Ms. Brennan told lawmakers on Thursday that the agency was already in talks with the Treasury about the potential loan, but its revenue predictions suggest that the money would not be enough if the crisis continues.
Even with an increase in online shopping and package delivery to Americans cooped up at home, the agency could see a 50 percent reduction in total mail volume by the end of June, compared with the same period last year, Ms. Brennan told the lawmakers.
She said the projected shortfall this fall could throw regular mail delivery into doubt.
They are chilling numbers, said Representative Gerald E. Connolly, Democrat of Virginia, who leads the House subcommittee responsible for the Postal Service. The reaction of a lot of my colleagues their jaws were dropping. It is one thing to say the Postal Service is suffering. It is another to hear these specifics.
For now, the mail service, which operates under government-mandated service requirements, has continued uninterrupted during the pandemic. Even as scores of its more than 600,000-person work force have fallen ill and some have died, mail sorters and carriers have continued to walk their routes in every corner of the country, in many cases the only physical lifeline Americans now have to the outside world. They deliver medicines, coronavirus test kits and packages ordered online, and could play a crucial role in Novembers presidential election, in which voting by mail is expected to surge.
But the debate over whether to shore up the Postal Service has been politically fraught.
Negotiators on Capitol Hill had reached a tentative deal last month to provide the Postal Service around $13 billion in direct relief as part of the $2 trillion stimulus law. That was far less than House Democrats had proposed, but it had the buy-in of a crucial Republican negotiator: Senator Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, the chairman of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, according to the officials familiar with the talks.
But Mr. Mnuchin said the administration would not have it.
Mr. Connolly said on Thursday that he would recommend that House leaders promptly back the new, higher figures presented by the Postal Service, and Representative Carolyn B. Maloney, Democrat of New York and the chairwoman of the oversight panel, indicated that she saw doing so as a matter of life and death for the agency.
Unless Congress and the White House provide meaningful relief in the next stimulus bill, the Postal Service could cease to exist, she said.
What is Covid-19?
It is caused by a member of the coronavirus family that has never been encountered before. Like other coronaviruses, it has come from animals. The World Health Organization (WHO) has declared it a pandemic.
What are the symptoms this coronavirus causes?
According to the WHO, the most common symptoms of Covid-19 are fever, tiredness and a dry cough. Some patients may also have a runny nose, sore throat, nasal congestion and aches and pains or diarrhoea. Some people report losing their sense of taste and/or smell. About 80% of people who get Covid-19 experience a mild case about as serious as a regular cold and recover without needing any special treatment.
About one in six people, the WHO says, become seriously ill. The elderly and people with underlying medical problems like high blood pressure, heart problems or diabetes, or chronic respiratory conditions, are at a greater risk of serious illness from Covid-19.
In the UK, the National health Service (NHS) has identified the specific symptoms to look for as experiencing either:
As this is viral pneumonia, antibiotics are of no use. The antiviral drugs we have against flu will not work, and there is currently no vaccine. Recovery depends on the strength of the immune system.
Should I go to the doctor if I have a cough?
Medical advice varies around the world - with many countries imposing travel bans and lockdowns to try and prevent the spread of the virus. In many place people are being told to stay at home rather than visit a doctor of hospital in person. Check with your local authorities.
In the UK, NHS advice is that anyone with symptoms should stay at home for at least 7 days. If you live with other people, they should stay at home for at least 14 days, to avoid spreading the infection outside the home.
How many people have been affected?
Chinas national health commission confirmed human-to-human transmission in January. As of 6 April, more than 1.25m people have been infected in more than 180 countries, according to the Johns Hopkins University Center for Systems Science and Engineering.
There have been over 69,500 deaths globally. Just over 3,200 of those deaths have occurred in mainland China. Italy has been worst affected, with over 15,800 fatalities, and there have been over 12,600 deaths in Spain. The US now has more confirmed cases than any other country - more than 335,000. Many of those who have died had underlying health conditions, which the coronavirus complicated.
More than 264,000 people are recorded as having recovered from the coronavirus.
The Huanan seafood wholesale market in central Wuhan was the kind of place where people often caught colds. Vendors started setting up as early as 3am, plunging their hands into buckets of cold water as they cleaned and prepared produce for the customers that arrived every morning.
The sprawling market of more than 20 streets spanned two sides of a main road in an upscale neighbourhood of the commercial district of Hankou. Racks of meat were hung on hooks or spilled out on plastic mats. Workers walked around in welly boots. Drains lined the kerb alongside stores selling everything from live poultry to seafood and cooking ingredients. It was crowded but clean.
So, in mid-December when Lan, who sold dried seafood at one of more than 1,000 stalls in Huanan, felt unwell, he thought little of it.
He stayed home to rest but after losing 3kg in just a few days, he decided to go to his regular hospital for a check up.
From there he was sent to a hospital that specialises in infectious diseases and was admitted on 19 December. He remembers how the staff praised his positive attitude. I was just a little bit sick. I wasnt scared in the slightest, said Lan, who asked not to disclose his full name.
Lan could not have known then that he was among the first cases of a new, highly contagious coronavirus that would kill more than 2,500 people in his city and engulf the world, infecting more than 1.6 million people so far and killing more than 95,000. The World Health Organization has described the outbreak of Covid-19 as the worst global crisis since the second world war. I thought I had a cold. I had no idea, he said.
Coronavirus infections began cropping up in Wuhan in December and reportedly as early as November but the Chinese authorities did not inform the public that the virus could pass between humans until late January.
Now, as China celebrates what it claims is victory over the disease, the number of infections and deaths is increasing around the world. Officials from Australia, the US and the UK have accused Beijing of suppressing information, allowing a localised outbreak to turn into a pandemic.
Beijing claims its strict lockdowns bought the world time that health authorities in some countries chose to squander. But interviews with early patients, medical workers and residents, as well as leaked internal documents, accounts from whistleblowers and research studies, show delays in the first few weeks of the epidemic, government missteps that would have far-reaching consequences.
By the end of December, before Lan recovered after more than 20 days in hospital, word had gotten out in Wuhan about a mystery illness. Internet users circulated screenshots of a WeChat conversation on 30 December in which a doctor at Wuhan Red Cross hospital, Liu Wen, warned colleagues of confirmed cases of a contagious coronavirus at another hospital. Wash your hands! Face masks! Gloves! the medic wrote.
That same day an ophthalmologist at Wuhan central hospital named Li Wenliang told a WeChat group of former medical school classmates that seven people at his hospital had contracted what he believed to be Sars, the outbreak that killed more than 600 people in mainland China and Hong Kong in 2002-03.
An urgent notice from the Wuhan health commission warning of successive cases of unknown pneumonia was also leaked and posted online on 30 December. The statement ordered hospitals to strengthen responsible leadership and ensure that no one disclose information to the public without authorisation.
Under growing pressure, the following day the health commission said researchers were investigating 27 cases of viral pneumonia, its first official notice about the virus. There was no obvious evidence of human-to-human transmission, the statement said, describing the outbreak as linked to the seafood market and assuring the public that all patients had been quarantined and their contacts placed under observation. The disease is preventable and controllable, it added.
A day later, on 1 January, the Huanan seafood market was closed and Wuhans public security bureau announced that eight people had been punished for spreading rumours. Authorities also tasked hospitals to screen for pneumonia cases linked to the market. It wasnt until 20 January that vendors in the market were asked to submit to temperature checks and blood tests.
But across the Yangtze River, some 6 miles (10km) away, people who had never been to the market were falling sick. In the second week of January, Coco Han, 22, developed a cough she couldnt shake.
After a week, she went to see her local clinic on 20 January and had a CT scan done. The results showed an infection on her lungs. A medic in a full hazmat suit escorted her to another hospital for more tests.
Hans mother joined her in a crowded waiting room where those waiting began to panic. Han had a mask but her mother had not thought to wear one, given the governments assurance. A young woman in line in front of them fainted and Hans mother hugged her, telling Han not to look.
We all knew we might have the virus. Everyone was scared, Han said. I think the doctors knew it was transmissible between humans or they wouldnt have sat so far from us and kept the windows open.
While Han was told that she probably had that pneumonia, she was not able to confirm the diagnosis because the hospital was not authorised to do so, an issue many early patients faced. She was told to go home and self-quarantine but the doctors prescribed her medicine that she had to renew every three days at the hospital, waiting in line with others.
I was extremely worried I was passing it to others, but I couldnt let my parents go somewhere so dangerous, she said.
Daron Hu, 35, who also had never been to the Huanan seafood market, began to feel feverish and dizzy on 16 January. He thought he was just hungover after a few drinks the previous night. Three days later, still unwell, he took a train to Jiangsu province for a work trip. He travelled back to Wuhan and from there returned to his hometown a few hours to the south.
By the time Hu was admitted into his local hospital, a team of researchers sent by the central government had arrived in Wuhan. Zhong Nanshan, a top respiratory expert famous for countering the government narrative on Sars, said on the evening of 20 January that there had already been cases of human-to-human transmission.
Hu, who at his worst point suffered diarrhoea and breathing troubles in addition to a fever and a cough, told his family that he was fine. But over the next 24 days in the hospital, at least three other patients died. He considered writing a will. I saw some people give up. It is very lonely, Hu said.
By the time officials revealed the infectiousness of the virus, hospitals in Wuhan were already overwhelmed and the numbers increased after the announcement. Video taken on 22 and 23 January showed crowds of patients at Wuhan No 6 hospital in Wuchang, another district of Wuhan.
It was so busy. We couldnt go home, said a nurse who slept in the hospital dormitory and rotated every four hours in a team of six people to keep up.
Another medic gestured to the sidewalk outside the hospital. This was all full, he said. Every day people were dying.
On 23 January, the city of 11 million people was placed under lockdown. Surrounding areas followed suit, putting a total of more than 50 million people under de-facto home quarantine.
Facing severe shortages of supplies, staff and space, the next few weeks were desperate. Hospitals turned away patients, sending them home where they often infected their families. Footage showed medics weeping and people collapsed in the streets. Dead bodies were left in hospitals where staff were too busy to collect them. Internet forums filled with pages of pleas for help by residents trying to save loved ones. By 19 February, the death toll from the virus had passed 2,000.
The virus was very quick. At the beginning, things felt out of control. We didnt know what would happen, said one doctor treating coronavirus patients at Wuhan central hospital, who asked not to be named because he was not given permission to speak to media.
