KQED's Forum

A 2020 study found that for every person who dies of COVID-19, at least nine people become bereaved. With more than half a million lives lost to COVID-19 in the U.S., that means more than 5 million people are experiencing grief from the pandemic alone. In her New York Times op-ed, “The Grief Crisis is Coming,” journalist and author Allison Gilbert writes that “we must begin to address the toll” of this grief and its impact on public health. We’ll talk to Gilbert and bereavement researcher Dr. Toni Miles about the rippling effects of grief on this scale and how to address it. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The last time a California governor faced a recall in 2003, there were more than 100 candidates on the ballot. This time around, the gubernatorial recall election is also shaping up to be a circus and not just because of the bear that candidate John Cox brought to a news conference. Well talk about the candidates lining up to replace Governor Gavin Newsom in the recall election later this year, including former San Diego mayor Kevin Faulconer, Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Covering politics has never been easy, but since the Jan. 6 insurrection, the landscape has become particularly difficult for the press. How does the country create costs and accountability for lying and shamelessness in politics? And following four years of Donald Trump, have the rules for press coverage permanently changed? Media critic and New York University professor Jay Rosen joins us to discuss how the press should respond when one party is actively supporting the “Big Lie” -- the false claim that the November 2020 election was stolen.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Gov. Gavin Newsom unveiled his $100-billion “California Comeback Plan” on Monday, which includes a proposal for $600 stimulus payments to a projected two-thirds of Californians, with additional $500 checks to families with children. The plan also proposes relief for rent and overdue utility bills. With a projected $75.7 billion state budget surplus, Newsom has until this Friday to submit his updated budget proposal. On Sunday, the governor announced a plan to increase funding for child and home care.  We’ll talk about his budget plan’s potential impacts both economically and politically ahead of the upcoming gubernatorial recall election. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

As more people get vaccinated and the state opens up, concerns over how to re-enter the social world are front and center. This is particularly true for babies born during the pandemic and toddlers who may have not learned usual socialization skills in the past year. We’ll talk to a pediatrician about what we should expect from kids that young, what you should and shouldn't worry about when it comes to your child’s social behavior and whether some kids are more at risk from lack of socialization opportunities. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The California Public Utilities Commission is debating potential updates to its rooftop solar program to address customer complaints about equity in billing. California’s Net Energy Metering subsidy program, which credits solar panel-owning customers when their systems generate excess electricity, has been contributing to higher electric bills across the state. The “cost-shift” element places an unfair financial burden on customers without solar panels, shifting the ongoing costs for overall maintenance of the state’s electric grid to them. Advocates for reform want customers with solar panels to pay their fair share of system maintenance, while others worry a rule change would decrease incentives to go solar, impacting the state’s clean energy efforts. We’ll discuss the ways California’s solar rules could be reformed and what potential changes could mean for solar energy in the state. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

An old wound was healed last week when former California state Assemblymember and longtime LGBTQ rights leader Tom Ammiano received his varsity letter decades after earning it on his high school track team. During an interview with KQED’s Political Breakdown, Ammiano, now 79, told his story of being denied a varsity letter because of homophobic rhetoric stating, “it’s something that still hurts, even a hundred years later.” A longtime listener was struck by the conversation and reached out to Immaculate Conception High School in New Jersey directly. The president and director of the school had a letter custom-made. His story went viral and since then, Ammiano has gained national recognition for his work in civil rights, education and politics. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Health experts say that while the Bay Area will likely end up with 80% of its population vaccinated against COVID-19, the United States is unlikely to reach herd immunity, a threshold where a high enough percentage of the population is inoculated against the coronavirus to essentially end its spread. Half of the adults in the U.S. have been inoculated with at least one dose, but daily vaccination rates have been dropping. We’ll talk about what this means for the future of the COVID-19 pandemic. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

More than 579,000 people have died of COVID-19 in the United States as of May 2021. Michael Lewis’ new book, “The Premonition,” argues that many would still be alive had the Centers for Disease Control and federal government responded promptly and forcefully in the pandemic’s early days. The book follows the American doctors and scientists who advocated for immediate action and charts the roadblocks they faced, including bureaucratic red tape, for-profit health care and partisan politics. Lewis, known for his books “Moneyball” and “The Big Short,” joins us to discuss where our public health systems went wrong. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Low-wage frontline workers have kept Californians fed and vulnerable populations cared for since the start of the pandemic. And they’ve borne a high cost for their work. A recent study out of UC Merced finds a 30% increase in deaths for essential workers in 2020. We’ll hear about people working in restaurants, grocery stores, home care and other industries who feared losing income -- or their jobs --if they took time off to recover from COVID-19. And as the state moves toward a full reopening next month, we’ll look at lessons learned during the pandemic on how we can better protect and support low-wage frontline workers.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices