After 9/11, the U.S. enforced stricter control on immigration. This enforcement led to the birth of Homeland Security and ICE, but what is ICE exactly? We explain. USA TODAY

As parts of the U.S. continue to suffer through surges of new confirmed COVID-19 cases, a USA TODAY study found Tuesday that almost half of all states are spiking at a faster rate than they had been in the spring.

Idaho, for example, is adding 20 new COVID-19 cases per hour after it was adding five in early April. This comes as many states have been forced to pause or roll back their plans to reopen their economies in order to mitigate the transmission rate and not overburden health care capacity.

Also on Tuesday, the Infectious Diseases Society of America offered public support for Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation's top expert on infectious diseases, after reports emerged over the weekend that the White House distributed opposition research against Fauci.

On Monday, White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnanydenied launching a campaign to discredit Fauci.

Florida, meanwhile, saw its four-day stretch of new single-day cases of at least 10,000 snapped Tuesdaybut reported a record-high of new single-dayCOVID-19 deaths with 132.

Gov.Ron DeSantis has blamed increased testing for the surge of new cases.

"We have to address the virus with steady resolve. We cant get swept away in fear," DeSantis said Monday at a news conference. "We have to understand what is going on, understand that we have a long road ahead.

Some recent developments:

Today's stats:The U.S. has surpassed 3.4million cases with over 136,000 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University. Globally, there have been 13.2million cases and over 575,000 deaths.

What we're reading:Los Angeles and San Diego schools are going online-only in the fall. Will other districts' reopening plans defy President Donald Trump and do the same?

Businesses and cities across the country are requiring people to wear masks, which some people say infringe upon their individual rights. USA TODAY

A candidate vaccine against COVID-19 developed by the federal government and Moderna, Inc., appears to be safe and to trigger an immune response,according to data released Tuesday from an early phase trial.

But whether that immune response is enough to protect someone from thecoronavirusthat causes COVID-19 remains unclear, according to several experts who reviewed the results.

Moderna's chief medical officer Dr. Tal Zaks said although the protective effect of their vaccine can't technically be known yet, all indications are that mRNA-1273 will be safe and effective.

Zaks said the levels of protective antibodies produced by the trial participants were similar to those found in patients who had recovered from COVID-19, suggesting that the candidate vaccine provides the same protection as an infection. Animal studies also show that mRNA-1273 can protect mice against infection, he said, and trials in primates and Syrian hamsters are underway.

Karen Weintraub and David Heath

The first confirmed case of a mother transmitting the coronavirus to her unborn baby has been reported in France, according to a case study published Tuesday.

French doctors said inthe peer-reviewed journal Nature Communicationsthat a 23-year-old woman was admitted to the Antoine Bclere hospitalin Paris with a fever and a cough when she was more than 35 weeks pregnant.

She tested positive for COVID-19and gave birth to her baby by cesarean section. Presence of the virus also was found in the boy.

After testing positive, the newborn recovered and was discharged from the hospital 18 days later.

Adrianna Rodriguez

Some ofPhiladelphia's most iconic events,including the 2020 Thanksgiving Day and 2021 New Year's Day Mummers parades, as well as thePhiladelphia Marathon and Broad Street Run are among the latest events to be canceled becauseof COVID-19.

Philadelphia Mayor Jim Kenney announcedTuesday the cancellation of all large events on public propertyfor six months due to coronavirus concerns.

The moratorium on publicly-advertised events on public property lasts until Feb. 28, 2021, the mayor said.

Indoor events are capped at 25 people and outdoor events are capped at 50, Kenney said.

Carly Q. Romalino,Cherry Hill Courier-Post

President Donald Trump's administration agreed on Tuesday to rescind its controversial rule barring international students from living in the U.S. while taking classes online, a sharp reversal that came after the White House faced a slew of lawsuits challenging the policy.

A Massachusetts judge announced the decision during a federal court hearing in a case filed last week byHarvard Universityand Massachusetts Institute of Technology.Judge Allison D.Burroughs said the universities' request for a preliminary injunction blocking the rule was moot because the government hadagreed to rescind the policy.

"The Government has agreed to rescind the July 6, 2020" policy, the clerk's notes from Tuesday's session say.

The Trump administration's about-face came a day after 18state attorneys generalsued the Department of Homeland Security over the rule,which would have forced foreign students to leave or face deportation if they were only enrolled in online classes this fall.

Deirdre Shesgreen

About half of American states are adding COVID-19 cases significantly faster than they did inthe springas many states were shutting down, a USA TODAY study found.

Idaho added about five COVID-19 cases per hour in early April. By the middle of May, it was adding less than onecase per hour; now its adding about 20.

Other states and territories adding cases at rates far above their spring peaks: Alaska, Arizona, California, Florida, Georgia, Missouri, Montana, Nevada, Oklahoma, Oregon, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, the U.S. Virgin Islands, Utah, West Virginia and Wyoming.

Individual states and even parts of states have had dramatically different progressions with the coronavirus, as outbreaks that ravaged the Northeast have lulled as Sunbelt states surged.

Arkansas and Wisconsin never had much in the way of peaks or lulls; instead, theyve been steadily increasing. About six states and Puerto Rico are marking levels above springs peak, but not dramatically so.

Most states in the Northeast are far below their spring peaks.

Mike Stucka

Florida reported a record 132 additional COVID-19-related deaths Tuesday, surpassing the previous high of 120 set July 9. The seven-day average for deaths statewide increased to 81.14, more than double the average on July 1 (38.43).

According to the Department of Health, the state added 9,194 novel coronavirus cases Tuesday, snapping a streak of four consecutive days with more than 10,000 new cases reported.That brings Florida's cumulative number of cases to 291,629. The state had reached a record high for new confirmed COVID-19 cases Sunday with 15,300, the most any state has reported in a single day since the pandemic started.

Tuesday was the 21st consecutive day with at least 5,000 positive cases.

The record-breaking daily death total increased the overall toll to 4,409 resident deaths statewide.

Dan DeLuca,Naples Daily News

After reports emerged over the weekend of the White House conducting a campaign to discredit Dr. Anthony Fauci, the Infectious Diseases Society of America issued a statement Tuesday offering publicsupport forFauci.

The only way out of this pandemic is by following the science, and developing evidence-based prevention practices and treatment protocols as new scientifically rigorous data become available," said Dr. Thomas File, president of the IDSA. "Knowledge changes over time. That is to be expected.If we have any hope of ending this crisis, all of America must support public health experts, including Dr. Fauci, and stand with science.

Fauci, who is thedirector of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and the country's top expert on infectious diseases, said he hasn't briefed President Donald Trump in two months.

In response to accusations of a campaign intended to discredit Fauci with opposition research, White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany said Monday "it couldnt be further from the truth" and that Fauci and Trump "have always had a very good working relationship."

France marked Bastille Day with a relatively quiet ceremony at the eastern end of the Champs-lyses. For the first time in 75 years, the annual military parade down the hallowed boulevardto mark the storming of the Bastille fortress in 1789 was canceled. More than 30,000 have died in France, and the country is experiencing a surge in new cases. President Emmanuel Macron saidhe wants masks to be required in all indoor public places starting Aug.1.

"We will be ready in the event of a second wave," Macron said.

Delta Air Lines CEO Ed Bastian, in a stark contrast to most of his rivals,says the airlinemight not have to lay off any workers despite the crushing coronavirus pandemic.Bastian said more than 17,000 employees,or almost 20%of Delta's 90,000 employees, have accepted early retirement offers and thousands more have agreed to voluntary unpaid leave in the fall.Last week, Unitedwarned that up to 36,000 of its employees face layoffs, though its ultimate number will depend on voluntary programs, too. Other airlines are also bracing for heavy fall layoffs as the payroll protections from the CARES Act end.

"Im optimistic if we do have a furlough, its going to be relatively minimal numbers,'' Bastian said Tuesdayon CNBC.

Dawn Gilbertson

Four of the first group of cadet candidates who arrived on campus at the United States Military Academy to begin basic training tested positive for COVID-19 and will spend their first weeks either in isolation or quarantine on campus.Lt. Col. RobertKinneysaid the fourwere screened as part of their reception day Sunday. The 1,200-member class has been brought to campus on three reception days, called "R Day." Cadets began arriving Sunday and the entire class begins military trainingWednesday.

Peter D. Kramer,Rockland/Westchester Journal News

A 42-year-old Tennessee physician who was infected with the coronavirus at a meeting about how to keep the coronavirus from spreading has a passionate message for all to hearwear a mask,avoid crowdsand protect yourself and those around you. Dr. Daniel Lewis was hospitalized in isolation and spent 10 days unconscious while hooked to a breathingmachine. When he finally awoke, he was plagued by hallucinations, blood clots and muscle atrophy that left him unable to walk, eat or go home.

"You dont have to be elderly, Lewis said. Its an apolitical virus that can strike anyone. While there are certain risk factors that may predispose some people to being more ill than others, it can strike people like myself that otherwise were healthy.

Brett Kelman, The Tennessean

Just when many shopping malls had finally figured out how to adapt to the era of digital retail, thecoronavirus pandemic is upending everything.Malls hadturned to dining, entertainment, fitness and personal services a pivot that was supposed to help them survive the Amazon age. But now they face mall anchor J.C. Penney struggling to avoid liquidation, smaller retailers closing or requesting rent relief, and venues such astheaters still temporarily shut down. The result: One in fourmalls to onein twocould go out of business altogether, analysts projected.

Half the nation's malls could be shut down if we cant stop the bleeding, Coresight Research CEO Deborah Weinswig told USA TODAY. That ends up changing the face of America.

Nathan Bomey, Kelly Tyko

The coronavirus pandemic has tacked on hundreds of millions of dollars in unexpected costs to this years election. Dozens of interviews with local election clerks, state officials and advocates by USA TODAY Network, Columbia Journalism Investigations and the PBS series FRONTLINE reveal the countrys patchwork election system is fraying. And a proposal to provide states an additional $3.6 billion in federal money to support cratering election budgets has yet to be voted on by the U.S. Senate. OneChicago nonprofit donated $6.3 million to five Wisconsin cities to help with their electionscosts.

"Local jurisdictions are literally relying on philanthropy to help pull off this election," said Nathaniel Persily, an election law professor with Stanford Law School. "It's like we are holding a bake sale for our democracy."

Pat Beall, Catharina Felke and Elizabeth Mulvey,USA TODAY Network and Columbia Journalism Investigations

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo defended a state Health Department report that declined to blamethousands of nursing home deaths on a controversial Cuomo administration directive requiring facilitiesto take in COVID-19 patients. The reportinstead suggested workers and possibly visitors unwittingly spread the virus.

Cuomo said ugly politics were behind this political conspiracy that the deaths in nursing homes were preventable.Some experts are less certain.Charlene Harrington, a professor emerita of nursing and sociology at the University of California at San Francisco, said it appeared the "Department of Health is trying to justify what was an untenable policy."

The Health Department, early in the crisis, had orderednursing homes to admit medically stable coronavirus patients discharged from hospitals that were overwhelmed by patients. More than 6,000 nursing home residents died. ProPublica reported that New Yorks nursing homes suffered a larger percentage of deaths relative to its total nursing home population than several states that did not have such a policy.

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A Mexican man being held in U.S. immigration custody in Florida died shortly after testing positive for the coronavirus, officials said Monday.

Onoval Perez-Montufa, 51, died Sunday afternoon at a Palm Beach County hospital, according to a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcementnews release. He had tested positive for COVID-19 on July 2 at the Glades County Detention Center in Moore Haven, which is west of Lake Okeechobee. Medical staff at the facility began treating him a day earlier after he complained of shortness of breath.

Perez-Montufa initially entered ICE custody June 15 following his release from federal prison in Massachusetts, where he had served 12 years for cocaine distribution. He was in ICE custody pending his removal to Mexico.

A Salvadoranman died in May after testing positive for coronavirus at a San Diego, California, ICE facility. A Guatemalan man died later that month at a Lumpkin, Georgia, facility.

Will Florida schools reopen?COVID-19 separated this school board member from her preemie. She plans to vote against reopening.

COVID survivors' main symptoms can linger for weeks or even months, causing pain, trouble breathing, nightmares and even organ failure. USA TODAY

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced the state will sendtesting and contact tracing teams to Atlanta as the city's COVID-19 cases continue to rise.

"Mayor Bottoms, we've been watching you and what you've been going through," Cuomo told Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms in a joint video conference Monday. "Anything we can do for you, for the city, we stand ready."

Bottoms responded: "Thank you Governor, and that's exactly what we need assistance with. Testing that gets people results very quickly, and also the contact tracing because we know that's extremely important for us to help slow the spread."

New York was once the nation's epicenter of the pandemic. On Sunday, New York City health officials reported thatno one died from the virus in the city on July 11. Cuomo said Monday thatair travelers from states with high rates of COVID-19 mustprovide their local contact informationor face a penalty of up to $2,000.

Hawaii extends its quarantine until Sept. 1

Hawaii is delayingits plan to allow out-of-state visitors to return to the vacation hot spot by a month because ofan increase in coronavirus cases in the state and on the mainland U.S.

In late June, the governor's officeannouncedthat travelers couldvisit Hawaii beginning Aug. 1, no quarantine required, by presenting a negative COVID-19 test taken within 72 hours of boarding.Without one, passengers arriving from the mainland would have to strictly quarantine for 14 days, a policy in place since March that has scared away most tourists and decimated Hawaii's tourism industry.

Hawaii Gov. David Ige said at a news conference late Monday that the program won't begin until Sept. 1, a decision he said was not taken lightly. "We havealways said that we will make decisions based on the health and safety of our communityas the highest priority,'' Ige said.

Dawn Gilbertson

Where a face mask is required:Many governors are instituting or renewing orders requiring people to wear face coverings in public as cases continue to rise. Is your state on the list?See it here.

Coronavirus Watch:We have a few ways for you to stay informed.Sign upfor our daily coronavirus newsletter here, and come together and share the latest information about the coronavirus, coping with lifestyle changes and morebyjoining our Facebook group.

Where are states on reopening?Some are taking preemptive measures to postpone further phases of their reopening, while others have rolled back their phases to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.See the list.

Contributing: The Associated Press

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Coronavirus updates: Almost half of all states are spiking at a faster rate than in the spring, USA TODAY study finds - USA TODAY

Data from Dutch mink farms hit by the coronavirus may shed more light on a mutation that has spread widely.

By Kai KupferschmidtJul. 14, 2020 , 5:45 PM

Science's COVID-19 reporting is supported by the Pulitzer Center and the Heising-Simons Foundation.

Its only a tiny change. At some point early in the pandemic, one of the 30,000 letters in the genome of SARS-CoV-2 changed from an A to a G. Today, that mutation, at position 23,403, has spread around the world. It is found in the vast majority of newly sequenced viruses and has become the center of a burning scientific question: Has the mutation become so common because it helps the virus spread faster? Or is it just coincidence?

More than 6 months into the pandemic, the virus potential to evolve in a nastier directionor, if were lucky, become more benignis unclear. In part thats because it changes more slowly than most other viruses, giving virologists fewer mutations to study. But some virologists also raise an intriguing possibility: that SARS-CoV-2 was already well adapted to humans when it burst onto the world stage at the end of 2019, having quietly honed its ability to infect people beforehand.

On average, the coronavirus accumulates about two changes per month in its genome. Sequencing SARS-CoV-2 genomes helps researchers follow how the virus spreads. Most of the changes dont affect how the virus behaves, but a few may change the diseases transmissibility or severity.

One of the earliest candidates was the wholesale deletion of 382 base pairs in a gene called ORF8, whose function is unknown. First reported by Linfa Wang and others at the Duke-NUS Medical School in Singapore in a March preprint, the deletion has since been reported from Taiwan as well. A deletion in the same gene occurred early in the 2003 severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) outbreak, caused by a closely related coronavirus; lab experiments later showed that variant replicates less efficiently than its parent, suggesting the mutation may have slowed the SARS epidemic. Cell culture experiments suggest the mutation does not have the same benign effect in SARS-CoV-2, Wang says, but there are indications that it may cause milder disease in patients.

The mutation at position 23,403 has drawn the most attentionin part because it changed the virus spike, the protein on its surface that attaches to human cells. The mutation changed the amino acid at position 614 of the spike from an aspartic acid (abbreviated D) to a glycine (G), which is why its called G614.

In a Cell paper this month, Bette Korber and colleagues at Los Alamos National Laboratory showed that G614 has become more common in almost every nation and region they looked at, whereas D614 is virtually gone (see graphic, below). That might be a sign that its outcompeted by G614, but it could also be a coincidence. Any one mutation may rise to very high frequency across the world, just because of random chance, says Kristian Andersen, a computational biologist at Scripps Research. This happens all the time.

Comparing the spread of different viral variants carrying the two mutations could reveal a difference. The United Kingdoms COVID-19 Genomics Consortium has sequenced 30,000 SARS-CoV-2 genomes, allowing scientists to compare how fast 43 lineages carrying the G614 mutation and 20 with D614 spread. They estimated that the former grew 1.22 times faster than the latterbut the statistical significance was low. Evidence for a difference is weak and if it does exist, the estimated effect is moderate, says evolutionary biologist Andrew Rambaut of the University of Edinburgh.

Researchers have also turned to cell culture experiments. When Korbers group engineered so-called viruslike particles to carry one spike protein or the other, the G614 variant appeared to be more efficient at entering cells. Jeremy Luban of the University of Massachusetts Medical School, who has found the same thing, explains that G614 causes a slight change in the shape of the spike, apparently making it easier for the protein to undergo the structural changes that cause the membranes of the virus and the cell to fuse. Our data looks like its somewhere between three and 10 times more infectious, Luban says. Thats a pretty enormous effect.

That does not mean the mutation has an effect in the real world, says virologist Emma Hodcroft of the University of Basel. In the past, she notes, We have cases where we really thought that we had evidence for a mutation that was changing viral behavior and as more evidence came, it didnt seem to be the case. An increased ability to infect a laboratory cell line may not translate to the billions of diverse cells in a human body, adds Angela Rasmussen, a virologist at Columbia University: Humans arent Vero cells.

A one-base mutation (D to G) in SARS-CoV-2s genome was rare in February but is found in almost every newly sequenced strain today. It may make the virus more transmissible.

Korberet al.,Cell, DOI: 10.1016/j.cell.2020.06.043, Adapted by N. Desai/Science

Animal experiments are another way to probe the effects of G614. One option, virologist Marion Koopmans of Erasmus Medical Center (EMC) says, would be to infect ferrets with it and D614 and look for differences in how much virus they shed. But infections in ferrets only last about 1 week, Koopmans notes. The effect would have to be very big to show up in an experiment like that.

Another idea is to expose uninfected ferrets to animals carrying either of the two variants and see how well they transmit. An uncontrolled transmission experiment has already taken place on Dutch mink farms, where the new coronavirusjumped from humans to minksat least five separate times. Twice it was the D614 variant, and three times G614, Koopmans says. She hopes data from the outbreaks could show whether either one spread faster and wider than the other. But the experiment doesnt have the rigor of a lab study, she concedes. We have a natural experiment here. The study design is not optimal.

Whether G614 is more transmissible or not, it has become the dominant strain and the world is living with it, Rambaut says. Most recent estimates of the virus reproduction numberwhich denotes how well it spreadsare already based mostly on the mutant strain. What we dont know is whether D614 would have been different, Rambaut says.

The attention lavished on G614 may obscure a bigger question, however: With the virus having spread to at least 11 million people worldwide, why arent more mutations that affect its behavior emerging?

Perhaps theres just little selection pressure on the virus as it races through millions of immunologically nave people, scientists say. That could change with the advent of vaccines or new therapies, forcing the virus to evolve. But it could also indicate that the virus has been with people longer than we know, and was spreading before the first known cases in Wuhan, China, in December 2019. The evolution of this virus to become a human pathogen may have already happened and we missed it, Rasmussen says.

Wang thinks a version of the virus may have circulated earlier in humans in southern Asia, perhaps flying under the radar because it didnt cause severe disease. If it happens in a small or remote village, even with some people dying, nobody is going to know theres a spillover, Wang says. The virus could then have infected an animal that was brought to Wuhan and started the pandemic.

At Dutch mink farms, after all, the virus jumped not just from humans to animals, but also back from animals to humans, Wang says. If that can happen in the Netherlands, surely it can happen in a village in Thailand, or in Yunnan province in southern China.

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The pandemic virus is slowly mutating. But is it getting more dangerous? - Science Magazine

Internet entrepreneur Marc Benioff told CNBC Monday that face masks have the potential to eradicate the coronavirus outbreak in the United States.

"Masks are so important," the Salesforce co-founder and chief executive told "Mad Money" host Jim Cramer. "If everyone in the United States wore a mask for 3 weeks just 3 weeks we would not have anymore coronavirus, because there would be no more spread, but people do not want to wear masks."

That issue is one that Benioff, a frequent guest on the evening stock investing show, and Cramer have teamed up to address as the Covid-19 pandemic continues to spread rapidly across the country. The two are sponsoring the Next-Gen Mask Challenge, a contest launched by the global pandemic response coalition XPRIZE Pandemic Alliance.

Evidence suggests that proper mask-wearing can reduce transmission of respiratory viruses, like coronavirus, but a Pew Research survey found one-in-three people in the U.S. reportedly do not wear the protective gear regularly. The Next-Gen Mask Challenge is offering a $1 million prize split to three teams that can design a face mask that the general public will adopt, according to a press release.

The initiative includes resources to mass produce the masks for widespread consumer use as communities try to restore their economies after a lockdown that threw the U.S. into recession. The competition seeks designs that will address the main reasons people refuse to wear masks.

"We expect hundreds, perhaps thousands, of submissions," saidPeter Diamandis, founder and executive chairman of theXPRIZE Foundation. "We're then going to take the top 25 of those and find out [if] they're manufacturable. Once we determine their manufacturability, we're going to take the top 10 of those and go out to influencers" to gauge acceptance.

The eight-month challenge invites young innovators, ages 15 to 24, around the globe to submit ideas that can change people's perspectives about facial masks. A panel of judges and industry professionals will select the grand prize winner, along with two other teams in a shark-tank themed event, Diamandis explained.

"We want masks that are culturally cool to wear, that say something about you, that are functional and then, finally, we're going to be besides testing whether they're functional with our partners, for example at Honeywell, do they provide protection we're then going to a shark tank," to select winners, he said. "The goal here is a new generation, next-generation masks that people wear because they want to wear them, not because they're being forced to wear them."

Read more:

Salesforce's Marc Benioff: Face masks can end the U.S. coronavirus crisis within weeks - CNBC

Pictured in 2019, Okinawa Governor Denny Tamaki on Tuesday questioned U.S. measures to stop the coronavirus from spreading on the island. Behrouz Mehri/AFP via Getty Images hide caption

Pictured in 2019, Okinawa Governor Denny Tamaki on Tuesday questioned U.S. measures to stop the coronavirus from spreading on the island.

Relations between the more than 25,000 U.S. military forces on Okinawa and that Japanese island's 1.5 million residents have long been strained over pollution, crime and overcrowding associated with the 31 U.S. military bases there. Now a new outbreak of COVID-19 cases among American service members stationed on Japan's southernmost territory is fraying things further.

As of Tuesday, 100 new cases of COVID-19 have been detected in the past week at five U.S. bases on Okinawa, according to Japan's independent Kyodo News agency. Beyond those bases, where only three cases had earlier been confirmed, Okinawa has had a relatively low impact from the disease, reporting 148 infections and seven deaths.

At a weekend news conference, Okinawa Gov. Denny Tamaki called the surge of coronavirus cases among U.S. military personnel "extremely regrettable," according to the Reuters news agency.

"I can't help but have strong doubts about the U.S. military's measures to prevent infections," Reuters quotes Tamaki telling reporters, while citing reports of American service members going off base for Independence Day beach parties and nightlife district visits around July 4.

"It is extremely regrettable that there have been a large number of infections among those connected with the U.S. military over a short period of time," The Asahi Shimbun quotes the governor as saying Saturday, "when the Okinawa prefectural government and the public were working together to prevent further infections."

On Tuesday - one day before a slated meeting with the Okinawa governor to discuss the new coronavirus outbreak Japanese Defense Minister Taro Kono told reporters that problems with COVID-19 extend to all U.S. military bases in Japan, not just those on Okinawa.

"We have discovered a number of problems," the Associated Press quotes Kono as saying, while noting that those unspecified problems were found after Japanese officials asked for information from the U.S. military. "We need to more strictly scrutinize the situation with the U.S. military in Japan."

Because a status of forces agreement excludes U.S. military personnel and their families from Japanese jurisdiction, American service members are not subject to a travel ban Japan has imposed on the U.S. and 129 other countries and territories during the pandemic.

On Sunday, in what the Japanese defense minister described as "an extremely grave incident," an American couple and their young daughter who landed at Tokyo International Airport at Haneda were tested for COVID-19 upon arriving en route to a U.S. Marines air base in Iwakuni. Kono said the family had falsely declared they would be traveling to the base by private car, when in fact they took a commercial flight there and were subsequently found to have tested positive for the virus.

Lt. Gen. Kevin B. Schneider, who commands all U.S. forces in Japan, on Saturday extended through Aug. 13 a COVID-19 Public Health Emergency declaration for all U.S. military bases in Japan. That means all clubs, bars, pachinko parlors, as well as flea markets, concerts, restaurant dining, the use of mass transit and gyms off base will continue to be prohibited for American military personnel in Japan.

Two U.S. Marine Corps bases on Okinawa have been placed on lockdown since the latest outbreak. Together, U.S. Marine Corps Air Station Futenma and Camp Hansen account for at least 62 of the known cases.

The Futenma air base, which is located in a densely populated urban area, has been at the center of ongoing controversy over the U.S. military's plans to relocate it to another part of the island. In a referendum last year, 70% of Okinawa voters rejected keeping the air base on the island.

Local officials complain that the U.S. military has not been sufficiently forthcoming about the details of who has been infected and where they have been during the recent surge in coronavirus cases.

"We have no way of knowing whether the large number of infections has made it difficult for the U.S. military to accurately grasp the details or if they have the details but are not disclosing them," an unnamed prefectural government official told The Asahi Shimbun. "We are also worried about whether the U.S. military hospital will be capable of dealing with a situation in which many patients develop serious symptoms."

American forces seized Okinawa 75 years ago in the last major battle of World War Two. The U.S. administered the island until 1972, when its control reverted to Japan. The island accounts for less than 1% of Japan's total land area, but 70% of the land occupied by the U.S. military in Japan is in Okinawa.

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US Forces Test Positive On Japanese Isle Largely Spared By Pandemic - NPR

Attendance in Tulsa fell well short of what officials had publicly touted, and the event was widely seen as a disastrous attempt to reset the campaign in the midst of the President's falling poll numbers. A handful of aides tested positive for coronavirus the day of the rally, and dozens more had to quarantine afterward. Sources close to the campaign say that the fallout shook some operatives' faith in the one area the campaign has always been able to flawlessly execute.

Before the coronavirus hit, campaign officials expected to be holding one to two rallies a week by now. But with cases surging across the country, it's unclear if the campaign will ever be able to work its way up to that pace. And while there are serious questions about whether rallies are the right strategy in the midst of a pandemic, Trump's bullheaded determination to press forward with in-person events is forcing the campaign to find a way.

By contrast, President Barack Obama had an extremely active summer when he was running for reelection in 2012. Obama spoke at 18 campaign events in June 2012 and 27 in July, a mix of private fundraisers and public rallies in swing states across the country.

"I think there is a growing sense of concern that the campaign isn't functioning as we want it to," one donor close to the campaign told CNN in the immediate aftermath of Tulsa.

The value of the rally

The Trump rally is in many ways the central aspect of the President's political brand, and a hallmark of his success as a first-time populist politician. The events offer an essential psychological boost to a President who has always fed on the energy of crowds -- and, now more than ever, is in need of that boost as he stews over his sinking polls and how the pandemic has upturned his political prospects.

"He can't win without rallies," one Trump adviser said, pointing more to the psychological effect of the rallies than anything else. "When he does them, it is a little bit of a release and takes some pressure off of his psyche and him believing that he's not getting his narrative out and everyone's against him."

In the words of a GOP strategist from a crucial swing state: "He needs rallies like a kite needs wind."