It is a time authorities are quick to gloss over as they celebrate the lifting of Wuhans almost three-month lockdown, an event marked with light shows and banners hailing the success of the peoples war.
Beijing has been working very hard to fight the negative domestic and international fallout, said Ho-Fung Hung, a professor in political economy at Johns Hopkins University.
But this is far from adequate in stopping people from discussing Chinas responsibility in covering up the outbreak in the beginning, he said.
Wuhan is slowly coming back to life. Neighbourhoods have erected flags and signs declaring them virus free. Cars are starting to fill the streets again as people return to work. Yet, visible reminders of the epidemic remain. Rows of tall metal fencing surround the still-shuttered Huanan seafood market, its former entrances manned by security while police cars patrol nearby.
And not everyone is willing to forget. On a wall near her home, Han recently spray-painted the Chinese characters bu neng, bu mingbai (I cannot, I do not understand), a reference to a declaration Li Wenliang, the whistleblower doctor, was forced to sign before eventually succumbing to the virus he tried to warn others about. Underneath the words, some residents have burned piles of paper money, a way to honour the dead, drawing small white circles around the ashes.
They said stay. I stayed. They said everything was fine. I believed. I believed it all, Han says. I want to know why this happened. Who said not to tell people?
I will remember this for the rest of my life I understand now that we are not important.
Additional reporting by Lillian Yang and Jiahui Huang
"It is likely that people who have passed away from (coronavirus) ... will be buried on the island in the coming days," New York City Mayor Press Secretary Freddi Goldstein told CNN.
Hart Island has been used by the city as a public cemetery for over 150 years and is managed by the Department of Correction. The Hart island burials are mostly people who have been unclaimed at the city's morgue for anywhere from 30 to 60 days, Goldstein said.
Over one million people are interred there.
The city is transferring unclaimed bodies to Hart Island to make way for other coronavirus victims whose bodies will be claimed, Goldstein said. New rules from the medical examiner's office say bodies will be taken to the island if they go unclaimed for two weeks.
Only people who have not been claimed by relatives or a loved will be buried there, Goldstein highlighted. Despite the new rule from the medical examiner, Goldstein said as long as morgue officials make contact with a relative within 14 days, they will not be moved to Hart Island.
"These are people who, for two weeks, we have not been able to find anyone who says, 'I know that person, I love that person, I will handle the burial,'" Goldstein said. "These are people who we have made zero contact with the family."
Usually, about 25 people are buried on the island each week, Goldstein said. But since coronavirus began claiming victims in the US, she said there are 25 people buried there each day.
CNN's Sheena Jones contributed to this report.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott signed an executive order banning all elective medical procedures, including abortions, during the coronavirus outbreak. The ban extends to medication abortions. Eric Gay/AP hide caption
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott signed an executive order banning all elective medical procedures, including abortions, during the coronavirus outbreak. The ban extends to medication abortions.
Governors across the country are banning elective surgery as a means of halting the spread of the coronavirus. But in a handful of states that ban is being extended to include a ban on all abortions.
So far the courts have intervened to keep most clinics open. The outlier is Texas, where the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit this week upheld the governor's abortion ban.
Four years ago, Texas was also the focus of a fierce legal fight that ultimately led to a U.S. Supreme Court ruling in which the justices struck down a Texas law purportedly aimed at protecting women's health. The court ruled the law was medically unnecessary and unconstitutional.
Now Texas is once again the epicenter of the legal fight around abortion. In other states--Ohio, Iowa, Alabama, and Oklahoma--the courts so far have sided with abortion providers and their patients.
Not so in Texas where Gov. Greg Abbott signed an executive order barring all "non-essential" medical procedures in the state, including abortion. The executive order was temporarily blocked in the district court, but the Fifth Circuit subsequently upheld the governor's order by a 2-to-1 vote, declaring that "all public constitutional rights may be reasonably restricted to combat a public health emergency."
"No more elective medical procedures can be done in the state because of the potential of needing both people ... beds and supplies, and obviously doctors and nurses," said Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton in an interview with NPR.
'Exploiting This Crisis'
Nancy Northrup, CEO of the Center for Reproductive Rights, sees things very differently. "It is very clear that anti-abortion rights politicians are shamelessly exploiting this crisis to achieve what has been their longstanding ideological goal to ban abortion in the U.S.," she said.
Paxton denies that, saying Texas "is not targeting any particular group."The state's the "only goal is to protect people from dying," he said.
Yet the American Medical Association just last week filed a brief in this case in support of abortion providers, as did 18 states, led by New York, which is the state that has been the hardest hit by the coronavirus.
They maintain that banning abortion is far more dangerous,because it will force women to travel long distances to get one. A study from the Guttmacher Institute found that people seeking abortions during the COVID-19 outbreak would have to travel up to 20 times farther than normal if states successfully ban abortion care during the pandemic. The AMA also notes that pregnant women do not stop needing medical care if they don't get an abortion.
Northrup, of the Center for Reproductive Rights, sees this as more evidence that the ban is a calculated move by the state: what "puts the lie to this is the fact that they're trying to ban medication, abortion as well; that's the use of pills for abortion.
