The Senate has passed a roughly $2 trillion coronavirus response bill intended to speed relief across the American economy. This is the third aid package from Congress and is meant to keep businesses and individuals afloat during an unprecedented freeze on the majority of American life.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., described the legislation, known as the CARES Act, as necessary emergency relief and vowed to put partisanship aside to get it done.
"No economic policy can fully end the hardship so long as the public health requires that we put so much of our commerce on ice," McConnell said in a speech on the Senate floor on Wednesday. "This isn't even a stimulus package. It is emergency relief. Emergency relief. That's what this is."
There are six main groups that would see the widest-reaching impacts: individuals, small businesses, big corporations, hospitals and public health, federal safety net, state and local governments, and education.
Here's what each group can expect if this bill becomes law.
Note: The legislation was released late Wednesday night and official cost estimates have not yet been completed. In some cases, Congress allocated dollar figures for specific programs. The official expected costs of other programs are not yet available. This story includes some figures that are based on administration and congressional estimates.
The bill includes several elements aimed at helping keep people engaged in the economy. That means direct cash for many families plus expanded unemployment benefits, new rules for things like filing your taxes and making retirement contributions.
Cash payments: Estimated to total $300 billion. Most individuals earning less than $75,000 can expect a one-time cash payment of $1,200. Married couples would each receive a check and families would get $500 per child. That means a family of four earning less than $150,000 can expect $3,400.
The checks start to phase down after that and disappear completely for people making more than $99,000 and couples making more than $198,000.
The cash payments are based on either your 2018 or 2019 tax filings. People who receive Social Security benefits but don't file tax return are still eligible, too. They don't need to file taxes; their checks will be based on information provided by the Social Security Administration.
Extra unemployment payments: The $260 billion estimated cost is subject to change based on the number of people filing for unemployment.
The bill makes major changes to unemployment assistance, increasing the benefits and broadening who is eligible. States will still continue to pay unemployment to people who qualify. That amount varies state by state. So does the amount of time people are allowed to claim it.
This bill adds $600 per week from the federal government on top of whatever base amount a worker receives from the state. That boosted payment will last for four months.
For example, if an out-of-work person is receiving the national average of about $340 per week, under the new federal program their take-home pay will be $940.
The legislation also adds 13 weeks of additional unemployment insurance. People nearing the maximum number of weeks allowed by their state would get an extension. New filers would also be allowed to collect the benefits for the longer period.
Gig workers and freelancers: Typically, self-employed people, freelancers and contractors can't apply for unemployment. This bill creates a new, temporary Pandemic Unemployment Assistance program through the end of this year to help people who lose work as a direct result of the public health emergency.
Tax returns: Some people have not filed their 2019 tax returns, but that's OK. The filing deadline has been extended to July 15. The IRS also says that people who have filed or plan to can still expect to receive a refund if they are owed one.
Student loans: Employers can provide up to $5,250 in tax-free student loan repayment benefits. That means an employer could contribute to loan payments and workers wouldn't have to include that money as income.
Insurance coverage: The bill requires all private insurance plans to cover COVID-19 treatments and vaccine and makes all coronavirus tests free.
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The main features for small businesses are emergency grants and a forgivable loan program for companies with 500 or fewer employees. There are also changes to rules for expenses and deductions meant to make it easier for companies to keep employees on the payroll and stay open in the near-term.
Emergency grants: The bill provides $10 billion for grants of up to $10,000 to provide emergency funds for small businesses to cover immediate operating costs.
Forgivable loans: There is $350 billion allocated for the Small Business Administration to provide loans of up to $10 million per business. Any portion of that loan used to maintain payroll, keep workers on the books or pay for rent, mortgage and existing debt could be forgiven, provided workers stay employed through the end of June.
Relief for existing loans: There is $17 billion to cover six months of payments for small businesses already using SBA loans.
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The bill sets aside roughly $500 billion in loans and other money for big corporations. These companies will have to pay the government back and will be subject to public disclosures and other requirements.
Airlines: About $58 billion is allocated to help airlines stay open. One portion of that money is set aside to help cover employee wages, salaries and benefits divided up as up to $25 billion for passenger air carriers, up to $4 billion for cargo air carriers, and up to $3 billion for airline contractors.
Stock buyback ban: Any company receiving a loan under the program is barred from making stock buybacks for the term of the loan plus one year.
Reporting requirements: All loans, their terms and any investments or other assistance provided by the government must be publicly disclosed.
Oversight: The bill creates a special inspector general to oversee pandemic recovery. That person, along with a special committee, would provide oversight of all loans and other uses of taxpayer dollars.
No benefit for Trump: The president, vice president, members of the Cabinet and members of Congress are barred from benefiting from the money carved out for corporations. That also extends so the "the spouse, child, son-in-law or daughter-in-law."
All businesses: The bill establishes a fully refundable tax credit for businesses of all size that are closed or distressed to help them keep workers on the payroll. The goal is to get those employees hired back or put on paid furlough to make sure they have jobs to return. The credit covers to 50 percent of payroll on the first $10,000 of compensation, including health benefits, for each employee.