That information doesn't just provide a snapshot of the President's biggest fans, it also helps identify potential new voters, including those who rarely vote and are especially valuable turnout targets.

Rallies also provide the campaign with free TV coverage from local affiliates that can amplify the President's message in parts of the country that are harder to reach. It's no accident that Trump has conducted several interviews in recent weeks with reporters from local TV broadcast networks.

Even the campaign seems to recognize that something has been lost with the lack of rallies.

"There is nothing like a Donald Trump rally," said Tim Murtaugh, the Trump campaign communications director. "It is a unique phenomenon in American political history; it is difficult to replicate that experience."

"We're pursuing an all-of-the-above strategy, and our goal is to put President Trump in front of as many patriotic Americans as possible," said Jason Miller, the campaign's top strategist. "Rallies are going to happen. They're going to be bigger than anything Joe Biden is able to pull off this year."

The fallout from Tulsa

Hope Hicks, one of the President's longest-serving aides, warned Parscale against touting ticket request numbers, reminding him that the number one rule in politics is not to overpromise and underdeliver, a source familiar with the matter said. But Parscale forged ahead, tweeting about the 1 million ticket requests the campaign had received.

And other officials estimated before the rally that a maximum of 15,000 people would likely attend, by looking at the ZIP codes of those who had signed up, using data modeling and factoring in the human element: the ongoing pandemic. But Parscale was confident the 19,000-person arena would be packed and the campaign even planned for Trump to address an overflow venue.

Officials say Trump's relationship with Parscale hasn't been the same since.

"He does not like Brad," the adviser said, noting that Trump has taken to frequently cutting Parscale off during meetings and disagreeing with nearly every position he takes -- at times ultimately agreeing with the same position when it is later reiterated by another aide in the room.

"It's very clear that when Brad offers a position, Trump decides to be against it," the adviser said.

In response to questions about Parscale's standing, the Trump campaign sent the following statement attributed to Lara Trump, the President's daughter-in-law and a senior adviser: "He has the confidence of the President and the entire family."

"I think Parscale probably needs to go," said the donor close to the campaign. "I think a lot of folks would feel more comfortable with someone who's actually run a campaign before."

So far, that hasn't happened. The biggest staff change in the wake of the Tulsa debacle: Michael Glassner -- the campaign's chief operating officer, who previously handled rallies -- has been reassigned to deal with legal affairs.

But for other Republicans, the problems are less about the management and marketing and more inherent to the product itself. The candidate and the campaign don't have a good story to tell.

"The rallies are a barometer of voter sentiment," Dan Eberhart, an oil executive and Trump donor, told CNN. "The living embodiment of Trump's slumping popularity."

One Republican strategist working on congressional races said Trump and the GOP need a "choice" election between Trump and Biden that the environment isn't giving them.

"It's all a referendum," said the strategist. "Trump is swinging at ghosts."

Still, some campaign officials remain confident that Tulsa was an outlier -- the result of overhyped expectations and news of campaign staffers testing positive ahead of the rally.

Time is running short

Though there are still four months until the election, some Republican operatives say the campaign is running out of time to turn things around. Given the amount of mail-in and early voting that will happen this cycle, the die could be cast by September, when early voting begins in some states.

Without rallies, the task of bringing swing voters into the Trump fold will fall chiefly to the RNC's traditional ground game operation. Unlike the core Trump campaign team -- Parscale; Trump's son-in-law and senior adviser, Jared Kushner; and the President himself -- the get-out-the-vote side is run by old political hands with years of experience in GOP politics.

That includes veteran operatives such as Katie Walsh Shields, currently the senior adviser for data at the RNC, who spent years working for the party, and Chris Carr, the political director for the campaign and the RNC. Carr worked for the National Republican Congressional Committee during the tea party wave in 2010 and is a RNC veteran.

"This process is much more scientific than it has ever been and it is a lot more accurate," said Rick Gorka, the spokesman for the Trump Victory Fund, the joint operation between the campaign and the RNC. "Voters tend not to just show up organically; you need to find a way to motivate them and convince them to participate. We've never stopped doing that because of this digital operation."

While there has been consternation from donors about several aspects of Trump's reelection campaign, there's more confidence about how well the Trump data operation and the RNC ground game can work together.

On Monday, the RNC and the campaign announced they have now hired 1,500 field staffers, and Trump campaign aides describe the ground operation as the largest ever assembled by a Republican nominee.

"I think it's a lot bigger, a lot more effective, and it's gone local," Doug Deason, a Dallas businessman, Republican donor and Trump fundraiser, said of the Trump and party ground game. "It's a lot more local than it was. It's much more organized. There are a lot more people on the ground, a lot more people on the phones."

Deason, who skipped the Tulsa rally over concerns about Covid transmission and anti-Trump protests, insists that even without the rallies, Trump's base remains solidly behind the President so he can finish the job of disrupting the status quo in Washington.

"He'll be able to really break up and bust up DC in a second term," Deason said of Trump. "All of his base knows that. That's the goal. That's why we hired him. We didn't hire him to be a wonderful role model for our children. We've had that for decades and it hasn't worked."

See the rest here:

Amid rising coronavirus cases, the Trump campaign struggles to get its rally machine going - CNN

The rate of coronavirus infection in England was significantly reduced in the month before lockdown restrictions were lifted, a study has found.

According to the research from Imperial College London, the rate of infection throughout the country was halving every eight to nine days during May.

There were on average 13 positive cases for every 10,000 people, with an overall reproduction number of 0.57 lower than previously reported.

For the study, researchers tested more than 120,000 volunteers aged over five across the country for Covid-19.

About 69% of those who tested positive reported no symptoms on the day of the test or the previous week, though they may have developed symptoms later.

The report provides an insight into who was infected with the virus between 1 May and 1 June, comparing geography, age, sex, ethnicity, key worker status and symptoms.

Beyond the diminished rate of infection, the research found young adults aged 18 to 24 were more likely to test positive than other age groups.

People of Asian ethnicity were also more likely to test positive than those of white ethnicity, while people working in care homes were at greater risk of being infected during lockdown than the general population.

The report also showed anyone who had recent contact with a known Covid-19 case was 24 times more likely to test positive than those with no such contact, emphasising the importance of contact tracing in keeping the spread of the virus under control.

The UK health secretary, Matt Hancock, said the study was crucial to the countrys ongoing battle with coronavirus.

This ambitious testing programme will help us better understand the spread of the virus to date, predict how it may spread in the future and inform our response to the pandemic, he said.

It shows the impact our national lockdown efforts have had and demonstrates that we have taken the right actions at the right time. As a country we have made great strides towards beating this virus but we mustnt take our foot off the pedal, and such studies will be vital as we continue to fight this virus.

The study, which has been upscaled and repeated for June, will undergo peer review before a final report is published.

Plans are under way for a second large-scale study, which will use antibody tests to determine how much of the general public has been infected with Covid-19 in the past.

Read the rest here:

Coronavirus infection rate in England fell sharply month before lockdown lifted - The Guardian

Within the first few weeks of states going into lockdown, reports began flooding in from domestic violence hotline centers throughout the country: They were seeing spikes in calls. But as sheltering-in-place dragged on, the calls for help dropped off. To those familiar with the dynamics of intimate-partner violence, this was not a good thing.

That domestic violence is part of the story of this pandemic is well known: Lockdowns have made it more difficult for domestic violence survivors to distance themselves from their abusers; orders of protection often take longer to come through because courts arent operating at full capacity; experts have viewed the decline in calls for help with alarm, as it suggests survivors might not be able to get away from abusers long enough to reach out.

But if covering domestic violence, which takes place mainly behind closed doors, is difficult in normal times, telling the story of its rise during a time of lockdowns and quarantines poses an even bigger challenge. That is why Christopher Lee, a photographer, opted to focus on the hotline workers. He began photographing them in the Austin, Dallas-Fort Worth and Houston metro areas in May.

According to Dr. Nol Busch-Armendariz, director of the Institute on Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault at the University of Texas at Austin, 38 percent of adult women in Texas in 2011 reported having been in an abusive relationship. The stay-at-home orders have had a severe effect on the most vulnerable women, and domestic violence centers are bracing themselves for the worst.

In Texas, which reported record numbers of daily cases of Covid-19 four times last week, the governor signaled on Friday the possibility of a new economic lockdown if the state cannot curtail its outbreak.

Like so many people around the globe, those who answer phones for domestic violence hotlines are working from home during the coronavirus pandemic. With the benefit of technology, advocates and counselors have been fielding calls, texts and emails from survivors from their kitchen tables and living rooms. Their experiences on one end of these calls help shed light on stories going untold.

Veronica Hernandez, a hotline operator and advocate at SAFE Austin, says shes seen an uptick in reports from a wider array of survivors than usual: men whove been abused, youth whove been trafficked and people whove been hurt by nonromantic partners such as roommates. Shes also sensed that those who call have grown more desperate she hears more frequently from women who are actively fleeing danger or have already had violent interactions with their abuser. Before the pandemic, callers would be more likely to say they had experienced non-life-threatening behavior or abuse, such as emotional or psychological abuse or behavior that could evolve into something violent. Now they are getting calls that go from zero to 60 in an instant.

As the stories have grown more desperate, the work has grown more challenging. Hotline workers who once counted on the commute between office and home to decompress from stressful professional lives no longer have that sense of separation. Bystander trauma is real, said Milisa Alexis-Flores, the managing attorney for the Houston office of Aid to Victims of Domestic Abuse, a nonprofit that provides legal aid to domestic violence survivors. We all experience it doing this line of work when you consume other peoples trauma for a living. Thats just the nature of the job and its always challenging, but its more challenging in a different way when youre doing it at home.

But I at least am still able to try to decompress in the safety of my home, which my client cannot do, Ms. Alexis-Flores said.

These images dont quite shed light on the domestic violence that is currently on the rise in private spaces around the world. What they do highlight is the parallel world of the hotline operators, working from their homes, speaking over the phone to survivors calling from rooms that at first glance probably look very similar; what sets them apart is the danger.

Read more:

The Women Fighting Domestic Violence During the Coronavirus - The New York Times

The disease investigators arrived at the apartment in street clothes, carrying their gowns, gloves and face shields in Whole Foods bags. They didnt knock on the door.

Instead, they called the resident a man in his 50s, then Californias first known coronavirus case by phone. When he answered, he was instructed to move to the farthest corner of the apartment so the team could go inside and suit up.

They had come to the apartment building in Orange County to make sure the man was where he promised to be and that he was isolating there, completely alone.

First case. New virus. We werent going to take peoples word for it, recalled the countys medical director of communicable disease control, Dr. Matthew Zahn, who oversaw the operation.

They asked about symptoms in the patients wife, his child, his recent dinner guest.

So began what by many measures was the most extensive public health campaign in California: a rapid mobilization to identify people suffering from the novel coronavirus and prevent them from infecting others. In the early days, officials didnt know whether this would be a short-term undertaking to prevent community transmission in the state or an epic battle against a once-in-a-century pandemic.

But as the latter scenario played out, California found itself unprepared, overwhelmed and constantly lagging, a Los Angeles Times investigation has found. Those early failures left California far behind in the fight against the coronavirus, and it has struggled to keep up even as cases surge today.

In the beginning, dozens of investigators, called cluster busters, worked each case to try to contain the spread of the coronavirus. They aimed at identifying each strand of transmission and snipping it before the virus could take hold as a sturdy web across communities. They functioned as all-inclusive personal assistants: arranging child care, setting up WiFi, coordinating grocery drop-offs.

But data would later show that, long before the official case count began to climb, the virus was freewheeling. Federal officials grappling with a shortage of test kits issued narrow testing criteria; that meant key local spreaders in the states budding outbreak were going unnoticed and untraced.

Contact tracers were never alerted, for example, to people such as Margaret Cabanis-Wicht and her husband, a 41-year-old movie director in Rancho Palos Verdes who had attended a January gala in Beijing with hundreds from across China.

Twelve days after her husbands return to California, their 5-year-old daughter woke in the night with a 102-degree fever. Cabanis-Wicht had one, too. For days, they hounded their doctors, the state health department and even the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. But the two were ineligible for coronavirus testing because, though living with a potential carrier, they hadnt left the country.

Well never know, Cabanis-Wicht said.

With a positive test result in the household, contact tracers would likely have visited the family, along with each of the children with whom the girl had played. Instead, Cabanis-Wicht watched in horror as school officials soon reported cases of influenza-like illness arising in the elementary school. In early March, a parent of a fellow student finally got a test and turned up positive.

Without a doubt, we were all aware that we were likely missing cases, said Zahn, citing the testing restrictions. We relied on test results. If you werent tested, we didnt identify you.

If the earliest potential spreaders werent eligible for coronavirus testing, how could cluster busters find them in time to curb a full-blown outbreak?

It was a question we were all asking, Zahn said.

Unprepared

The laboratory testing process relied on strikingly inefficient instruments: humans.

The strict protocol approved by federal health officials meant no automation at L.A. Countys public health lab. Lab workers hovered over patient samples, using the plastic droppers known as pipettes to manually extract genetic material from them, one by one.

They loaded samples into the wells of a testing machine that looked more like an outdated LaserJet office printer than the solution to a pandemic. It ran 18 hours a day, seven days a week. Still, by March 11, with infections likely spreading by the thousands, only about 70 peoples specimens had been tested in the Downey lab, the departments director said.

Other counties were worse off. One in four of the states public health laboratories closed entirely in recent years, and there remained less than one public health lab per million state residents. Many reported an annual equipment budget of zero dollars or were under review for closure until couriers began arriving with patient swabs and hand-scribbled test requests.

A technician processes specimens at the UCLA clinical microbiology lab in Brentwood.

(Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times)

Demand for testing surged after about 1,250 Californians who had been on a cruise ship with a coronavirus patient had unknowingly scattered across the state, likely proliferating the spread. Another 9,000 people in California had recently returned from countries experiencing severe outbreaks.

The pileup of samples left the countys testing infrastructure bottlenecked and on the brink of collapse. A county memo asked hospitals to turn away any suspected coronavirus patient with mild symptoms without a test and without reporting the case.

Dont call the public health department, one infection control coordinator wrote in an email to doctors.

The county reported a total of just 29 infections an obvious undercount.

Outmatched

On March 13, a Friday, Steve Rusckowski, the chief executive of Quest Diagnostics, approached the podium in the Rose Garden of the White House. President Trump patted him on the back.