"Those do not need to take place in a clinic and they can be done, taken effectively by tele-medicine. So it shows that the real goal here, tragically, is shutting down one's right to make the decision to end the pregnancy, not a legitimate public health response."
'I Was Desperate'
Affidavits filed in the Texas case tell of harrowing experiences already happening as the result of the Texas ban. One declaration was filed by a 24-year-old college student. The week she lost her part-time job as a waitress, she found out she was pregnant. She and her partner agreed they wanted to terminate the pregnancy, and on March 20 she went to a clinic in Forth Worth alone; because of social distancing rules, her partner was not allowed to go with her.
Since she was 10 weeks pregnant, still in her first trimester, she was eligible for a medication abortion. Under state law, she had to wait 24 hours before getting the pills at the clinic, but the night before her scheduled appointment, the clinic called to cancel because of Abbott's executive order.
He partner was with her and we "cried together," she wrote in her declaration. "I couldn't risk the possibility that I would run out of time to have an abortion while the outbreak continued," and it "seemed to be getting more and more difficult to travel."
She made many calls to clinics in New Mexico and Oklahoma. The quickest option was Denver--a 12-hour drive, 780-mile drive from where she lives. Her partner was still working, so her best friend agreed to go with her. They packed sanitizing supplies and food in the car for the long drive and arrived at the Denver Clinic on March 26, where she noticed other cars with Texas plates in the parking lot, according to the affidavit.
At the clinic, she was examined, given a sonogram again, and because Colorado does not have a 24-hour waiting requirement, she was given her first abortion pill without delay and told she should try to get home within 30 hours to take the second pill.
She and her friend then turned around to go home. They were terrified she would have the abortion in the car, and tried to drive through without taking breaks. But after six hours, when it turned dark they were so exhausted they had to stop at a motel to catch some sleep. The woman finally got home and took the second pill just within the 30-hour window.
She said that despite the ordeal she was grateful she had the money, the car, the friend, and the supportive partner with a job, to make the abortion possible. Others will not be so lucky, she wrote. But "I was desperate and desperate people take desperate steps to protect themselves."
A 'Narrative' Of Choice
Paxton, the Texas attorney general, does not seem moved by the time limitations that pregnancy imposes, or the hardships of traveling out of state to get an abortion. He told NPR "the narrative has always been 'It's a choice' ... that's the whole narrative. I'm a little surprised by the question, given that's always been the thing."
On Thursday abortion providers and their patients returned to the district court in Texas instead of appealing directly to the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn the Fifth Circuit's ruling from earlier this week. The district court judge, who originally blocked the governor's ban, instead narrowed the governor's order so that medical abortions--with pills--would be exempt from the ban, as well as abortions for women who are up against the state-imposed deadline. Abortions in Texas are banned after 22 weeks.
In the end, though, this case may well be headed to the U.S. Supreme Court. And because of the addition of two Trump appointees since 2016--the composition of the court is a lot more hostile to abortion rights.
Voters cast ballots at Riverside High School during Wisconsin's primary election on Tuesday in Milwaukee. It's the only state to hold a major election since stay-at-home orders were issued across most of the country. Morry Gash/AP hide caption
Voters cast ballots at Riverside High School during Wisconsin's primary election on Tuesday in Milwaukee. It's the only state to hold a major election since stay-at-home orders were issued across most of the country.
Who does and doesn't get to vote in November could rest on how states, political parties and the federal government respond to the coronavirus threat to U.S. elections.
The pandemic has already caused major disruptions. Partisan legal fights have erupted over how to address voters' concerns about showing up at the polls in person. This week's primary in Wisconsin, with long lines of voters waiting in protective gear to cast their ballots, offered a dire warning of what could lie ahead.
"The real outstanding question is whether or not we're going to have an election system that can deliver for the voters and whether or not we're going to be able to manage everybody being able to vote in November," said Michael McDonald, a political scientist at the University of Florida who tracks voter participation.
McDonald said Wisconsin is "just one canary in a coal mine. We have a whole flock of canaries that could also be under severe distress come November."
The focus now is over the expansion of mail-in and absentee balloting to help Americans who have been told to stay in their homes. A handful of states already conduct their elections primarily through the mail. The rest allow some form of absentee voting, but to varying degrees.
It's an increasingly popular form of voting, accounting for nearly 1 in 4 ballots cast in 2018. Even before the pandemic, more states were expanding absentee and vote-by-mail options as a way of providing voters more flexibility and reducing Election Day polling place lines.
Several states have already made changes for upcoming primaries and are considering extending them into November. The question is how much to loosen the rules and who will be affected.
President Trump is among those who believe that Republicans would be hurt. He has made no secret that he does not like mail-in voting even though he and the first lady cast their ballots that way in last month's Florida primary. He said it provides tremendous potential for voter fraud, although there are only limited examples that such fraud has occurred.
A woman casts her ballot at a high school in Milwaukee this week. The coronavirus pandemic will likely reshape how Americans vote and even who casts a ballot this November. Kamil Krzaczynski/AFP via Getty Images hide caption
A woman casts her ballot at a high school in Milwaukee this week. The coronavirus pandemic will likely reshape how Americans vote and even who casts a ballot this November.