For employers with more than 100 full-time employees, the credit is for wages paid to employees when they are not providing services because of the coronavirus. Eligible employers with 100 or fewer full-time employees could use the deduction even if they aren't closed.
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Lawmakers want to supplement community and private health systems to help meet the influx of new patients.
Hospitals: There is $100 billion for hospitals responding to the coronavirus.
Community health centers: The bill provides $1.32 billion in immediate additional funding for community centers that provide health care services for roughly 28 million people.
Drug access: There is $11 billion for diagnostics, treatments and vaccines. The bill also includes $80 million for the Food and Drug Administration to prioritize and expedite approval of new drugs.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention: CDC programs and response efforts are getting $4.3 billion.
Veterans' health care: There is $20 billion set aside for veterans.
Telehealth: The bill reauthorizes a critical telehealth program to extend the reach of virtual doctors appointments.
Medicine and supplies: The bill gives $16 billion to the Strategic National Stockpile to increase availability of equipment, including ventilators and masks. It also boosts hiring for vital health care jobs during the public health crisis and speeds the development of a vaccine, treatments and faster diagnostic.
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This is the second wave of funding for major food security programs.
Child nutrition: There is $8.8 billion to give schools more flexibility to provide meals for students.
Food stamps: $15.5 billion is going to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, also known as SNAP. The money will help cover the expected cost of new applications to the program as a result of the coronavirus.
American Indian reservations, Puerto Rico, Northern Mariana Islands and American Samoa all get additional funds and access to federal nutrition programs.
Food banks: There is $450 million more for food banks and other community food distribution programs.
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The legislation designates $339.8 billion for programs that will go to state and local governments. It is divided up to put $274 billion toward specific COVID-19 response efforts, including $150 billion in direct aid for those state and local governments running out of cash due to high numbers of cases.
It also includes $5 billion for Community Development Block Grants, $13 billion for K-12 schools, $14 billion for higher education and $5.3 billion for programs for children and families, including immediate assistance to child care centers.
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The bill includes relief for college students and graduates with outstanding federal student debt.
Temporary student loan relief: All loan and interest payments would be deferred through Sept. 30 without penalty to the borrower for all federally owned student loans.
Work study funds: It allows schools to turn unused work-study funds into supplemental grants and continue paying work study wages while schools are suspended.
Students who are forced to drop out: Students who drop out of school as a result of the coronavirus wouldn't have that time away from school deducted from their lifetime limits on subsidized loan and Pell grant eligibility. Those students would also not be asked to pay back any grants or other aid they've already received.
Other programs: There is a very long list of other areas receiving funding including arts programs, universities and other institutions.
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President Trump, in saying that he wanted to reopen the economy by Easter, has argued that an economic downturn would be more deadly than the coronavirus.
What Was Said
You have suicides over things like this when you have terrible economies. You have death. Probably and I mean definitely would be in far greater numbers than the numbers that were talking about with regard to the virus. at a news conference on Monday
Youre going to lose more people by putting a country into a massive recession or depression. during a virtual town hall on Fox News on Tuesday
This lacks evidence. Though the question of the overall impact of recessions on mortality remains unsettled, experts disputed Mr. Trumps claim that an economic downturn would be more deadly than a pandemic. (The White House did not respond when asked for the source of the presidents conjecture.)
All these effects of economic expansions or recessions on mortality that can be seen, e.g., during the Great Depression or the Great Recession, are tiny if compared with the mortality effects of a pandemic, said Dr. Jos A. Tapia, a professor of public health and economics at Drexel University who has written several studies on the topic.
It is difficult to disaggregate the impact of an economic downturn on health and mortality from other factors. Those who become unemployed do tend to have higher levels of depression and bad health. But for the general population, studies have found that death rates from other causes cardiovascular disease, respiratory diseases, and traffic and industrial injuries were either unchanged or actually decreased.
For example, a 2012 study found that suicides did increase during the Depression of the 1930s, but the death rate for car accidents decreased and no significant effects were observed for 30 other causes of death in the United States. A 2009 study found that mortality actually decreased across almost all ages during the Depression. Researchers last year also found that mortality rates overall declined from 2005 to 2010, a period that covered the deep recession that ran from late 2007 through mid-2009.
In comparison, projections from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimated that deaths from the coronavirus in the United States could range from 200,000 to 1.7 million.
Mr. Trump is right to be concerned about the trend of increased suicides during recessions, said Aaron Reeves, a professor and sociologist at Oxford University and the lead author of a 2012 study that estimated an excess of 4,750 suicides in the United States after 2007, coinciding with the recession. But in a scenario in which workplaces and businesses reopen and social distancing is more limited but people continue to wash their hands, Mr. Reeves said, my sense is that this virus would almost certainly kill more people under those conditions than suicides would.
Moreover, it is not inevitable that a recession would lead to excess suicides. In countries and American states with adequate social programs in place, the impact of economic downturns can be reduced.
