Democratic Assemblymember Ash Kalra is proposing a bill to jump-start the process, but Big Medicine will fight to kill it. By Mark Kreidler for Capital & Main The COVID-19 pandemic has brought all sorts of uncomfortable truths to the surface in California. Minority and lower-income communities, with families who live and work in conditions that produce worse health outcomes overall, have been ravaged by the virus. Testing and vaccination distribution efforts have been wildly uneven. While wholly ignorant of the science, the politicization of the COVID-19 vaccine and basic safety measures like masking have hindered even the most organized efforts to prevent the spread of disease. And for those who’ve long considered the state’s health care system broken, the pandemic’s march has reminded them why they’re working to change it. “I often say that the pandemic didn’t create the inequities we see, but it certainly exposed and exacerbated them,” said Democratic California state Assemblymember Ash Kalra. “A lot of people have woken up to the fact that our health care system is not only inequitable, but there are a lot of people suffering—affected by COVID and dying from COVID—because they don’t have the same access to health care as others in our state.” Read more