"Mail-in voting is a terrible thing," he told reporters at the White House this week. "I think if you vote, you should go, and even the concept of early voting is not the greatest, because a lot of things happen."
Across several tweets, Trump said absentee voting might be great for "many senior citizens, military, and others who can't get to the polls on Election Day" but that statewide mail-in voting "doesn't work out well for Republicans."
But McDonald and other election experts say that's not necessarily the case. They note that both Republican- and Democratic-led states are among those that use widespread mail-in voting. And recent studies have found that absentee voting doesn't seem to favor one demographic group over another, although older voters do tend to use it more than others.
"There hasn't been strong evidence that a wholesale shift to voting by mail does cause a state to move more Democratic or more Republican," said Patrick Ruffini, partner and co-founder of Echelon Insights, a Republican polling and analytics firm.
The real issue, said Ruffini, is the rules under which expanded vote-by-mail is conducted. Some states require that voters have an excuse such as being out of state or ill while others have no-excuse absentee voting. States with all mail-in elections automatically send ballots out to registered votes, while others require voters to request such a ballot. Some states pay the return postage; others do not. Some states require mail-in ballots to be received by Election Day, while others only require that they be postmarked by then.
"The devil is truly in the details," said Ruffini, adding that "any time the voting system changes, even under nonemergency circumstances, you're going to see each party try to change things in a way that they feel like they have the advantage."
The legal fights have already begun.
Wisconsin Republicans successfully appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn a lower court's ruling that absentee primary ballots could be postmarked after Election Day. Citing the chaos in Wisconsin's primary, Texas Democrats filed a suit this week claiming that their state's restrictive mail-in voting rules are unconstitutional. In Georgia, voting rights groups are objecting to a requirement that voters have to pay their own postage, likening it to a poll tax. Republicans are also fighting efforts in some states to allow what they call "ballot harvesting," or the ability of an individual to collect and return absentee ballots for a large number of people.
Both parties are fighting over the rules under which elections will be held in the midst of a pandemic, with an eye toward ensuring their voters have an edge. Kamil Krzaczynski /AFP via Getty Images hide caption
Both parties are fighting over the rules under which elections will be held in the midst of a pandemic, with an eye toward ensuring their voters have an edge.
There are also proposals in Congress and the states to increase early voting and to allow voters to register on Election Day, in an effort to expand access to the polls during the current crisis. Democrats support the changes and Republicans are generally opposed, although again, it's not clear who would benefit the most.
The electorate will likely be different in November than it would have been without the pandemic, but it's too soon to know how, said Tom Bonier, who runs TargetSmart Communications, a Democratic data firm.
"That's the big question and that's what we're seeking to answer at this point. There's too many factors at play in terms of voter safety, changes in voting mechanisms, changes in the economy, changes in voter registration methods and how people can engage in the electorate," Bonier said. "At this point, I think it's safe to say that no one has that answer."
The common belief that Democrats gain when turnout is high and Republicans lose just isn't borne out by the facts, agreed McDonald, the political scientist who studies voter turnout.
The good news is there's enough time for states to make the changes needed to ensure that everyone who wants to vote in November will be able to do so, despite the pandemic, said Ned Foley, an election law expert at the Ohio State University. But he worries that the parties will choose instead to "gerrymander the virus" and shape the rules for political gain.
"You would like to think that patriotism would win out here and that our political leaders would think that the first and most important thing is to get a fair electoral process for the sake of the citizens as a whole. That shouldn't be too hard," he said.
But he thinks the early signs, especially the partisan divide over the conduct of Wisconsin's primary, are not encouraging.
At least 276 detainees and 172 staff members -- mostly correctional deputies -- at Cook County Jail have tested positive for coronavirus, the county sheriff's office said Wednesday. Two detainees who tested positive for the virus have died as of Thursday, and more than 20 detainees are hospitalized.
Across the country, prisons and jails have become hotbeds for coronavirus. Close confinement is likely fueling the spread.
"Jails in this country are petri dishes," said Toni Preckwinkle, Cook County Board president. "It's very difficult in a jail to maintain social distancing."
But this isn't just a major health problem. It's also a growing safety concern.
Melee breaks out in a Washington prison
In Washington state, violence erupted Wednesday after six inmates at Monroe Correctional Complex tested positive for coronavirus.
It started with a demonstration in the recreation yard involving more than 100 inmates, the Washington Department of Corrections said.
"All measures to bring individuals into compliance were ignored including verbal directives, pepper (OC) spray and sting balls, which release light, noise, and rubber pellets," the department said.
"Fire extinguishers were set off within two housing units within the Minimum Security Unit, providing an appearance of smoke from the exterior."
Authorities used more sting balls in those housing units. "The individuals then stopped the destruction of the two housing units and came into compliance," the department said. No inmates nor staff were injured.
"It is believed at this time that the incident was caused by recent positive test results of COVID-19 among six men within the Minimum Security Unit," the Department of Corrections said.
Authorities hope the frustration and violence don't escalate. But some inmates at the Monroe prison have threatened to set fires and "take prison guards," Washington State Patrol Trooper Heather Axtman said.
The Department of Corrections said it's trying to protect medically vulnerable inmates. And all inmates in the housing unit where the coronaviarus patients were previously housed "continue to have no symptoms of illness or disease (asymptomatic) and are wearing surgical masks for further protection."
