March 25 - Updates on COVID-19

CAMPUS SNAPSHOT

A high sun gleams over the arts school. Photo by Steve Zylius

TODAY'S CAMPUS UPDATES

Bren vaccination: appointments required

UCI Health will continue to serve our community this weekend by vaccinating eligible individuals, as described in the county’s distribution plan. Please note that vaccines will be distributed by appointment only, and walk-ups cannot be accommodated due to limited vaccine supply. Appointments may be made through California’s myturn.ca.gov or a link in an invitation email. For additional UCI Health vaccination updates, click here.

No Friday newsletter

In observance of tomorrow’s Cesar Chavez Day holiday, this newsletter will take Friday off and return Monday. Have a wonderful weekend.

Vacation accrual cap resumes June 30

The temporary lifting of vacation accrual maximums for policy-covered staff employees will end June 30. To keep accruing vacation after that date, please use vacation time to stay below your accrual maximum. And please note that for employees reporting time on a monthly basis, leave is reported in arrears and leave taken in a current month is reported and processed the following month. Leave balances can be viewed on UCPath or via TRS.

No new campus cases*

No student residents or on-campus employees tested positive for COVID-19 on Wednesday. For more information, visit the UCI COVID-19 dashboard.

UCI COVID-19 NEWS AND EVENTS

UCI will pool UC COVID-19 data into a federal platform

UC hospitals have received a $500,000 grant from the National Institutes of Health to transfer their COVID patient information into a centralized data resource. Easily accessible, centralized records will facilitate further research into the disease.

GENERAL COVID-19 NEWS

This section curates noteworthy coronavirus news, trends and opinions. No endorsement by UCI is implied. Note: Some news sites require subscriptions to read articles. The UCI Libraries offer free subscriptions to The New York Times, Wall Street Journal and OC Register for students, faculty and staff.

All Californians 50 and older eligible for COVID vaccine April 1

Gov. Gavin Newsom announced today that everyone age 50 and older will be eligible for a vaccine in California starting April 1. On April 15, the state will open appointments to Californians 16 and older.

A bad news bias in COVID coverage

Virus coverage by U.S. publications with a national audience was much more negative than it was in any other source, including scientific journals, major international publications and regional U.S. media, according to a new study.

$81 billion in funding will go to resuming in-person classes

On Wednesday, President Biden announced the release of $81 billion in funding for school reopenings, part of the administration’s efforts toward getting the majority of K-12 institutions opened in his first 100 days in office.

All Californians will be eligible by end of April

According to California’s vaccine dashboard, more than 15.5 million doses have been administered statewide. Roughly 13% of all Californians are now fully vaccinated, and all Californians are slated to be eligible for a vaccine by the end of April.

Benefits of AstraZeneca vaccine outweigh any rare reactions, WHO chief scientist says

Reports of extremely rare blood clots should not deter governments from distributing the AstraZeneca vaccine to their citizens, according to the World Health Organization.

HOPE, INSPIRATION, LAUGHTER

Amid the heartbreaking loss of life and economic hardship wrought by the coronavirus, we recognize the need for stories of kindness, hope, courage and humor.

Walrus took a nap on an Arctic iceberg — and woke up in Ireland

Oversleeping is a bad idea, even for walruses. A young walrus apparently fell asleep on an ice floe and drifted at least a thousand miles from the North Pole to Ireland.

Los Angeles now has a road map for 100% renewable energy

If all goes according to plan, L.A. could become one of the country’s first major cities to nearly eliminate fossil fuels from its power supply. In a first-of-its-kind study, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory concluded L.A. is capable of achieving 98% clean energy within the next decade and 100% by 2035.

#UCIconnected

Matthew Hanson, new ventures director at UCI Beall Applied Innovation, shares his interpretation of “double-masking.”

If you have a shoutout, or if you’d like to share what you’ve been up to during the pandemic, send photos and/or words about your activities, workstation, volunteering, etc., to marketing@uci.edu or post on social media with the #UCIconnected hashtag.

EXPOSURE NOTIFICATION

* Potential workplace exposure: UCI provides this notification of a potential workplace COVID-19 exposure. Employees and subcontractors who were in these locations on the dates listed may have been exposed to the coronavirus. You may be entitled to various benefits under applicable federal and state laws and University-specific policies and agreements. The full notification is available on the UCI Forward site. If you have been identified as a close contact to a COVID-19 case, the UCI Contact Tracing Program will contact you and provide additional direction.