Stephen, Trump said. Great job.

Stephen Rusckowski, chief executive of Quest Diagnostics, discusses the coronavirus at a White House news conference with President Trump on March 13.

(Alex Brandon / Associated Press)

With the testing infrastructure in public facilities crippled, the federal government had turned to private partners to scale up testing. Flanked by industry leaders and members of the federal task force, Rusckowski told television cameras and print reporters that the companys testing process was underway, adding that the number of tests available to the public will be considerably increased in the next few weeks.

It was. That day, Los Angeles County had reported just eight new coronavirus cases overnight; the following Friday, it reported 64 overnight. The one after that, it was 252. By the end of the month, total detection in the county surpassed 3,000 cases.

But unfortunately for Quest and other private players such as LabCorp the growing capacity to detect cases was only as good as supply lines. And quickly, every step in the process showed strain.

For tens of thousands of Californians to receive a coronavirus test, medical staff needed just as many cotton-tipped swabs the simplest piece and yet the No. 1 issue, said Dr. Clayton Kazan, medical director for the Los Angeles County Fire Department and former coronavirus testing coordinator for the county. A common type, called a flocked swab, is typically produced in Italy and China, where the outbreak had paralyzed manufacturing. More than 125 testing sites in California would later report swabs as their primary testing shortage.

Failure was federal, state and local. We all failed.

Dr. Clayton Kazan

After collection, a swab sample was immediately inserted into a plastic screw-top tube filled with transport medium a solution intended to preserve it on its journey. But the fluid was so scant that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration began endorsing the use of basic saline in its place.

Once it arrived at processing laboratories such as Quest or LabCorp, sample preparation required specific chemicals, known as reagents, to extract genetic material from the swab. Without the reagents, Gov. Gavin Newsom said, the test kits were like printers, but without ink.

But Qiagen, a top supplier, quickly fell behind. Patients in intensive care units waited more than a week for results; some nurses had to tell families that, in the pileup, the commercial labs had lost their relatives samples entirely.

Even on their deathbeds, they had no diagnoses.

Reagent manufacturing looked like having a garden hose on hand to fight a wildfire, said Michael Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota. The outbreak in Wuhan, China, demanded a full-blown fire hydrant, he added, and the global spread required virtually a canals worth.

And while states such as New York used expanded testing to screen every nursing home patient, California didnt have the means; about half of deaths in California are from these facilities.

The testing regime failure was federal, state and local. We all failed, Kazan said. If we could go back to January, when we saw what was happening in Wuhan, if we had taken that opportunity to scale ourselves up in anticipation, we could have been more prepared than we are now.

By March 25, Quest alone had 160,000 unprocessed tests about half of all the orders it had received.

The scramble

The backlog reached all the way to the office of Dr. Valerie Ng, the lab director at the Alameda Health System who one day in mid-March found herself piling patient samples into her car for a road trip to the state lab in Richmond. Two separate testing infrastructures had failed her. This was Plan C.

Earlier that month, the pileup at Quest had become insufferable; Dr. Ng had redirected samples to Alameda Countys public health lab. But their aging equipment delivered test results by fax; the head of labs at three hospitals and several clinics found herself relegated to watching for the LOW TONER light to illuminate on the printer.

Issues compounded when the lab equipments test results could not be validated. The deluge of specimens came to resemble the accelerating conveyor belt of confections in the classic chocolate factory episode of I Love Lucy, she said. She began chauffeuring them to Richmond.

When the surge came, it came to the lab, she said in an interview. Were swimming as fast as we can.

Meanwhile, at UC Berkeley, molecular biologist Fyodor Urnov formed what he called SEAL Team Six: hand-selected scientists, physicians and students who had constructed a volunteer lab in a matter of weeks to help relieve Quests backlog. They moved heaven and earth to get government certifications and create a highly automated lab that could run as many as 1,000 patient samples a day, he said.

But when Urnov told nearby hospitals he could provide free testing and results in 48 hours, the hospitals declined, saying their electronic records systems were still entangled at Quest and LabCorp. The volunteers were stunned.

We said, What? Are you kidding me? They have a direct link to a testing provider that has failed, Urnov said. Theres institutional inertia.

Silicon Valley steps in

Fred Turner has always been entrepreneurial. By 17, hed built a DNA machine in his bedroom to figure out why his brother was a redhead. At 20, he dropped out of Oxford to launch his first biotech start-up. And this spring, during an afternoon kicking back at his San Francisco flat, friends of the then-24-year-old talked him into upending his life to address a new problem: coronavirus testing.

Thanks to venture capitalists, Turner, within weeks, was in a hotel room in Southern California blasting out job openings for medical technicians, lab workers and programmers. DM if interested! Turner, the new chief executive of the brainchild, Curative, wrote on Twitter.

Staffers slept in sleeping bags between shifts at their new facility: a former NFL/MLB anti-doping laboratory in San Dimas, its glass walls and biosafety cabinets transformed into the most efficient coronavirus testing operation in the region. By late April, patient samples stuffed inside trash bags were arriving by the truckload on the ground floor of the facility, called KorvaLabs.

Each day, some 350 employees stepped into the assembly lines: sterilizing pouches and scanning bar codes, feeding racks of samples to an automated Tecan extraction robot and transferring plates into almost two dozen viral detection machines with a master mix of chemicals that run in tandem almost around the clock.

Industrial engineers used digital time stamps to track the daily workflow of each step, looking for lags. Were back to Henry Ford, said Dr. Jeffrey Klausner, professor of medicine and public health at UCLA, the medical director of the program.

By early May, California had gone from 2,000 to nearly 40,000 tests per day. The Curative-Korva lab was running 10,000 of them.

Back to the future

Dr. Zahns contact tracing team was back in action, and their caseload by late May was surging. Trading their gowns and gloves for phone lines and shared drives, tracers spend their days staring at computer screens glowing with the ever-growing lists of names.

Dont think Russell Crowe in A Beautiful Mind. Dont think Sherlock Holmes, said Zahn. There is no big opera music in the background. Think less glamorous: Excel spreadsheets.

Californias contact tracers librarians, Peace Corps volunteers and others called infected patients and asked for the phone number of each person theyd recently seen, vowing to keep the identity of the positive case concealed. Those contacts were asked about symptoms, and they, too, were requested to isolate at home.

But the challenges were overwhelming. Los Angeles County, after a massive team scale-up, still had only 1,759 contact tracers for more than 10 million residents, and, in the U.S., there was another unique hurdle: enforcement.

Effective methods to force compliance were in use elsewhere: Taiwan monitored quarantined people with digital fencing that sounded an enforcement alarm whenever one of some 50,000 quarantined citizens ventured too far from home. Contact tracers in South Korea and Singapore kept track of infected people through GPS and Bluetooth data.

But none of those options were available in California. Contact tracers lacked authority to insist that infectious individuals avoid exposing others.

I cant imagine an America where we can replicate exactly what they did in Asia, given the fact that we have freedoms and a Constitution, said Dr. Bob Kocher, a venture capital executive and former member of the governors task force on testing.

And the more contact tracers went about their work, the more their effectiveness was entirely dependent on the one thing they still couldnt control: testing.

The shadow of past failures and the legacy of ones still in the making lingered.

For example, L.A. County health officials in early June were still only about three-quarters of the way through testing residents and staff at the nearly 400 skilled nursing facilities. In jails, another hot spot for the virus, staff have reported running out of the rapid test kits used before booking new inmates. In rural towns and inner-city neighborhoods, California is scaling back its testing expansion, citing costs.

And, in a startling dj vu to the outbreaks inception, L.A. County public health officials on Wednesday limited the criteria for testing due to dwindling supplies. The ever-fragile testing infrastructure is once again threatened by shortages of swabs, reagents and, curiously enough, those tiny plastic pipette tips that lab workers had wielded by hand in the Downey lab.

The droppers now work robotically, but the plastic needed to manufacture the tips is shrinking across the globe, experts say. If labs run out of the tiny, crucial components, the entire system could grind to a halt by October, they say.

Without these little plastic tips, Kocher said, testing will break down again.

Times staff writers Melody Petersen, Anita Chabria, Sandhya Kambhampati, Matt Stiles and Sean Greene contributed to this report.

Read the original:

How California failed at coronavirus testing from the start - Los Angeles Times

WASHINGTON The United States economy is headed for a tumultuous autumn, with the threat of closed schools, renewed government lockdowns, empty stadiums and an uncertain amount of federal support for businesses and unemployed workers all clouding hopes for a rapid rebound from recession.

For months, the prevailing wisdom among investors, Trump administration officials and many economic forecasters was that after plunging into recession this spring, the countrys recovery would accelerate in late summer and take off in the fall as the virus receded, restrictions on commerce loosened, and consumers reverted to more normal spending patterns. Job gains in May and June fueled those rosy predictions.

But failure to suppress a resurgence of confirmed infections is threatening to choke the recovery and push the country back into a recessionary spiral one that could inflict long-term damage on workers and businesses large and small, unless Congress reconsiders the scale of federal aid that may be required in the months to come.

The looming economic pain was evident on Tuesday as big companies forecast gloomy months ahead. Delta Air Lines said it was cutting back plans to add flights in August and beyond, citing flagging consumer demand. The nations biggest banks warned that they were setting aside billions of dollars to cover anticipated losses as customers fail to pay their mortgages and other loans in the months to come.

May and June will prove to be easy in terms of recovery, Jennifer Piepszak, the chief financial officer of JPMorgan Chase, said during an analyst call on Tuesday. Were really hitting the moment of truth, I think, in the months ahead, she said.

Jamie Dimon, the banks chief executive, said much of the economic pain had been blunted by federal spending, which was now running out. You will see the effect of this recession, he said.

Some companies that used small-business loans to retain or rehire workers are now beginning to lay off employees as those funds run out while business activity remains depressed. Expanded benefits for unemployed workers, which research shows have been propping up consumer spending throughout the spring and early summer, are scheduled to expire at the end of July, while more than 18 million Americans continue to claim unemployment.

Many states are already renewing lockdowns, including California, where officials have ordered indoor bars, restaurants, gyms and other establishments to close. College sports conferences are beginning to cancel fall sports, including the lucrative football season, and concert tours are out of the picture.

The earlier-than-anticipated resumption in activity has been accompanied by a sharp increase in the virus spread in many areas, Lael Brainard, a Federal Reserve governor, said on Tuesday. Even if the virus spread flattens, the recovery is likely to face headwinds from diminished activity and costly adjustments in some sectors, along with impaired incomes among many consumers and businesses.

Most economists abandoned hope for a V-shaped recovery long ago. Now they are warning of an outright reversal, with mounting job losses and business failures. And this time, much of the damage is likely to be permanent.

Our assumption has to be that were going into re-lockdown in the fall, said Karl Smith, the vice president of federal policy at the conservative Tax Foundation in Washington.

Until recently, Mr. Smith said, he had been pushing administration officials and members of Congress to begin phasing out an extra $600 per week for unemployed workers perhaps replacing it with an incentive payment for Americans who return to work and to shift spending toward tax incentives.

The last two weeks of coronavirus data changed his mind. He is now calling for another large economic rescue package from Washington, including extending the enhanced unemployment benefits, offering more aid to small businesses and perhaps sending another round of stimulus checks to American households.

We have to go back to liquidity mode. I know in Congress theres not a lot of appetite for that, Mr. Smith said. But theres still a chance it could be a horrible fall, and the legislative calendar is not set to deal with that.

Trump administration officials have suggested a willingness to negotiate with Democrats on unemployment benefits, small-business aid and possibly another round of stimulus checks, while also pushing for business tax cuts that have found little traction in Congress. Some Senate Republicans want to cut off pandemic spending increases entirely, though their leadership has expressed openness to a deal if it includes protections from lawsuits for businesses that reopen.

Small businesses around the country say that if lockdowns persist without some type of additional financial cushion from Congress, they will be faced with a dire choice.

At Sonoma Fit, a three-gym chain in Northern California, business was finally starting to stabilize this month after weeks of lost revenue and extreme uncertainty. Old customers were starting to come back. New ones were signing up. The thousands of dollars that Jennifer and Adam Kovacs, the owners, had spent to overhaul their facilities to allow for social distancing seemed to be paying off.

Then on Monday, a friend called to tell Ms. Kovacs that the governor had just ordered gyms in much of California to close again. Ms. Kovacs said she was blindsided" but she tried to hide it from her 17-year-old daughter, who was working at the front desk.

About three-quarters of Sonoma Fits nearly 5,000 members stuck with them through the first shutdown, but Ms. Kovacs said she thought they would be lucky to retain half their members this time. She said she could not imagine business returning to normal as long as rules differed by county and industry and were subject to change at a moments notice.

I really cannot express the level of fear and frustration and helplessness that we feel, Ms. Kovacs said. This slow reopening isnt working. Shut down everything, shut down every single thing, and keep us home for three weeks. Id rather do that than this off-on, off-on, off-on. Because every time we do that, were losing thousands of dollars.

Mr. Trumps advisers continue to predict the economy will rebound sharply in the months ahead, and the president has made increasingly insistent calls for a full reopening of schools this fall. Many economists agree that the economy cannot fully recover let alone grow if millions of young children remain at home without viable child care options. Yet failure to control the virus has made reopening a risky trade-off.

Some of the nations largest school districts, including Los Angeles and San Diego, have announced that they will not immediately return to in-person classroom instruction when the new school year begins. In New York and other large public school districts around the country, officials are preparing to bring students back for only part-time instruction and have warned parents they could shut down again if cases rise.

Those announcements have not been accompanied by government-funded programs that economists say would help schools open safely or ensure access to child care for millions of Americans who are struggling to juggle parenting and work a group that is disproportionately made up of women who are not white. Even as Mr. Trump pushes a return to classrooms, many districts are facing pandemic-induced budget shortfalls.

Updated July 7, 2020

The coronavirus can stay aloft for hours in tiny droplets in stagnant air, infecting people as they inhale, mounting scientific evidence suggests. This risk is highest in crowded indoor spaces with poor ventilation, and may help explain super-spreading events reported in meatpacking plants, churches and restaurants. Its unclear how often the virus is spread via these tiny droplets, or aerosols, compared with larger droplets that are expelled when a sick person coughs or sneezes, or transmitted through contact with contaminated surfaces, said Linsey Marr, an aerosol expert at Virginia Tech. Aerosols are released even when a person without symptoms exhales, talks or sings, according to Dr. Marr and more than 200 other experts, who have outlined the evidence in an open letter to the World Health Organization.

