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In November 2021, the City of San Diego handed over responsibility for its ambulance services to Falck. The private ambulance provider promised to improve ambulance response times across the city. However, it has fallen short of its lofty goals. The city is now taking action to ensure that San Diegans will be able to get to the hospital on time.

Under the new plan, the city will handle billing and staffing for Falck. It will also be able to hire other companies, meaning that Falck will no longer be an exclusive provider. While the city is still working on the plan, it’s safe to say that things will change in San Diego soon.

Notably, the city is not going to take complete control of ambulance services in the city. In other major California cities, like Los Angeles, the city completely operates all ambulances. The paramedics who work in ambulances are all city employees. That will not be the case in San Diego, where the city is simply becoming more involved in Falck’s services. And it’s a good thing that it’s doing so, because Falck was falling short.

San Diego was unsatisfied with Falck’s ambulance services.

When the city of San Diego awarded Falck its contract, it came with some expectations. Falck promised to provide over 1,000 hours per day of ambulance coverage. That came with the requirement to have the proper amount of medical staff to cover those hours.

Falck has failed to meet those conditions of its contract. It usually provides around 950 hours of coverage per day. While that’s an improvement over San Diego’s last ambulance company, it does represent a breach of its contract with the city.

Negotiations over the transition are ongoing and should continue for a while. Once the city and Falck reach an agreement, implementation of the new plan will take a few months. In the interim, Falck will work side-by-side with another provider to help cover San Diegans.

The number of COVID-19-positive patients in San Diego County hospitals has decreased by 20 to 441, according to the latest state figures.

Of those patients hospitalized as of Saturday, 46 were being treated in intensive care, down five from a day earlier.

There were 220 available ICU beds Saturday, down four from Friday.

San Diego Count has the second-highest number of coronavirus patients in the state, behind Los Angeles County’s 1,202.

Meanwhile, the number of new COVID-19 cases remained fairly steady this past week, but county officials warned that an influx from holiday gatherings was likely in coming days.

San Diegans must take caution over the winter months during indoor gatherings, including masking, washing hands often, staying home when sick and home testing.

COVID-19 vaccines, including bivalent boosters, and flu vaccines were widely available at local medical providers and pharmacies. The county continues to offer vaccinations throughout the region at its vaccination sites.

The COVID vaccines do not necessarily prevent people from contracting or transmitting the virus, but health officials say they offer protections against serious symptoms and possible death.

In the past week, the county Health and Human Services Agency reported 21 additional COVID deaths and 4,714 new infections — compared to 15 deaths and 4,537 the week prior. Thursday’s data increased the county’s cumulative coronavirus totals to 967,078 cases and 5,662 deaths.

According to an HHSA report, 80.5% of eligible San Diegans have received their two-shot primary vaccinations, and 21% of all eligible San Diego residents 5 years and older have received the new bivalent booster.

Flu numbers are on a downward trend, with one additional death and 643 cases reported in the past week, compared to two deaths and 906 cases the previous week. The county’s cumulative total increased to 30 deaths and 20,030 infections — compared to 1,253 at the same time last season and a 3,144 prior 5-year average during the same week.

But what about the new sub variant?

What about it? Don’t worry! It’s an Est-Coast exclusive.

XBB coronavirus subvariants — especially one tagged XBB.1.5 — are fast becoming the most prevalent types circulating in the United States. But that is not yet the case in San Diego County or most of the West.

San Diego’s latest readout of coronavirus genetic surveillance, posted this week by SEARCH, a consortium of local research labs, indicates that 8 percent of genetic material decoded from wastewater samples taken on Dec. 28 are XBB strains. That’s roughly the same number that has appeared in recent readings, with 5.5 percent recorded on Dec. 27 and 9.1 percent on Dec. 26.

There’s a brand-new vending machine making the rounds at Riverview International Academy. It’s incredible, honestly. Because it’s a brand-new addition of books for the local student body in the local school district. The machine definitely tilts the industry on it’s head. All because there’s an initiative for the students that want to receive a gold token. All while there’s a new machine that dispenses books. Crystal Grobner, the leader of the Riverview Parent Teacher Student Association, believes that this will be a great motivator for students who want to improve their behavioral skills. In a statement, she said that “The idea of having a book as a prize as an award, and something exciting that you get to choose and put a coin in and get a book in return, we think that extra layer of excitement about books is really important at our school.”

Using triple-immersion curriculum, the school provides books with three different languages: English, Spanish and Mandarin.

Teachers are always pushing for more students to learn and what way for them to do so is better than receiving free materials?

The teachers choose which of the kids are able to choose from the free book vending machine, but do so while showing an example of equity. In other words, all students are mandated to earn a token for every school year.

Global Vending Group, in charge of creating enough book vending machines for 500 schools all over the USA, state how the system is so popular, there’s a wait list that takes months to endure

And that is certainly a delight to hear as boys and girls all over the San Diego county get more enthusiastic about reading through the very surprise of reward. It’s a great initiative that empowers the youth of today to adopt the habits of tomorrow. All a very forward interest to put on children. One would say that the San Diegans of the future are always pushing to be well-read, without having to worry about finances. If more people realized the value that came with reading, they would know that it improves cognitive thinking and would therefore think twice before scrolling wocial media incessantly.

