The numbers from the holiday weekend are in – and the East Bay Times reports that California has broken every record for new coronavirus cases. Obliterated them, actually. The California Department of Public Health reported more than 230,000 new cases on Tuesday, more than twice as many as has been reported in a single day before.

The Los Angeles Daily News reports that number of COVID-19-positive patients in Los Angeles County surged well above the 2,000 mark on Tuesday, Jan. 4, amid a surge in infections that has seen daily case numbers skyrocket over the past two weeks. According to state figures, there were 2,240 COVID-positive patients in county hospitals as of Tuesday, a jump from 1,994 on Monday. Of those patients, 303 were being treated in intensive care, an increase from 278 a day earlier.

The Marina Del Rey WCAB notified litigants that the office would suspend in-person trials this Monday and Tuesday due to COVID concerns, however they commenced again by Wednesday January 5.

The Los Angeles Times reported Tuesday that Los Angeles County, still in the midst of a surge in violent crime, will suspend all criminal trials for two weeks due to the challenge of dealing with the omicron variant of the coronavirus, according to presiding county Judge Eric Taylor.

The news came a day after a panel of judges ordered the suspension of all federal trials in Los Angeles, Riverside and Orange counties. There was no timetable given for a return to normal operations in the federal court system.

And in another story, the Times reported that the L.A. healthcare system has been hit with widening staffing shortages as workers get coronavirus.

ABC News reports that the 79th annual Golden Globes will be held Jan. 9 at the Beverly Hilton in Beverly Hills, California — the same location as usual — but this year there will be no audience, no red carpet and no media credentials provided for journalists to cover the event

Down south, the San Diego Union-Tribune reported that unprecedented numbers of sick medical staff are causing gridlock in hospitals across San Diego County. Chris Van Gorder, CEO of Scripps Health, said that 14.5% of the health system’s workforce, about 700 workers, were out Tuesday afternoon. “I’ve never seen a staffing issue this serious before,” Van Gorder said.

Further north, in San Francisco, the San Francisco Chronicle reports that more than 600 classrooms in San Francisco were without their teachers or aides Tuesday and with only 157 substitutes available, every district employee with a teaching credential was ordered to take a class, including the superintendent and other high-ranking officials.

San Francisco’s dramatic rise in omicron cases is straining the city’s essential services, according to the Chronicle, as hundreds of police officers, firefighters and transit operators began the new year under quarantine due to exposure or in isolation due to a positive COVID test. As of Tuesday, 167 San Francisco police officers, 135 Fire Department personnel and 85 employees in the city’s Municipal Transportation Agency were in quarantine due to a COVID exposure.

And Politico reports that when President Joe Biden took office last January amid a winter Covid-19 surge, he vowed an all-out federal assault aimed at vanquishing the virus. A year later, with the country facing unprecedented levels of disease once again, his administration is now hoping to fight it to a draw. The new strategy has been defined as “a manage-not-contain Omicron game plan.”