Common symptoms include fever, a dry cough, fatigue and difficulty breathing or shortness of breath. Some of these symptoms overlap with those of the flu, making detection difficult, but runny noses and stuffy sinuses are less common. The C.D.C. has also added chills, muscle pain, sore throat, headache and a new loss of the sense of taste or smell as symptoms to look out for. Most people fall ill five to seven days after exposure, but symptoms may appear in as few as two days or as many as 14 days.

A commentary published this month on the website of the British Journal of Sports Medicine points out that covering your face during exercise comes with issues of potential breathing restriction and discomfort and requires balancing benefits versus possible adverse events. Masks do alter exercise, says Cedric X. Bryant, the president and chief science officer of the American Council on Exercise, a nonprofit organization that funds exercise research and certifies fitness professionals. In my personal experience, he says, heart rates are higher at the same relative intensity when you wear a mask. Some people also could experience lightheadedness during familiar workouts while masked, says Len Kravitz, a professor of exercise science at the University of New Mexico.

The steroid, dexamethasone, is the first treatment shown to reduce mortality in severely ill patients, according to scientists in Britain. The drug appears to reduce inflammation caused by the immune system, protecting the tissues. In the study, dexamethasone reduced deaths of patients on ventilators by one-third, and deaths of patients on oxygen by one-fifth.

The coronavirus emergency relief package gives many American workers paid leave if they need to take time off because of the virus. It gives qualified workers two weeks of paid sick leave if they are ill, quarantined or seeking diagnosis or preventive care for coronavirus, or if they are caring for sick family members. It gives 12 weeks of paid leave to people caring for children whose schools are closed or whose child care provider is unavailable because of the coronavirus. It is the first time the United States has had widespread federally mandated paid leave, and includes people who dont typically get such benefits, like part-time and gig economy workers. But the measure excludes at least half of private-sector workers, including those at the countrys largest employers, and gives small employers significant leeway to deny leave.

So far, the evidence seems to show it does. A widely cited paper published in April suggests that people are most infectious about two days before the onset of coronavirus symptoms and estimated that 44 percent of new infections were a result of transmission from people who were not yet showing symptoms. Recently, a top expert at the World Health Organization stated that transmission of the coronavirus by people who did not have symptoms was very rare, but she later walked back that statement.

Touching contaminated objects and then infecting ourselves with the germs is not typically how the virus spreads. But it can happen. A number of studies of flu, rhinovirus, coronavirus and other microbes have shown that respiratory illnesses, including the new coronavirus, can spread by touching contaminated surfaces, particularly in places like day care centers, offices and hospitals. But a long chain of events has to happen for the disease to spread that way. The best way to protect yourself from coronavirus whether its surface transmission or close human contact is still social distancing, washing your hands, not touching your face and wearing masks.

A study by European scientists is the first to document a strong statistical link between genetic variations and Covid-19, the illness caused by the coronavirus. Having Type A blood was linked to a 50 percent increase in the likelihood that a patient would need to get oxygen or to go on a ventilator, according to the new study.

If air travel is unavoidable, there are some steps you can take to protect yourself. Most important: Wash your hands often, and stop touching your face. If possible, choose a window seat. A study from Emory University found that during flu season, the safest place to sit on a plane is by a window, as people sitting in window seats had less contact with potentially sick people. Disinfect hard surfaces. When you get to your seat and your hands are clean, use disinfecting wipes to clean the hard surfaces at your seat like the head and arm rest, the seatbelt buckle, the remote, screen, seat back pocket and the tray table. If the seat is hard and nonporous or leather or pleather, you can wipe that down, too. (Using wipes on upholstered seats could lead to a wet seat and spreading of germs rather than killing them.)

If youve been exposed to the coronavirus or think you have, and have a fever or symptoms like a cough or difficulty breathing, call a doctor. They should give you advice on whether you should be tested, how to get tested, and how to seek medical treatment without potentially infecting or exposing others.

Census figures from 2019 analyzed by Melissa S. Kearney, a University of Maryland economist who directs the Economic Strategy Group at the Aspen Institute, show that nearly one-quarter of American workers about 38 million adults have at least one child under the age of 13 at home. The share is higher among so-called essential workers who are required to report to their jobs during lockdowns, and it rises to one-third for workers in low-income families.

Only 16 percent of all workers with a young child have a nonworking spouse at home who could plausibly care for children who are not in school in order for a spouse to report to work, Ms. Kearney said.

Theres millions of workers that cant go back to work if their kids dont have a safe place to be, most days a week, Ms. Kearney said. This is not, get schools open or dont get schools open. We need to figure out a way to get schools open safely.

Even for workers who are able to do their jobs from home, having to juggle parenting responsibilities during the day reduces productivity and hurts the economy, Ms. Kearney added. Its hard to work at home when kids are at home.

Driving all that damage is the resurgence of the virus. The federal government is nowhere close to the testing and tracing capacity that some economists have long warned are needed to restore consumer confidence until a vaccine is found. Lawmakers at every level, on school boards and in Congress and the White House, have not coalesced around a unified approach to getting as many Americans as possible back to work safely by the fall.

The country has now tried two strategies to raft its economy through the pandemic: shutting down commerce to slow the spread of the virus and rapidly lifting restrictions on activity to get business humming again. It has not followed through on either approach.

Officials in Florida, Texas and other states began a rapid reopening of their economies in May, while the nations infection rate remained higher than those of other wealthy nations and well before the federal government had a plan to ensure the safety of anything resembling normal business activity. An ensuing surge of cases in the Southeast and Southwest has forced some governors to reimpose limits like shutting down bars.

Restaurants, retailers and other businesses that have partly adapted to the new realities of the crisis, often by moving some operations outdoors, must now brace for the prospect of at least several more months of constricted revenues as colder weather sets in. Broadway has shuttered until 2021. Popular music groups have canceled tours, leaving independent concert venues with no way to earn money to survive.

I am normally a very optimistic person, and I have never seen an entire industry face an existential struggle like we are facing right now, said Audrey Fix Schaefer, a communications director for music venues in Washington, D.C., including The Anthem and the 9:30 Club, and for a newly formed trade group called the National Independent Venue Association. It is that dire.

More here:

A Resurgence of the Virus, and Lockdowns, Threatens Economic Recovery - The New York Times

Tue, Jul 14 20201:39 AM EDT

Singapore entered a technical recession, defined as two consecutive quarters of decline. Its economy shrunk 41.2% in the three months that ended in June, compared with the three months prior, according to advance estimates from the government.

The second quarter's economic performance worsened as the city-state implemented partial lockdown measures, described by the government as a "circuit breaker," to slow the spread of the coronavirus.

Nonessential workplaces and businesses were closed from early April through May, before the restrictions were eased in phases starting in June. Those restrictions were said to have hurt businesses dependent on domestic consumption, particularly at a time when demand for Singapore's goods externally is weak due to the economic downturn.Yen Nee Lee

Tue, Jul 14 202012:13 AM EDT

Health officials in Tokyo have appealed for more than 800 theatergoers to get tested for the coronavirus infection, Reuters reported.

A production, which starred Japanese boyband members, and staged at Theatre Moliere for six days, near Tokyo's red-light district, was discovered to be the source of at least 20 infection cases, the newswire said.

Tokyo's government said it learned of the first infection among the cast on July 6 and by Monday, testing found 20 related cases, according to Reuters. As such, the government has asked all audience members who attended the performances to get tested. Saheli Roy Choudhury

Mon, Jul 13 20207:00 PM EDT

Massachusetts casinos reopened Monday after being closed for four months because of the coronavirus crisis, CNBC's Contessa Brewer and Jessica Golden report. With reopening comes strict guidelines, including a maximum occupancy of 25% for the casinos.

Seth Stratton, MGM Springfield's vice president, said some machines were moved to allow for more social distancing. Some games, including poker and roulette, will not be opened during the first phase.

Outdoor seating options have increased by 200% on MGM property, and guests will no longer be allowed to walk around the casino with a drink. Only 700 employees will go back to work initially, and over time, more will come in phases.

MGM's first-quarter revenue decreased 29% while the coronavirus shut down casinos. Suzanne Blake

Mon, Jul 13 20206:51 PM EDT

Across the U.S., 19 states saw new cases reach daily records on Sundaybased on an average over the previous seven days,according to a CNBC analysis of data compiled by Johns Hopkins University. That includes Texas, Georgia and Florida, the last of which reported 15,300 new cases on Sunday.

Coronavirus-related deaths in Texas surged 140% from last week to an average of about 82 deaths per day over the past seven days as of Sunday, according to CNBC's analysis of data compiled by Hopkins.Arizona has reported an average of about 59 new coronavirus-related deaths per day over the past seven days as of Sunday, up more than 78% compared with a week ago.As of Sunday, the U.S. averaged just over 700 new deaths a day, according to Hopkins data.Noah Higgins-Dunn

Mon, Jul 13 20203:48 PM EDT

California Gov. Gavin Newsom is ordering some indoor businesses including restaurants, bars, movie theaters and museums to reclose statewide as new cases continue to rise.

The governor previously issued a "watch list" of hot-spot counties and is ordering additional businesses including gyms and places of worship to shutter in those areas for three days. Read more on the latest closures from CNBC's Noah Higgins-Dunn.Sara Salinas

Mon, Jul 13 20203:33 PM EDT

Dr Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases testifies during a Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington, U.S.

Kevin Dietsch | Reuters

New cases are surging across the United States because the nation failed to shut down entirely early in the outbreak, Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation's top infectious disease expert, said. The comment by Fauci came during a Q&A withStanford Medicine Dean Lloyd Minor.

Fauci also said that the U.S. hasn't "even begun to see the end" of the coronavirus pandemic yet, contradicting President Donald Trump, who has previously said the pandemic is nearing its end.

In recent weeks, Trump and some state leaders have downplayed the threat of the virus, tying the surge in new cases to an increase in testing. However, public health officials and infectious disease experts refute those claims, saying the rate of cases that test positive in the U.S., hospitalizations and deaths remain high in some states.

Fauci said he expects the public to compare the Covid-19 pandemic to the1918 pandemic flu, which killed around 50 million people, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.Berkeley Lovelace Jr.

Mon, Jul 13 20203:30 PM EDT

While class will be in session this upcoming August for two of California's largest school districts, instruction will be strictly online, according to a joint statement from the Los Angeles Unified and San Diego Unified School Districts. In the statement, the school districts said much of the research surrounding the coronavirus and children is still unknown and many of the guidelines for reopening are "vague and contradictory."

Both school districts said they would reevaluate in the fall whether to invite students back for in-class instruction at some point during the academic year. The decision will be based on whether the virus is sufficiently under control, whether testing is sufficient and whether the federal government provides adequate funding, according to the statement.

California is one of many states seeing a surge in Covid-19 cases, with Los Angeles County, San Diego County and other surrounding counties reporting the most cases.

"One fact is clear: those countries that have managed to safely reopen schools have done so with declining infection rates and on-demand testing available. California has neither," according to the statement. Noah Higgins-Dunn

Mon, Jul 13 20202:40 PM EDT

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo outlined the state's plan to allow schools in some regions to reopen this fall, adding that "we're not going to use our children as guinea pigs."

The governor's guidance comes after President Donald Trump vowed to pressure state and local officials into reopening schools for in-person learning even as the outbreak appears to worsen across the country.

Schools in regions that are in phase four of New York's reopening plan are eligible to hold in-person classes this fall, but the area has to maintain a daily infection rate below 5%, based on a 14-day average over a sustained period, he said. He added thatif the regional infection rate rises above 9%, based on a 7-day average, after the first week of August, schools will not be allowed to reopen.Will Feuer

Mon, Jul 13 20202:10 PM EDT

TrivagoCEOAxel Hefertold CNBC the company has observed a decline in travel demand in response to the rising Covid-19 cases in parts of the U.S.

"With a significant deterioration of the health situation, you see a significant drop in travel activity,"Hefer said on"Squawk on the Street," while adding the correlation "goes both ways."

"You can clearly see that when there is a significant improvement in the health situation, and also clear communication from the government that it is safe to travel, that there is an increase in demand," he explained.

Trivago, a platform to search for and book hotels, expects to see a "bumpy ride" for travel in the months ahead as a result of the public health crisis, Hefer said.Kevin Stankiewicz

Mon, Jul 13 20202:08 PM EDT

How Canada is fighting Covid-19: Ramping up PPE production, U.S. travel ban

Canada has excelled in hospital preparedness and increasing PPE production, CNBC's Christina Farr reports as part of a CNBC series on how the world is fighting Covid-19.

The country reported more than 105,000 coronavirus cases and more than 8,000 deaths. Experts gave the country a score of 6.5/10 in how it has handled the pandemic.

Canada's economic relief package has surpassed what the U.S. has offered, providing Canadian residentswho have lost their jobs or couldn't work because of the virus up to $2,000 in direct monthly payments for a four-month period. Now, the relief package has been expanded to those who earn up to $1,000 a month.

Canada issued a travel ban on March 20 for visitors from the U.S.Since then,thousands have been turned away at the border, particularly those traveling for nonessential reasons. Suzanne Blake

Mon, Jul 13 20201:23 PM EDT

World Health Organization officials warned global leaders against turning the decision to reopen schools "into yet another political football in this game," adding that children will be exposed to the virus and some will be infected and spread it to others.

"My fear in this is that we create these political footballs that get kicked around the place," Dr. Mike Ryan, executive director of the WHO's health emergencies program, said at a news conference. "If we suppress the virus in our society, in our communities, then our schools can open safely."

Current studies show that the coronavirus doesn't generally make children as sick as adults, but the organization's research on Covid-19's impact on children is "still limited," WHO said. Ryan noted that scientists still don't know the long-term effect of the coronavirus on children's health, although they tend to have milder symptoms. Noah Higgins-Dunn

Mon, Jul 13 20201:01 PM EDT

World Health Organization officials said that patients who recover from Covid-19 may be able to get the virus again, adding that studies suggest their immunity may wane after a few months.

While scientists don't yet have a complete answer,Dr. Maria Van Kerkhove, head of the WHO's emerging diseases and zoonosis unit, said patients"do mount some level of an immune response."

