.
The University of California – San Francisco announced the six week class called “Aboriton: Quality Care and Public Health Implications.”
“I think that if we can inspire even a small portion of the people who take the course to take steps in their communities to increase access to safe abortion and decrease stigma about abortion, then we have been totally successful,” Dr. Jody Steinauer, associate professor of obstetrics, gynecology and reproductive sciences at the University of California – San Francisco, told The Daily Beast who broke the story.
The school claims over 3,000 people have signed up for the class.
The outline of the class shows the pro-abortion propaganda taxpayers are funding.
“Each week’s lectures will incorporate the stories of women who seek abortion in order to better portray abortion significance and rationale,” its outline states. “Other topics will include a brief history of abortion, the clinical aspects of medication and procedural abortions in and after the first trimester, an overview of patient-centered abortion-care, the basics of abortion counseling, the professional obligations of health care practitioners to ensure that women have access to safe abortion care, and the maze of restrictions that make safe abortion care inaccessible to many women.”