"The Department of Corrections takes the safety and security of its correctional facilities, staff, and incarcerated individuals very seriously," the agency said. "An internal investigation will be completed."
Vandalism in Kansas prison
Inmates at a prison with 26 positive coronavirus cases in Kansas vandalized their cell block for hours, an official said Thursday night. The incident happened in cell block C of Lansing Correctional Facility in Lansing, Kansas.
Lansing is about 30 miles northwest of Kansas City, Missouri.
Randall Bowman of the Kansas Department of Corrections told CNN that the inmates are throwing around laundry and papers, setting off fire extinguishers and moving around furniture and cabinets in the cell.
The reason for the vandalism is unclear, he said, adding an investigation is underway.
'There's a potential of us dying, too'
As of Wednesday, 29 inmates and more than 60 staff members have tested positive for the virus, the California department of corrections said.
"You have people in Italy dying, people in Spain dying, people in America dying, people are panic buying, people are concerned and people are scared," Samuel Brown, an inmate at California State Prison, Los Angeles County, told CNN.
"And the truth of the matter is, prisoners are people. So we're also afraid. And there's a potential of us dying, too."
What prisons and jails are doing
At the jail, officials have created a quarantine "boot camp" to keep infected detainees separated from the rest of the population.
The jail houses about 4,500 detainees. On Thursday, a federal judge rejected a request by two detainees to order the immediate release or transfer of those who are medically vulnerable.
But Judge Matthew Kennelly did order Cook County Sheriff Thomas Dart to enact additional sanitation and quarantine guidelines. Any detainees showing coronavirus symptoms must be tested by Saturday, and any detainee who is quarantined must be given a face mask by Sunday.
In California, about 3,500 non-violent inmates who have less than 60 days left in their sentences could be released by next Monday, the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation said.
The inmate release is part of an effort to curb the spread of coronavirus while also making more room for those who need to be quarantined or isolated, the department said. At least 1,300 non-violent California inmates have already been released.
In addition, inmates across California will receive their meals in their cells or individual housing units to maximize social distancing, the corrections department said.
Yard time will still be allowed, but fewer inmates will be released at a time to allow for more space between them.
Showers and telephones will be wiped down after each use. And all visitors and staff must undergo temperature screenings before entering any California correctional facility.
I lie on a stretcher, thinking of my two sons. They are both healthy, in Philadelphia and Manhattan. Seven months before, we suffered through the death of their mother my wife of 37 years. She wanted to live so badly. After an 18-month battle with cancer, she left us.
The three of us have gotten closer since her death, but I know I am no replacement. After 12 days of living with the coronavirus, I admitted myself to the Emergency Department.
I know too much about this illness. I know that my oxygen saturation plummeting the night before is a sign of advanced pulmonary disease with Covid-19 infection. I know that I might need a mechanical ventilator I have given this therapy to strangers hundreds of times.
On March 9, the pandemic still seemed far away. Nobody had gotten ill yet. I attended the last large emergency management system meeting of the Northwell health system in Manhasset, N.Y., where we discussed supply procurement and personnel coverage for the coming pandemic. I drove back to my office in the Cohen Childrens Medical Center in nearby New Hyde Park.
That afternoon, I met twice with a group of colleagues. I was feeling so cold. Over the next hour, I became colder with shaky chills. My assistant, who is like a big sister to me, told me to go home immediately. I drove home, febrile and achy. I slept for 15 hours.
The next morning, still feeling fluish, I was tested at an urgent care center. The results returned positive that afternoon.
As a 66-year-old, I knew the mortality risks. On Friday, I was taken over by coronavirus malaise. Malaise is a term used by health care workers, but I didnt fully understand it until I experienced it in my body. Malaise forces you onto the couch or bed, tells you youre not hungry. The idea of cooking became overwhelming. I lost interest in even cleaning up.
I am fortunate to have so many close friends and relatives in the area. Their texts and phone calls were a lifeline. Medically, I knew there was no reason to go to the hospital. My vital signs and oxygen levels were fine. I monitored myself a few times a day, but I did realize, in the fog that took over, that I wasnt eating or drinking much. Even rewarming an already prepared meal became a major chore.
For 12 days I lived with burning lungs, malaise, no appetite and little gusto for life. One night, my oxygen saturation dipped. The next morning, I called my colleagues for help. An ambulance arrived. We drove from my home in New Rochelle, N.Y., to North Shore University Hospital in Manhasset.
The infectious disease doctor ordered a lung CT scan, and the results showed severe, bilateral disease. Lying there, thinking about my future (or lack of one), I made three phone calls. I called both of my sons separately, to tell them how sick Ive become, what the doctors and I were worried about. I couldnt guarantee them that I would live through the weekend. The third call I made is to my close friend, a personal attorney, to ensure that everything would be in order if I died.
That afternoon, I stabilized with no further degradation of my oxygen saturation levels. On oxygen, I felt more secure in my breathing. I remained on oxygen and was transferred to a Covid floor where I stayed for six days. I began to enjoy my surroundings. My lungs started to burn less, and my cough subsided.
My caretakers were amazing, though I dont know what any of them look like; they were always masked when I saw them. I am indebted to the nurses who helped me, allowing me to feel like a real person and maintain some dignity.
