California deploys national guard to hospitals overwhelmed by Covid

Rural north and Central Valley have case rates three or four times higher than the rest of the state, exposing stark disparities

The national guard has been deployed to hospitals in rural north and central California, where short-staffed hospitals have been overwhelmed with coronavirus patients - exposing stark disparities within the most populous US state.

Although California has the lowest coronavirus case rate in the country, its agricultural heartland in the Central Valley and its sparse, rural north have case rates that are three or four times higher. National guard medical teams have been deployed to several hospitals in the valley's Bakersfield and Kern counties, and to two hospitals in Shasta county in the far north.