But it is unclear "how strong that protection is and for how long that protection will last,"she said at a news conferenceat the organization's Geneva headquarters.

Antibodies are generally produced in response to foreign particles or antigens that invade the body and help the body's immune system fight off infections. When a person gets sick with a virus, they produce antibodies to that particular virus in the recovery process, which generally protects them from getting reinfected.

In the case of the Covid-19 virus, health officials have said there is insufficient data to indicatethat antibodies ensure immunity against the virus.Jasmine Kim

Mon, Jul 13 202012:38 PM EDT

The month of June saw a 55% jump annually in sales of newly built homes, according to a survey by John Burns Real Estate Consulting. This marks the largest annual gain since the housing boom more than a decade ago, CNBC's Diana Olick reports.

The coronavirus' impact on new housing demand is thought to play a role in the jump, as the supply of existing homes declines and residents prefer new, high-tech homes for easy work from home potential. Many buyers are also fleeing to the suburbs and away from large cities.

"The anecdotal evidence is overwhelming. Sales in the distant commuter areas are the most robust," said John Burns, founder and CEO of JBRC. "I believe a lot of computer-oriented people have proven to their co-workers that they can be productive from home, and have sensed, or officially been given the green light, to work from home at least a significant portion of the time after a vaccine has been found."

New home sales were greatest in the Northeast, with an 86% annual jump, and in Florida, which saw an 84% increase, while California lagged behind, the survey found. Suzanne Blake

Mon, Jul 13 202012:05 PM EDT

Executive Director of the World Health Organization's (WHO) emergencies program Mike Ryan speaks at a news conference on the novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV) in Geneva, Switzerland.

Denis Balibouse | Reuters

The World Health Organization warned that too many countries are headed in the "wrong direction" as the coronavirus continues to rapidly spread across the globe.

The comment by the WHO came after the U.S. and Brazil reported111,319 new Covid-19 cases on Sunday, accounting for roughly half of all the new cases reported worldwide.As of Sunday, U.S. cases are growing by 5% or more in 37 states and also Washington D.C.

WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the agency's top official, criticized some countries' responses to the virus, saying their actions haven't matched the seriousness of the pandemic.

"The only aim of the virus is to find people to infect. Mixed messages from leaders are undermining the most critical ingredient of any response: Trust," he said during a press conference. The virus "is going to get worse and worse and worse but it doesn't have to be this way."Berkeley Lovelace Jr.

Mon, Jul 13 202011:43 AM EDT

Disneyland Hong Kong.

Getty Images

Disney's theme park in Hong Kong will close temporarily on Wednesday after the island reported a spike in coronavirus cases.

Hong Kong Disneyland reopened less than a month ago after closing down in January during the first surge of Covid-19 cases in the region.

The local government has limited group gatherings to four people, from 50, and forced 12 different kinds of businesses, including gyms and gaming centers, to shutdown for a week.

The news of the park's closure comes as Disney's Magic Kingdom and Animal Kingdom reopened in Orlando, Florida on Saturday.Sarah Whitten

Mon, Jul 13 202011:35 AM EDT

Children in the U.S. are more likely to become severely sick and die from Covid-19 than kids in other countries because the U.S. has a comparatively unhealthy population, former Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Dr.Scott Gottliebsaid.

"We have more co-morbid illness among young people in this country, more asthma, more obesity, more diabetes, so there is going to be higher risk with our school-age population," Gottlieb said on "Squawk Box."

President Donald Trump vowed last week to pressure governors into reopening schools even as the U.S. outbreak continues to balloon, especially in a number of hot-spot states across the South and West.Will Feuer

Disclosure: Scott Gottlieb is a CNBC contributor and is a member of the boards of Pfizer, genetic-testing start-upTempus and biotech company Illumina. He also serves as co-chair of Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings' and Royal Caribbean's "Healthy Sail Panel."

Mon, Jul 13 202011:26 AM EDT

Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla.

Michael Brochstein | SOPA Images | LightRocket | Getty Images

Mon, Jul 13 202010:17 AM EDT

People volunteer for Covid-19 surveillance testing using the Quest Diagnostics self administered PCR test in Livingston, Montana.

William Campbell | Getty Images

Quest Diagnostics reported preliminary revenue for the second quarter above analysts' estimates, pushing shares up 2.7% before the bell on growing demand for Covid-19 testing. The company's revenue fell 6% to $1.83 billion, but was still above estimates of $1.52 billion, according to the company.

After more than a 40% decline in testing during the last two weeks of March, the company began seeing a rise in testing volume at a faster-than-expected rate. Quest is expected to report second-quarter results on July 23, according to Reuters.Alex Harring

Mon, Jul 13 20209:48 AM EDT

Yelp will bring back "nearly all" of its 1,100 furloughed employees next month, and will restore employee pay and work hours.

The company in April laid of 1,000 employees and furloughed roughly 1,100 more, as the Covid-19 pandemic kept people across the nation home.

"As local economies begin their recovery, we remain cautious but optimistic in the face of continued uncertainty," Yelp CEO Jeremy Stoppelman wrote in an email to employees that was shared with CNBC.

Coronavirus cases continue to spike in some areas across the nation, and Yelp will extend its office closures into 2021. The company said that will result in a layoff of 63 more employees.JessicaBursztynsky

Mon, Jul 13 20208:37 AM EDT

PepsiCo's net sales fell more than 3% in the most recent quarter as the coronavirus kept consumers away from restaurants, convenience stores and sporting events, the company announced in its quarterly report.

The company's North American beverage division reported a 7% drop in organic revenue, which strips out the impact of foreign currency, acquisitions and divestitures. Pepsi's packaged food units, by contrast, saw increased sales as Americans stayed home. Quaker Foods North America reported organic revenue growth of 23%, and Frito-Lay North America reported organic sales growth of 6%.

Read more on the quarterly update from CNBC's Amelia Lucas.Sara Salinas

Mon, Jul 13 20207:38 AM EDT

German biotech firm BioNTech and U.S. pharmaceutical company Pfizerannounced that two of their vaccine candidates were granted "fast track" status by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

The companies said in a statement that the designation was based on preliminary data from the candidates' phases one and two trials, which are still ongoing. On July 1, the companies released early data on the trials.

Read more:

California's two largest school districts to return online in the fall - CNBC

NEAR WEST SIDE After more than three years, Eden is set to close this weekend amid the coronavirus pandemic.

Co-owner Jodi Fyfe and chef/owner Devon Quinn said they will close the restaurant at 1748 W. Lake St. after dinner service Saturday.

While we recently reopened our doors to an immensely positive response, the larger economic impact resulting from the coronavirus pandemic has made it impossible for us to sustain operations, the restaurant owners said in a statement.

Eden, which opened in December 2016, served seasonal cuisine inspired by the restaurant partners world travels.

In announcing the closing, Fyfe and Quinn thanked friends, family and the stellar team members for their support.

Eden has been our passion project, our baby. We thank all of the guests who have joined us for dinner, indulged in our popular weekend brunch, celebrated a holiday or milestone or even taken a selfie in front of our beautiful mural, Fyfe and Quinn said.

We are grateful to those who chose to spend their time with us, and to have contributed to each and every moment along the way, the owners said.

Subscribe to Block Club Chicago. Every dime we make funds reporting from Chicagos neighborhoods.

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Eden In Near West Side Closing Because Of Coronavirus Pandemic - Block Club Chicago

While New York and New Jersey were the early virus hotspots, California, Florida, Arizona and Texas now have become the states to watch, Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation's top infectious disease doctor, said Tuesday.

Fauci, a member of the White House coronavirus task force, called Covid-19 a "pandemic of historic proportions."

"I think we can't deny that fact," he said during a Georgetown University Global Health Initiative webinar. Fauci compared the current crisis to the 1918 influenza pandemic that killed more than 50 million people globally and about 675,000 in the US. "That was the mother of all pandemics and truly historic. I hope we don't even approach that with this, but it does have the makings of, the possibility of ... approaching that in seriousness."

As new cases continue to emerge, at least 27 states have paused or rolled back plans to reopen their economies. Among them is Nevada, where 37 bars have filed a lawsuit to fight Gov. Steve Sisolak's order to revert back to Phase 1 of the state's reopening plan.

But Fauci cautioned that relaxed restrictions in California, Florida, Arizona and Texas are partly to blame for rising cases in those states, particularly among young people.

Addressing the climb in the number of cases overall and among young people, US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Dr. Robert Redfield said Tuesday the nation is in a much better place than it was in the spring, because the mortality rate is lower, but said "we're not out of the woods for this."

"While we've made a lot of progress, we still have a ways to go in terms of getting this under control," Redfield said during a webinar with the Buck Institute.

Hopes for a successful vaccine

A major determinant in how long the US will have to live with a coronavirus pandemic, experts say, is how quickly researchers can produce a vaccine.

Without one, Redfield said, "we're going to have to go through two or three years of wrestling with this virus."

But Redfield also said he has "never seen the government move faster" and is hoping that the nation will have a successful vaccine by January.

Creation of the vaccine is not the end of the virus, however. It must then be distributed to enough people, along with survivors of the virus, to establish herd immunity.

Companies developing vaccines have said they will be able to make up to a billion doses, Fauci said Tuesday. He is hopeful those vaccines can be developed and distributed within the next year to a year and a half, he said.

"I'm feeling much better about getting a vaccine that's distributed not only within our country, but then to be able to have doses for people throughout the world, who cannot afford, nor are they in a situation where it's very easy for them to get vaccinated," Fauci said.

Death toll predictions rise from surge

Before that happens thousands more Americans will die from the virus, an influential model says.

The model from the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington is now projecting that 224,000 people will die from the virus by November 1, which is an increase of almost 16,000 from the week before.

That jump is due to skyrocketing cases around the country, particularly in Florida, Texas, Arizona, California, Louisiana, Kentucky, Mississippi, Nevada, New Mexico, South Carolina, Tennessee and Utah, chair of the IHME Dr. Chris Murray told CNN's Don Lemon Tuesday.

Some of those states set coronavirus records Tuesday.

Texas reported a record high daily number of new cases Tuesday with more 10,745. Mississippi has its highest numbers of coronavirus hospitalizations by far since the first case was reported, Gov. Tate Reeves said. California also set records with 6,745 hospitalizations and 1,886 ICU admissions, according to data from the California Department of Public Health (CDPH).

The virus is so widespread that laboratories are getting more coronavirus samples than they can process, the American Clinical Laboratory Association said Tuesday.

Debate continues as back-to-school dates draw closer

In California, some of Orange County's largest school districts said they will not follow the county Board of Education's controversial recommendations to return students and teachers to the classroom this fall without the use of face masks or social distancing.

Many are still discussing their alternatives, but Anaheim and Santa Anita Unified School Districts said their school years will start with full distance learning.

"During these challenging times, the safety of our school community continues to be our top priority. While we hope at some point to have our students attend our schools alongside their classmates and teachers, now is not the time," said Santa Ana Unified School District Superintendent Jerry Almendarez.

President Donald Trump, who has threatened the funding of schools that do not return to campus in the fall, said Tuesday in an interview with CBS News that it would be a "terrible decision" for schools not to go back and that people are playing politics with the issue.

CNN's Sarah Moon, Amanda Watts, Joe Sutton, Jason Hoffman, Jennifer Henderson, Molly Silverman, Raja Razek and Jenn Selva contributed to this report.

View post:

Covid-19 is a 'pandemic of historic proportions,' expert says, as cases climb in the South and Southwest - CNN

A woman in a protective face mask walks through Brixton Market in South London, as the UK continues in lockdown to help curb the spread of the coronavirus.

Victoria Jones | PA Images via Getty Images

Immunity to Covid-19 may last only a few months, according to a U.K. study that casts doubts over the longevity of potential coronavirus vaccines.

Antibody responses to the coronavirus can peak three weeks after onset of symptoms, but then begin to decline after as little as two months, researchers at Kings College London found.

The study,published Saturday on preprint server MedRxivand not yet peer-reviewed, examined the antibody levels of 64 patients and six health-care workers who had tested positive for the virus at Guy's and St Thomas' NHS foundation trust (which runs several London hospitals) between March and June. It also monitored 31 other members of staff who volunteered to have regular antibody tests.

Researchers found that levels of antibodies that can fight the coronavirus peaked three weeks after the onset of symptoms but then declined. While 60% of the people tested in the study had a "potent" level of antibodies after an average of 23 days following first onset of symptoms, only 16.7% had that level of antibodies 65 days after the first signs of symptoms.

The levels of antibodies were higher in patients who had more severe disease, although it is not clear why, the researchers said, and some individuals who developed antibodies were asymptomatic.

The researchers noted that their study found the antibody response to Covid-19 was similar to that of other human coronaviruses, such as SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome) and seasonal coronaviruses associated with common colds, in which an individuals' antibody response tends to "wane over time, from as little as 12 weeks to 12-34 months after infection."

The study was led by Katie Doores from KCL's School of Immunology & Microbial Sciences. She said the study highlights that the antibody responses circulating in the blood are declining after infection and that further research is needed to determine the level of antibodies required for protection from infection.

"We need to continue to measure antibody responses in these individuals to see if antibody titres continue to drop or plateau to a steady state," she said. Antibody titres refer to the presence, and amount, ofantibodieswithin a person's blood.

The research calls into question how much protection individuals who have had the coronavirus have from subsequent reinfection, and the durability of any potential vaccine.

World Health Organization officials said Monday that patients who recover from Covid-19 may be able to get the coronavirus again, citing similar studies that suggest immunity may wane after a few months.

Dr. Maria Van Kerkhove, head of the WHO's emerging diseases unit, said patients"do mount some level of an immune response."

Speaking at a news conferenceat the organization's Geneva headquarters, she added that, "what we don't know is how strong that protection is and for how long that protection will last."

"So there are a number of studies under way that are trying to answer these questions," she said.

A peer-reviewed study published in the Lancet medical journal last week claimed thatCovid-19 antibodies in Spain's population were "insufficient to provide herd immunity,"which refers to when a population is allowed some exposure to the virus in order to buildimmunity among the general population.

Read more:

Immunity to the coronavirus may last only a few months, UK study finds - CNBC

Theres a common refrain that masks dont protect you; they protect other people from your own germs, which is especially important to keep unknowingly infected people from spreading the coronavirus.