I have been home now for 13 days. Each day I feel a little bit stronger and more like myself. My youngest son is staying and cooking for me and we FaceTime with my older son in Philadelphia every day. Death has never felt so close and so far away in the same breath.
Charles L. Schleien (@CharlesSchleien) is the Philip Lanzkowsky professor and chair of pediatrics at the Barbara & Donald Zucker School of Medicine of Hofstra/Northwell and senior vice president of Pediatric Services and Cohen Childrens Medical Center.
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One of the most recent, baseless conspiracy theories surrounding the virus is that 5G networks -- the next generation of wireless technology that's steadily being rolled out around the world -- are fueling the global coronavirus pandemic. They are not.Unfounded claims about a supposed link between 5G and Covid-19 began circulating on the fringes of the internet, where New Agers and QAnon followers perpetuated the hoax that global elites were using 5G to spread the virus. Unsophisticated algorithms amplified those voices and ushered unsubstantiated theories into the mainstream.
There's no evidence to support the theory that 5G networks cause Covid-19 or contribute to its spread. But still, it refuses to die.
Here's what to know about 5G networks, how these false theories came about and why they don't hold up.
How 5G works
There are several theories linking 5G and Covid-19. One simply suggests that 5G networks cause Covid-19, or symptoms of the infection. Another more insidious one is that 5G networks emit radiation that weakens the immune system, making people more susceptible to infection.
To break it down, it helps to understand what exactly 5G is.
The big differences between 4G and 5G are faster speeds, higher bandwidth and lower lag time in communications between devices and servers.
5G signals run over new radio frequencies, which requires updating radios and other equipment on cell towers. Carriers building superfast 5G networks have to install tons of small cell sites to light poles, walls or towers, often in close proximity to each other. So far, the networks have mostly been deployed city by city.
Why people are linking 5G and Covid-19
5G networks began rolling out in cities and countries in 2018, but were more widely adopted in 2019 -- the same year that Wuhan, China, saw the world's first coronavirus outbreak.
Conspiracy theorists were quick to link the two, ignoring the ever-relevant adage: Correlation does not imply causation.
Another thing those areas have in common? They're metropolitan areas: large population centers that are more vulnerable to the spread of the coronavirus and are more likely to adopt 5G networks earlier.
There are other reasons those suggestions don't hold up. Although Iran has not rolled out 5G, it's one of the countries hardest hit by the pandemic.
The International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection (ICNIRP) is a body of independent scientific experts that considers how exposure to electromagnetic fields used by cell phones and other devices affects people's health. The organization maintains that there is no link between 5G and the coronavirus.
"The theory that 5G might compromise the immune system and thus enable people to get sick from corona is based on nothing," Eric van Rongen, chairman of ICNIRP, wrote in an email to CNN.
"There are no indications from scientific studies that 5G (or any other G) affects the immune system. If that would be the case, we would have seen effects on the scale and severity of infectious diseases already decades ago. And we don't."
What's being done to limit the spread
Social media and internet platforms have started taking steps to limit the spread of coronavirus misinformation, though some have been slow to act.
"We will continue to take action on accounts that violate our rules, including content in relation to unverifiable claims which incite social unrest, widespread panic or large-scale disorder," a spokesperson for the company said. "If people see anything suspicious on our service, please report it to us."
Similarly, a Facebook search for "5G coronavirus" yielded mostly reliable information from news organizations, hospitals and health organizations, though false theories can still be found through the platform.
A spokesperson for Facebook said the company is taking "aggressive" measures to combat misinformation surrounding the virus, and is "starting to remove false claims which link Covid-19 to 5G technology" and which encourage attacks on cellular towers.
CNN's Brian Fung, Clare Duffy and Hadas Gold contributed to this report.
BOGOT, Colombia Every morning at a school in the vast desert along the Colombian coast, 40 children, all part of the countrys largest Indigenous group, the Wayuu, gather before class for breakfast.
For many of them, the morning arepa a traditional corn meal pastry, stuffed with meat is their only meal of the day.
But since Colombia went into quarantine and schools shut down two weeks ago, Josefa Garca, a school administrator, has not received any of these meals from the countrys ministry of education. Nor have those children.
And many of the students, some of whom have watched their brothers and sisters die of malnutrition in this remote and often neglected region, are starting to worry about survival.
Our fear is that if we dont die of the virus, said Ms. Garca, 68, we will die of hunger.
The global spread of the new coronavirus has put millions of Indigenous people on high alert, aware that just a few cases could spell disaster in places far from hospitals or with little access to soap and water.
But along with concern about future infections are concerns about tonights dinner, or tomorrows lunch. Many Native communities are unprepared for months of economic paralysis. And in the worst cases, isolation measures are already causing emergencies.
The little food we had left is gone, said Adolfo Jusay, 55, a father of four young boys.
Last week, with his income as a taxi driver halted by Colombias countrywide quarantine, all he could give his boys for the day was a drink made of cornmeal called chicha and a single arepa each.
Across the Americas, diseases brought in by outsiders once erased or devastated many Native nations, and this legacy remains strong in collective memories. In recent decades, diseases like measles and swine flu have wreaked havoc on some communities.