If knowledge is power, access to free education is the fuel. And using a vending machine a valuable means of reading allows for some stylistic quirkiness to be often unforgettable when Riverview International Academy is remembered by alumni.

Startups all over San Diego have continuously been built right up to global financial markets, thanks to a growing amount of venture capital flowing to local companies, while creating about 60 percent comparisons to the similar quarter in the past year. However, it didn’t turn out to be a bad result. All because startup funding, plummeted through 2022 from the record highs of the last year. Firms all over the area have been able to raise about $1.04 billion in funding through third quarter, as exactly to the Venture Monitor’s specificity to snapshots of fundraising by the National Venture Capital Association and Pitchbook, being an industry research firm.

Huge funding rounds come from various companies like Capstan Therapeutics, RayzeBio, software firm Drata and battery materials outfit Wildcat Discovery while propping up the region’s total venture capital haul, throughout tough times for financial markets. The third quarter ranks as the 10th highest quarterly total for San Diego venture capital investment since Venture Monitor would publish data in 2014.

These type of developments bring hardship for the whole industry of San Diego Startups.

The San Diego region has about the eighth spot across the nation for venture capital raising in the third quarter alone. All following San Francisco, Los Angeles, San Jose all according to Venture Monitor. The region handles around 10 metropolitan areas for startup funding, all with thanks to dual pillars of technology companies and life science firms.

Straight out of the pandemic, the financial markets drove record investment in startups in 2020 and 2021, through hot sectors such as subscription software, fintech, health care and logistics. Entrepreneurs throughout San Diego were in turn able to pull in about $9.6 billion dollars in 2021. This being up 55 percent from years earlier. In regards to 2022, however, the stock market falling low had sidelined plenty of public stock offerings. That, being the key vehicle for venture capitalists to go ahead and cash in on invesments for young companies. In the past year, there had been about 416 companies that had gone public. In the past year, only 83 were IPO, according to Tim Holl, who was an audit partner with EY in San Diego.

EY, formerly Ernst&Young, operated in San Diego for a while. Of course, mergers, being the alternate avenue for venture capitalists to book, have totally slowed down, according to Venture Monitor. Exit values have been on the way to lower levels since 2016. Though not from a lack of trying, startups have brought up about $3.7 billion in funding, down from $8.1 billion for the same period last year.

In our county, avocado growers have been facing tough circumstances while showing the result of a heightening cost of water coupled in ongoing heatwaves and drought. The crop is likely to generate just about $82.8 million through the region within the past year, all down from the $152.9 million in 2020. All according to the yearly crop report. It’s likely the first time that avocado fruit have only been able to generate less than $100 million per year since 1996.

The productivity has been the biggest issue facing avocado growers in 2021. All while trees have produced an average of 2 tons per acre. Down from 4 tons an acre within the year before. The amount of land which has been equally harvested. The crop’s value has bumped up right to $3,117 per ton.

But where did this come from?

For starters, a lack of precipitation played a major role, being that because of the absense of raine, San Diego has essentially recorded around two years of less than satisfactory below-average precipitation while farmers have been absorbing the impacts. In which case, there’s hopes that a wet winter will re-up the avocado production in a major way. Growers are always needing to irrigate from year round. Which, in itself costs more but also doesn’t flush salts from the ground as effectively.

While California handles record dry conditions, there’s also been another threat from the weather. Heatwaves. They’ve made it way difficult for growers in the county. Of course, the rise in temperatures caused trees to shed avocados as they’re ripe. It’s typical for 100-degree temperature to occur for August heats. But for an occurrence to happen about four-or five days in a row. Avocado farmers are increading land from production as the cost of water has risen to unbelievable heights. Growers have therefore in turn, harvested about 14,458 acres from last year. Down from beyond 26,000 acres in 2007. As a result, the cost of water has tripled. Beyond a year, the Fallbrook Public Utility District and Rainbow Municipal Water District have been cutting ties with the country’s wholesaler: San Diego County Water Authority. Those agencies are joining forces with the Eastern Municipal Water District in Riverside County, where water rates are likely to be less volatile.

This is in hopes that agriculture is stabilized. The demand has dropped across the last two decades from 20,000 acre feet a year to nearly about 8,000 acre feet a year. Any acre foot is just enough to cover an acre a food deep, approximately 325,851 gallons. Water authority officials believe that savings shown by the water agencies are just too short-lived while, joining Eastern could expose agencies to state drought restrictions.

On the opposite side of the spectrum, the bigger cash crops included bedding plants, perennials and cacti as well as succulents, all according to the report. They would supplant ornamental trees and shrubs, as they have been for the past 12 years. However, honey and beeswax would suffer from an even bigger decline, as only a little of the overall farm economy still fell 85 percent, no thanks to the drought stopping bees’ from making honey.