But now, theres mounting evidence that masks also protect you.

If youre unlucky enough to encounter an infectious person, wearing any kind of face covering will reduce the amount of virus that your body will take in.

As it turns out, thats pretty important. Breathing in a small amount of virus may lead to no disease or far more mild infection. But inhaling a huge volume of virus particles can result in serious disease or death.

Thats the argument Dr. Monica Gandhi, UC San Francisco professor of medicine and medical director of the HIV Clinic at Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital, is making about why if you do become infected with the virus masking can still protect you from more severe disease.

There is this theory that facial masking reduces the [amount of virus you get exposed to] and disease severity, said Gandhi, who is also director for the Center for AIDS Research at UC San Francisco.

The idea of requiring mask-wearing in public has become an increasingly pressing and politicized issue as California and the rest of the nation see a surge in new cases as the economy reopens.

California this week ordered a reclosure of many businesses, include a statewide halt to all indoor dining and the closure of bars. The state also ordered the closure in dozens of hard-hit counties, including L.A. County of indoor gyms, houses of worship, hair salons, nail salons and offices for nonessential industries.

But experts say masks are essential for people to wear when they go out in public, such as to shop or go to medical appointments, and when close to other people at the beach or park.

California has mandated face coverings in public settings since June 18, and a growing number of communities say they will ticket people who disobey the rules. But there remains resistance to the government mandating wearing masks in some corners of the state, including Orange County.

Some leaders in Orange County have pushed back against requiring students to wear masks should they return to classrooms in the fall.

In policy recommendations approved by the Orange County Board of Education on Monday, a document stated that requiring children to wear masks during school is not only difficult if not impossible to implement but [is] not based on science. It may even be harmful. Individual districts will have the final say on how schools open.

Some health experts were appalled by that language.

This anti-mask rhetoric is mind-blowing, dangerous, deadly and polarizing, said Dr. Peter Chin-Hong, professor of medicine and an infectious diseases specialist at UC San Francisco. There is no evidence that it is dangerous.

In fact, wearing masks can help prevent children from being infected and suffering serious consequences of infection, such as multisystem inflammatory syndrome, a rare condition that has been seen in children who have been infected with the coronavirus. Kids not only transmit, but they can get sick as well, Chin-Hong said.

While children are less likely to develop severe illness from the coronavirus than adults, they can still be infected, be contagious and transmit the virus to other people, Gandhi said.

Wearing a mask at school would not only reduce their ability to transmit the virus to other classmates, teachers and administrators, but also protect the students from getting infected with a large dose of virus from infected people.

Transmission rates for coronavirus have been rising across the state. Nearly 1,000 of San Franciscos nearly 4,600 cases have been diagnosed in just the last two weeks, said Dr. Grant Colfax, the citys director of public health.

In San Francisco, nearly half of all those who have tested positive in the city are Latinos, he said, even though Latino residents make up just 15% of the citys population. Overall, the city has seen 7.8 new infections per 100,000 residents over the last seven days, far above its goal of no more than 1.8 new infections per 100,000 people.

This, again, indicates that the virus is spreading throughout the city, particularly ... in the southeast part of the city, Colfax said.

For every one person who contracts the virus, another 1.25 people on average are now infected, he said. We really need to drive that down to 1 or below as quickly and as soon as possible.

The transmission rate also rose above 1 in L.A. County in June, but has fallen back to 1. The virus currently rages on in our community, Public Health Director Barbara Ferrer said.

The reason why masks are so important in controlling the spread of the coronavirus is that it can be widely spread by people who are not visibly sick either because they havent yet shown signs of illness, or they will spend the entire course of their infections with little or no symptoms at all.

A key piece of evidence for this emerged earlier this year, on the Diamond Princess cruise ship that carried infected crew and passengers in Asia. A study published by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that of 712 people testing positive for the virus, nearly half were asymptomatic at the time of testing.

We also know that viral load is highest early during disease, said Dr. Chaz Langelier, an assistant professor at UC San Francisco, during the panel discussion. In fact, 44% of transmissions are believed to occur when the infected person has no symptoms, according to a study published in Nature Medicine.

Thats different from the seasonal flu, where peak infectiousness occurs about one day after the onset of symptoms, Langelier said.

Masks dont filter out all viral particles, Gandhi said. But even cloth face masks filter out a majority of viral particles.

And even if a person wearing a mask gets infected, the mask by filtering out most of the viral particles exhaled by the infected person probably leads to less severe disease, Gandhi said.

The idea that a lower dose of virus when being infected brings less illness is a well-worn idea in medicine.

Even going back to 1938, there was a study showing that by giving mice a higher dose of a deadly virus, the mice were more likely to get severe disease and die, Gandhi said.

The same principle applies to humans. A study published in 2015 gave healthy volunteers varying doses of a flu virus; those who got higher doses got sicker, with more coughing and shortness of breath, Gandhi said.

And another study suggested that the reason the second wave of the 1918-19 flu pandemic was the deadliest in the U.S. was because of the overcrowded conditions faced in Army camps as World War I wound down. In 1918, the Army camps [were] characterized by a high number of contacts between people and by a high case-fatality rate, sometimes 5 to 8 times higher than the case-fatality rate among civilian communities, the study said.

Finally, a study published in May found that surgical mask partitions significantly reduced the transmission of the coronavirus among hamsters. And even if the hamsters protected by the mask partitions acquired the coronavirus, they were more likely to get very mild disease, Gandhi said.

So what happens if a city dramatically masks up while in public?

If Gandhi is right, it may mean that even if theres a rise in coronavirus infections in a city, the masks may limit the dose of virus people are getting and result in less severe symptoms of illness.

Thats what Gandhi said she suspects is happening in San Francisco, where mask wearing is relatively robust. Further observations are needed, Gandhi said.

Theres more evidence that masks can be protective even when wearers do become infected. She cited an outbreak at a seafood plant in Oregon where employees were given masks, and 95% of those who were infected were asymptomatic.

Gandhi also cited the experience of a cruise ship that was traveling from Argentina to Antartica in March when the coronavirus infected people on board, as documented in a recent study. Passengers got surgical masks; the crew got N95 masks.

But instead of about 40% of those infected being asymptomatic which is what would normally be expected 81% of those testing positive were asymptomatic, and the masking may have helped reduce the severity of disease in people on board, Gandhi said.

The protective effects are also seen in countries where masks are universally accepted for years, such as Taiwan, Thailand, South Korea and Singapore. They have all seen cases as they opened ... but not deaths, Gandhi said.

The Czech Republic moved early to require masks, issuing an order in mid-March, Gandhi said; thats about three months before Gov. Gavin Newsom did so statewide in California. But in the Czech Republic, every time their cases would go up ...their death rate was totally flat. So they didnt get the severe illness with these cases going on.

By May, the Czech Republic lifted its face mask rule. And theyre doing great, Gandhi said.

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Masks offer much more protection against coronavirus than many think - Los Angeles Times

MILAN In February, he said the directors of the nursing home where he worked kept him from wearing a mask, fearing it would scare patients and their families. In March, he became infected and spoke out about the coronavirus spreading through the home. In May, he was fired amid claims that he had damaged the companys image.

Hamala Diop, a 25-year-old medical assistant, challenged the decision in a lawsuit that was first heard in court on Monday. The proceedings will raise the issue of whether whistle-blowers have paid a price in raising alarms about dangerous conditions at medical facilities.

After successfully lowering the curve of new cases after a devastating initial outbreak, Italy is now bracing for a potential second wave.

The country, with the oldest population in Europe, was affected especially deeply by the coronavirus, and nearly half the infections reported in April happened in nursing homes, according to the Italian National Institute of Health. The breadth of the outbreak put the management of nursing homes under judicial and media scrutiny.

As the country fears the emergence of new clusters, some worry that Mr. Diops experience could have a chilling effect on those seeking to raise early warnings about potentially dangerous behaviors.

Nobody protected us from catching the virus, Mr. Diop said, and nobody protected us from getting fired.

On Feb. 26, as officials had already sealed off towns in the northern region of Lombardy, a director at the Palazzolo Institute of the Don Gnocchi Foundation, a nursing home in Milan where Mr. Diop worked, walked to the ward where Mr. Diop and his colleagues were tidying up the dining room. Mr. Diop said in an interview the director told them not to wear masks, that the building was safe and that they should not scare the residents. When presented with this account, the foundation said that they had always rejected any accusation that the employees were kept from using masks as serious and baseless.

For more than two weeks, while the coronavirus epidemic was exploding in the region, Mr. Diop said that he and his colleagues washed, changed and fed the residents without wearing masks or other protection. More than 150 residents would die in March and April, according to Milans prosecutors investigating the case. Asked if that figure was accurate, nursing home officials declined to comment.

They watched TV and saw what was going on outside, he said of the residents, but I had to reassure them and tell them that the virus will never come into our safe place.

The human resources director encouraged managers to place on leave employees who polemicized or insisted on wearing protective gear even when they are not required to, according to an email submitted as evidence. Mr. Diop said that he received his first mask on March 12, when more than 15,000 people in the country had already been infected and days after the government had imposed nationwide restrictions on movement and work.

That same day, Mr. Diop fell ill. A week later, his swab test came back positive for the virus. His mother, who also works at the home, was infected, too.

Eleven days after becoming sick, he filed his complaint along with 17 colleagues, most of whom also had the virus. In it, they argued that management had covered up the first coronavirus cases among the staff and prevented them from using the necessary protective gear, contributing to the spread in the nursing home.

Updated July 7, 2020

The coronavirus can stay aloft for hours in tiny droplets in stagnant air, infecting people as they inhale, mounting scientific evidence suggests. This risk is highest in crowded indoor spaces with poor ventilation, and may help explain super-spreading events reported in meatpacking plants, churches and restaurants. Its unclear how often the virus is spread via these tiny droplets, or aerosols, compared with larger droplets that are expelled when a sick person coughs or sneezes, or transmitted through contact with contaminated surfaces, said Linsey Marr, an aerosol expert at Virginia Tech. Aerosols are released even when a person without symptoms exhales, talks or sings, according to Dr. Marr and more than 200 other experts, who have outlined the evidence in an open letter to the World Health Organization.

Common symptoms include fever, a dry cough, fatigue and difficulty breathing or shortness of breath. Some of these symptoms overlap with those of the flu, making detection difficult, but runny noses and stuffy sinuses are less common. The C.D.C. has also added chills, muscle pain, sore throat, headache and a new loss of the sense of taste or smell as symptoms to look out for. Most people fall ill five to seven days after exposure, but symptoms may appear in as few as two days or as many as 14 days.

A commentary published this month on the website of the British Journal of Sports Medicine points out that covering your face during exercise comes with issues of potential breathing restriction and discomfort and requires balancing benefits versus possible adverse events. Masks do alter exercise, says Cedric X. Bryant, the president and chief science officer of the American Council on Exercise, a nonprofit organization that funds exercise research and certifies fitness professionals. In my personal experience, he says, heart rates are higher at the same relative intensity when you wear a mask. Some people also could experience lightheadedness during familiar workouts while masked, says Len Kravitz, a professor of exercise science at the University of New Mexico.

The steroid, dexamethasone, is the first treatment shown to reduce mortality in severely ill patients, according to scientists in Britain. The drug appears to reduce inflammation caused by the immune system, protecting the tissues. In the study, dexamethasone reduced deaths of patients on ventilators by one-third, and deaths of patients on oxygen by one-fifth.

The coronavirus emergency relief package gives many American workers paid leave if they need to take time off because of the virus. It gives qualified workers two weeks of paid sick leave if they are ill, quarantined or seeking diagnosis or preventive care for coronavirus, or if they are caring for sick family members. It gives 12 weeks of paid leave to people caring for children whose schools are closed or whose child care provider is unavailable because of the coronavirus. It is the first time the United States has had widespread federally mandated paid leave, and includes people who dont typically get such benefits, like part-time and gig economy workers. But the measure excludes at least half of private-sector workers, including those at the countrys largest employers, and gives small employers significant leeway to deny leave.

So far, the evidence seems to show it does. A widely cited paper published in April suggests that people are most infectious about two days before the onset of coronavirus symptoms and estimated that 44 percent of new infections were a result of transmission from people who were not yet showing symptoms. Recently, a top expert at the World Health Organization stated that transmission of the coronavirus by people who did not have symptoms was very rare, but she later walked back that statement.

Touching contaminated objects and then infecting ourselves with the germs is not typically how the virus spreads. But it can happen. A number of studies of flu, rhinovirus, coronavirus and other microbes have shown that respiratory illnesses, including the new coronavirus, can spread by touching contaminated surfaces, particularly in places like day care centers, offices and hospitals. But a long chain of events has to happen for the disease to spread that way. The best way to protect yourself from coronavirus whether its surface transmission or close human contact is still social distancing, washing your hands, not touching your face and wearing masks.

A study by European scientists is the first to document a strong statistical link between genetic variations and Covid-19, the illness caused by the coronavirus. Having Type A blood was linked to a 50 percent increase in the likelihood that a patient would need to get oxygen or to go on a ventilator, according to the new study.

If air travel is unavoidable, there are some steps you can take to protect yourself. Most important: Wash your hands often, and stop touching your face. If possible, choose a window seat. A study from Emory University found that during flu season, the safest place to sit on a plane is by a window, as people sitting in window seats had less contact with potentially sick people. Disinfect hard surfaces. When you get to your seat and your hands are clean, use disinfecting wipes to clean the hard surfaces at your seat like the head and arm rest, the seatbelt buckle, the remote, screen, seat back pocket and the tray table. If the seat is hard and nonporous or leather or pleather, you can wipe that down, too. (Using wipes on upholstered seats could lead to a wet seat and spreading of germs rather than killing them.)

If youve been exposed to the coronavirus or think you have, and have a fever or symptoms like a cough or difficulty breathing, call a doctor. They should give you advice on whether you should be tested, how to get tested, and how to seek medical treatment without potentially infecting or exposing others.

We are their arms and their legs and they all become like our grandpas and grandmas, Mr. Diop said of the residents. And they kept us from protecting them, he said in reference to the management.

In a statement, the foundations lawyers said the home had followed the instructions of the Italian National Institute of Health on the use of masks, and that communications about the infections among workers took place according to privacy laws.