Already, more than a dozen Indigenous groups have reported cases of Covid-19, including the Yukpa in northern Colombia, the Six Nations of the Grand River Territory in southeastern Canada and the Navajo in the southwestern United States.
In Brazil, Joenia Wapichana, the countrys only Indigenous member of congress, warned recently that the coronavirus could represent one more genocide for Native communities.
In response, many Indigenous leaders have taken protective measures into their own hands, in some cases building hand-washing stations within their territories, sealing off their lands and setting up border patrols.
Sometimes, these measures have been effective. In other instances, leaders are finding their efforts thwarted.
In Colombia, which has about 2,000 of the more than 30,000 confirmed Covid-19 cases in Latin America, Indigenous leaders in the mountainous department of Cauca were threatened by drug trafficking groups after they closed their borders by setting up 69 control points protected by 1,200 guards.
In a March 20 letter publicized on social media, dissident members of the FARC, one of Colombias militant groups, said Indigenous patrols found impeding our mobility left them no choice but to act with our arms.
Years after a peace deal between the FARC and the Colombian government, a swirl of guerrilla groups, paramilitary organizations and crime syndicates remain in the region, and, increasingly, Indigenous people who try to interfere with illegal activity have been found dead.
Elsewhere, including in Ecuador and Brazil, Native leaders have petitioned large oil or mining companies to halt work in their regions, fearful of contamination from outside workers. They have had limited success.
We are very concerned, said Andrew Werk, president of the Fort Belknap Indian Community in north central Montana, after news that the company TC Energy would continue building the Keystone XL pipeline, a 1,200-mile project that drew protests in 2016.
Thousands of workers are expected to arrive in the area this summer. The United States government considers pipeline layers to be essential critical infrastructure workers, who can be exempted from health-related stop-work orders.
In a statement, the president of TC Energy, Russ Girling, said the company would take measures to ensure the safety of our crews and community members during the current Covid-19 situation.
Few places have felt the effects of the virus as strongly as the northern Colombia coastal state of La Guajira, where the Wayuu make up about half of the 800,000 residents.
After surviving war, revolution and generations in one of the regions harshest landscapes, the Wayuu now find themselves hammered by quarantine-related hunger.
So far, there is just one case of the virus in La Guajira. But Colombias nationwide quarantine has paralyzed the departments tourism and trade economies, shuttering businesses based around small urban centers and leaving parents unable to buy the weeks rice, fish or cornmeal.
Mr. Jusay, the driver with four hungry boys, was once among the more successful people in the town of Siapana, saving his money to trade in his mud home for a concrete one.
But recently, Mr. Jusay has been chasing rabbits, looking for meat. At night, he gathers the children Aldemar, 2, Juan, 4, Jaiber, 6 and Eduard, 9 in their home, where they open their Bible and pray.
More than anything we pray about whats happening in the world, he said.
We need immediate help, he went on, speaking of the situation in La Guajira. This an emergency.
Celina Pushaina, a mother of five who lives in Nio Wayuu, a neighborhood in the city of Uribia, said her bicycle taxi was confiscated by the police in the early days of the quarantine, after she tried to continue working.
Working was an act of desperation, she said. Now her children are living on donated rice. If I dont earn money, she said, I dont buy and we go hungry.
Mara Sijuana, who lives in the city of Puerto Lpez, said her three young children have been surviving mostly on chicha and fried pasta since the quarantine began. The future is up to God, she said.
For the Wayuu, the crisis comes in the dry season, and after several years of difficult dry seasons that have exacerbated a longstanding problem of malnutrition.
The crisis also comes as thousands of Wayuu have fled economic collapse in neighboring Venezuela. About 1.5 million people overall have arrived in recent years from Venezuela.
The Colombian government has been working to support vulnerable communities amid the viruss spread. In March, President Ivn Duque said the government would send a one-time payment of about $40 to some of the countrys poorest families.
The ministry of education has also promised to continue its critical school meal program by sending food into millions of homes, a project that will be countrywide by April 20. But logistics are complex in this nation of about 50 million people that is trisected by mountain ranges and connected by long desert roads.
And unable to wait that long, some Wayuu people have begun blocking roads with sticks and branches, trying to publicize their cause.
Some aid groups have scrambled to redesign programs.
The World Food Programme office in La Guajira had to shutter 9 of its 13 community kitchens to protect public health, but is offering food packages instead. Mercy Corps, which gives monthly cash support to about 1,600 families in the department, advanced the mid-April payout by about three weeks.
The group plans to begin distributing hygiene kits soon, which could be critical in an area where thousands do not have regular access to soap or clean water.
Some Wayuu leaders, pointing out that most of their neighbors have long lacked the basics, said these problems might have been prevented had the government fulfilled duties to protect Wayuu laid out in a 2017 decision by the countrys Constitutional Court.
I am certain the Wayuu will survive, said Weildler Guerra Curvelo, a Wayuu anthropologist and the former governor of La Guajira.
But what will be the cost of survival, in human lives, to this community that has resisted so much? he asked. How will the authorities help to make sure the cost is as small as possible?
Reporting was contributed by Dan Bilefsky in Montreal; Mara Iguarn in Medelln, Colombia; and Ernesto Londoo in Rio de Janeiro.