After news of the lawsuit was published by Italian newspapers, dozens of victims families filed similar complaints. Milanese prosecutors opened a criminal investigation into the homes management. On May 7, Mr. Diop was fired by the cooperative that employed him, a subcontractor for the foundation, for talking to reporters about the lawsuit, and many of his colleagues have also been transferred or dismissed.

Mr. Diop challenged the decision, and his lawyer, Romolo Reboa, argues in court filings that Italian and European laws on whistle-blowers should protect workers who raise alarms about situations that put lives at risk. Mr. Reboa cited a similar case of a nurse in Rome who was fired after anonymously speaking on the radio about the lack of masks in his hospital.

In nursing homes, the politics of Covid was if you speak, you get sanctioned, Mr. Reboa said. And this created a climate of intimidation that had a direct impact on the number of deaths.

Mr. Diop, originally from Mali, lives with his parents and two siblings in Cormano, a small town north of Milan. He said that losing his job was a serious financial setback and that he was worried he would not find new work given his record.

While he had expected to face some consequences for his actions, he said he did not think he would lose his job, since the government had imposed a freeze on layoffs during the emergency and health care workers were particularly in demand.

We only are heroes when they like it, he said.

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A Health Worker Raised Alarms About the Coronavirus. Then He Lost His Job. - The New York Times

The BDN is making the most crucial coverage of the coronavirus pandemic and its economic impact in Maine free for all readers. Click here for all coronavirus stories. You can join others committed to safeguarding this vital public service by purchasing a subscription or donating directly to the newsroom.

Another eight cases of the coronavirus have been detected in Maine, health officials said Tuesday.

There have now been 3,566 cases across all of Maines counties since the outbreak began here in March, according to the Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention. Thats up from 3,558 on Monday.

Of those, 3,168 have been confirmed positive, while 398 are likely positive, according to the Maine CDC.

New cases were tallied in Aroostook (1), Cumberland (3), Franklin (1) and York (3) counties. Daily changes in county-level data may vary from new case reports as the Maine CDC continues to investigate cases.

No new deaths were reported Tuesday, leaving the statewide death toll at 114. Nearly all deaths have been in Mainers over age 60.

Meanwhile, 54 more people have recovered from the coronavirus, bringing total recoveries to 3,062. That means there are 390 active and likely cases in the state, down from 436 on Monday.

Heres the latest on the coronavirus and its impact on Maine.

A record flood of absentee ballots is expected to help Maine meet turnout projections in Tuesdays election, even as the coronavirus pandemic curbs in-person turnout across the state. Michael Shepherd, BDN

The state is now opening 18 new drive-up coronavirus testing sites in places as far abreast as South Portland and Presque Isle as part of a previously announced expansion to the states overall ability to detect the disease. Charles Eichacker, BDN

The Bangor and Brewer school departments, like many others in the state, are putting together three separate plans for reopening public schools in fall, including a full return to in-person schooling, a combination of in-person and online learning and a fully online semester. But to decide which plan to put into action, they will need input from the state. Eesha Pendharkar, BDN

Three inmates at the Cumberland County Jail in Portland have become infected with the coronavirus as part of a new outbreak of the disease, according to state health officials. Charles Eichacker, BDN

Maine could benefit from a potentially rich trove of unused federal funds that have not yet factored into state discussions on rebuilding an economy hammered by the coronavirus. Lori Valigra, BDN

One hundred years from now, when future Mainers decide to research what happened during the coronavirus pandemic of 2020, what information will they find? What photos and artwork will they see? What kinds of documents will they come across? Whose stories will they read? A number of Maine libraries are hoping to create an archive of all those things by asking Mainers to contribute their stories, photos, artwork and other documents about their experience during the pandemic. The goal is to create a large-scale picture of how the state got through the pandemic the bad, the good and everything in between. Emily Burnham, BDN

As of Tuesday evening, the coronavirus has sickened 3,407,798 people in all 50 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands and the U.S. Virgin Islands, as well as caused 136,252 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University of Medicine.

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July 14 evening update: The latest on the coronavirus and Maine - Bangor Daily News

3M and researchers from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology announced Tuesday a partnership to develop a rapid coronavirus antigen test they say will be widely available in the U.S.

With new cases of Covid-19 surging across much of the country, major test manufacturers and laboratories have warned of delays in processing. Delivering quick testing results is crucial to the U.S. response to ensure that infected individuals can be quickly isolated and local public health workers can find potentially exposed people early in their infection,health officials say.

Antigen tests are a relatively new for Covid-19. They work by scanning for proteins that can be found on or inside a virus.The Food and Drug Administration has touted the tests as an important tool for combating the pandemic because they can be produced quickly, at relatively low costs, and test patients in a variety of settings.

3M and MIT's testing device, which is in the early stages of development, would function "like a pregnancy test," 3M senior technical manager Cathy Tarnowski told CNBC. It will be a paper-based point-of-care testing device, which will help reduce the cost, the company said.

If development goes well,Tarnowski said, 3M is looking to manufacture millions per day, allowingfor frequent and affordable diagnostic testing.

The device has receivedphase oneapproval from the National Institutes of Health's Rapid Acceleration of Diagnostics Tech program, which comes with $500,000 in funding to accelerate development, Tarnowski said.

"We're really looking forward to understanding whether we can create a low-cost, high-accuracy device to be able to detect the antigen," she said. "Our focus right now really is understanding and demonstrating that we have a device that has the accuracy that we're looking for."

3M has been partnered for years with the MIT team, which is led byHadley Sikes,associate professor in the department of chemical engineering,Tarnowski said. Seeing the testing shortage amid the pandemic, the partnership pivoted to develop an effective diagnostic test.

The partnership will help to ramp up manufacturing of the testing devices if and when they prove effective and receive FDA authorization, Sikes told CNBC. The newly announced partnership with NIH provides some financial as well as technical support, she added, and the NIH program helps to coordinate national research efforts to eliminate redundancies.

"One of the problems that we're having is that the RNA tests that are there, people take them, but they typically take them only once," Sikes said. "But if you're able to do more tests and take more time points, then you have a better chance of getting the right answer."

A major emphasis will be making the test accessible to the general public, she said, which means making it affordable and manufacturing enough that they can be widely distributed to rural and as well as urban communities across the country.

While so-called PCR diagnostic tests are typically the most accurate kind of screening that detects current Covid-19 infections, antigen tests can be processed much more rapidly, according to the FDA. However, the agency says antigen tests are typically less sensitive than PCR tests, which means they can result in false negatives that misdiagnose someone who actually has an active infection.

The FDA has authorized two antigen tests since May 8. The first one granted an emergency use authorization is produced by Quideland the second, which was authorized for emergency use last week, is produced byBecton Dickinson. Becton Dickinson said its test can be administered at the point of care and produce results within 15 minutes.

"The biggest challenge in the outbreak is identifying who is infectious," Sikes said. "Trying to figure out who is infectious and having them isolate. That's really what we need."

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3M partners with MIT researchers to develop U.S.-backed rapid coronavirus antigen test - CNBC

OLYMPIA Counties in Washington state wont be able to relax restrictions further for at least two weeks as confirmed cases of the new coronavirus climb around the state, Gov. Jay Inslee announced Tuesday.

And with a steady increase in cases across Washington, the governor, in a news conference, warned he may have to roll back parts of the gradual reopening made in recent months since the pandemic peaked here.

As the virus roars back across chunks of America, Washington, so far, has avoided the steep rise in confirmed cases and hospitalizations seen in Arizona, Florida and elsewhere.

But Inslee said the current rise of confirmed cases here along with an estimated transmission rate indicating infected people are spreading the virus to others leaves Washington in a dangerous position if left unchecked.

You can drown with the tide coming in, if you dont move, even though its really slow, just as much as a big, instant wave, Inslee said. And thats the situation were looking at. An incoming tide, in my view.

Hospitalizations for cases of COVID-19 in Washington ticked up in June, but have remained below the pandemics peak earlier in spring.

State health officials confirmed 547 new COVID-19 cases in Washington on Tuesday, and five new deaths.

The update brings the states totals to 42,304 cases and 1,404 deaths, meaning about 3.3% of people diagnosed in Washington have died, according to the state Department of Health (DOH). The data is as of 11:59 p.m. Monday. Nationally, COVID-19 has killed more than 136,000 people.

The governor, however, cited an increase recently in cases among younger residents. While they arent as prone to serious illness and thus being hospitalized they can spread it to older or more vulnerable people.

Maybe this week and the next week its the 20-year-olds, but in weeks three, four and five its the parents, Inslee said. And in weeks six and seven, its the grandparents thats when you really get the explosion of the hospitalizations.

We think thats to some degree, what is happening in Arizona and Florida, he added.

The governor urged people to wear masks and keep social distancing to prevent further spread of the virus.

In one bright spot, Inslee said most residents in Yakima County one of the hardest-hit regions are wearing masks and confirmed cases there have declined in recent days.

The governors statewide requirement for people to wear masks when they cant socially distance has shown early success, Inslee said.

But rollbacks could come to the four-part reopening plan if new confirmed cases continue to climb, the percentage of coronavirus tests coming back positive are elevated and if hospitalization rates for the virus start to rise, he said.

No decisions have been made about any rollbacks, but restrictions could potentially be reimposed for bars and indoor seating at restaurants, Inslee said.

Health officials are seeing outbreaks of the virus across Washington, state Health Officer Kathy Lofy said.

Theyre being detected in businesses, manufacturing and food-production settings, restaurants, long-term care facilities and some child-care centers, Lofy said in the news conference.

It is really across the board, unfortunately, she said.

The announcement comes two weeks after Inslee and state Health Secretary John Wiesman announced a pause on approving any counties hoping to move to the fourth and least restrictive phase of the plan.

No county has yet made it to the fourth phase. King, Pierce and Snohomish counties now are in the second phase of the plan. That has allowed for the reopening of a host of businesses like nail and hair salons and barbershops and some indoor dining with safety guidelines to protect against the spread of COVID-19.

The pause announced Tuesday would prevent counties from advancing to any new phase in the governors four-part plan through at least July 28.

The developments come as some Washingtonians continue to protest the governors use of emergency powers to try and curb the global pandemic.

A group Tuesday announced they would seek signatures to qualify an initiative to the Legislature that would curtail the emergency authority that lawmakers long ago gave Washingtons governors.

Among other things, proposed Initiative 1114 would limit a governors emergency Proclamations to no longer than 14 days unless state lawmakers then voted to extended them.

Organizers have until Dec. 31 to submit signatures for that proposal. If it qualified with enough valid signatures, the measure then would go before state lawmakers and likely Washington voters next year.

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Inslee pauses reopening of Washingtons counties through July 28 as COVID-19 cases spike - Seattle Times

Russell Westbrook of the Houston Rockets, the N.B.A.s most valuable player in the 2016-17 season, said on Monday in a social media post that he had tested positive for the coronavirus. He said he received his test result before the team left for Walt Disney World in Florida, where the N.B.A. is attempting to restart its season.

Im currently feeling well, quarantined, and looking forward to rejoining my teammates when I am cleared, Westbrook said in his statement. He added: Please take this virus seriously. Be safe. Mask up!

Westbrook and Houstons other star guard, James Harden, did not travel with the team on Thursday to the Walt Disney World campus. Luc Mbah a Moute, a veteran forward whom the Rockets signed this month, also did not make the trip. Coach Mike DAntoni did not specify why, in comments to reporters over the weekend, but said he expected the players to arrive soon.

These are things that people are dealing with, DAntoni said. Were not going to get into why not. Theyre on their way.

It was unclear when Westbrook would be able to join the Rockets or when his quarantine period began. According to the N.B.A.s guidebook on health protocols, Westbrook will be allowed to join others on the campus when he tests negatively for the coronavirus in two separate tests at least 24 hours apart. He must also be cleared by a league-approved infectious disease physician and undergo a cardiac screening.

The Rockets were 40-24 and tied for fourth place in the Western Conference before the pandemic suspended the season in March. Westbrook, the teams second-leading scorer, struggled with his shooting throughout the season, but still averaged 27.5 points a game, with eight rebounds and seven assists a game.

The N.B.A. also announced on Monday that two other players had tested positive for the coronavirus upon arriving in Florida. In total, 322 were tested, the league said in a statement. The two players, who were not identified, never cleared quarantine and have since left the campus to isolate at home or in isolation housing.

Shortly before the N.B.A. announced its findings, one player, Richaun Holmes of the Sacramento Kings, said that he had left the campus to pick up a food delivery order and now has eight days left in another quarantine.

Since July 1, according to the N.B.A., 19 players had tested positive for the coronavirus before arriving in Florida. That number includes players like Spencer Dinwiddie and DeAndre Jordan of the Nets, who are skipping the N.B.A. restart entirely as a result. Commissioner Adam Silver had said that the league expected more positive cases as players arrived on campus. But even so, Silver has expressed confidence that the N.B.A. season will be able to conclude and that players will be safer on campus than off.

What would be most concerning is once players enter this campus and then go through our quarantine period, then if they were to test positive or if we had any positive tests, we would know we would have an issue, Silver told Fortune this month.

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Russell Westbrook Says He Tested Positive for the Coronavirus - The New York Times

State officials adopted new guidelines Tuesday outlining who should be prioritized for COVID-19 testing in California as cases surged and counties reported delayed lab results.

The new rules mark a move away from the Newsom administrations plans for anyone, including those without symptoms, to be tested for the virus in California. The guidelines instead adopt tiers that prioritize the testing of hospitalized patients with coronavirus symptoms, other symptomatic people, and then higher-risk asymptomatic individuals, according to state health officials.

Todays testing guidelines ... set priorities Tier 1 and Tier 2 priorities that look to really focus our initial testing on people who have symptoms, said Dr. Mark Ghaly, the states secretary of Health and Human Services, during a briefing on Tuesday. Through such testing, he said, we can make really important efforts in suppressing disease transmission.

The change comes as California reports more than 330,000 confirmed COVID-19 cases, as well as increases in hospitalizations and the rate of positive tests over the last two weeks. Some counties are reporting bottlenecks at testing labs that have resulted in delayed results or a shortage of supplies as more people seek tests.

The new state testing guidelines are:

Tier 1:

Tier 2:

Tier 3:

Tier 4:

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California's new rules on who can be tested for COVID-19 - Los Angeles Times