There are some choices that governments have about how you potentially offset the consequences of recessions that may come, Mr. Reeves said, pointing to the $2 trillion economic package passed by the Senate. Trump could put in place more to protect those people if hes worried about suicides.
Experts also warned that the argument about whether to stave off a recession or contain the coronavirus was a somewhat false choice. If efforts to mitigate the coronavirus abate and cases and deaths spiral out of control, the economy would also be affected by self-imposed lockdowns.
The mental health effects of high levels of unemployment during a recession, too, would have its parallels if the United States suffered colossal loss of lives. That would bring about communal bereavement, where there is widespread distress and feelings of loss even among those who do not know the deceased, and its associated health risks, said Ralph Catalano, a professor of public health at the University of California at Berkeley.
Id rather contain the epidemic first and then take my chances with the recession, Mr. Catalano said. Humans control recessions; mindless nature controls epidemics. Its just bad medicine to mix epidemiology and economics right now.
Curious about the accuracy of a claim? Email factcheck@nytimes.com.
An assistant nursing manager at a New York City hospital, who told his family he believed he had contracted the coronavirus after being exposed at work, died Tuesday evening, his sister told NBC News.
The death of Kious Jordan Kelly, 48, was confirmed by Mount Sinai Hospital. It comes amid an escalating crisis in New York in which hospitals are faced with surging numbers of coronavirus patients and shortages of crucial medical equipment and protective gear for staffers.
Kelly suffered from severe asthma, said his sister, Marya Sherron, but she questioned whether his death could have been prevented and expressed alarm over the reports of inadequate protection for health care workers.
"There's only going to be more," Sherron said. "He's not the only one with asthma. He's not the only one with conditions who is going to work every day helping and fighting for people."
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Mount Sinai Hospital did not respond to specific questions about how Kelly was exposed to the virus, but it insisted that it has provided workers with the necessary protective equipment.
"This crisis is straining the resources of all New York area hospitals and while we do and have had enough protective equipment for our staff, we will all need more in the weeks ahead," a spokesperson said. "This crisis is only growing and it's essential that we not only have all the right equipment but that we come together to help and support one another."
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In an earlier statement, the hospital described Kelly as "a compassionate colleague, friend and selfless caregiver."
"Today, we lost another hero," the statement added.
A colleague confirmed that Kelly had been working directly with coronavirus patients at the Mount Sinai West medical center.
"He was moving them, transporting them, going into their rooms," said the colleague, who asked to remain anonymous for fear of jeopardizing the person's job. "He used to do whatever he needed to do to decongest the emergency department or help the nurses out so patients wouldn't sit in the hallway exposing others."
"He paid the ultimate price for working too hard and caring too much," the colleague added.
Kelly was born in Chicago and grew up in Lansing, Michigan, his sister said. He was valedictorian of his high school and worked as a dancer for many years before becoming a nurse.
"He was born with a hole in his lung, and my mom talked about how she was told he wasn't going to live and he healed," Sherron said. "He wasn't supposed to be able to do a lot of things physically that he did, and we were always in awe. "
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The last time Sherron heard from her older brother was via text message. He got in touch on March 18, Sherron said, telling her that he had been moved to the intensive care unit at the main Mount Sinai Hospital and that he couldn't talk because he was on a ventilator. He sent her a photo and told her he would be OK and not to worry the rest of the family. Six days later, he was dead.
"He was the best. He was just the most giving, selfless person," Sherron said. "He would always find a way to make you smile."
Joseph Fuoco, the son of a former patient, described Kelly as an angel in a post on Mount Sinai's website, where he recounted how Kelly took care of his dying mother.
"He showed my mom and us empathy and compassion that helped us get through the weekend and what was to come," Fuoco said. "He went above and beyond and is an asset to the hospital."
Kelly's family, like the loved ones of any coronavirus patient, were barred from visiting him in the hospital because of the risk of transmission.
His sister said she's still wrestling with the fact that her younger brother died alone.
"I want his unit, the hospital and health care providers to get the protective gear they need," Sherron said.
CORRECTION (March 26, 2020, 6:35 p.m. ET): An earlier version of this article identified the nurse who died as James Kious Kelly. Kelly's sister said James was his middle name at birth but that he had legally changed his name to Kious Jordan Kelly. The article also misspelled the sister's first name. She is Marya Sherron, not Mayra.
Emmanuelle Saliba is a reporter with the NBC News Investigative Unit, specializing in visual verification and open-source investigations.
Now that many parts of the US have shut down temporarily to combat the coronavirus, our greatest enemy is our own impatience.
The measures taken in California last week and 15 other states since then hurt. They kill off businesses that were critical to the livelihoods of millions of people. They throw millions of Americans out of work and off their health insurance.
And for the next two weeks, it wont even be clear if theyre doing anything.
We have sacrificed so much already, but it feels like nothing is working. Thats because it takes weeks to see results. We must stay committed and trust that the social distancing we are enduring now will save thousands of lives, Dr. Caitlin Rivers at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security wrote Monday.
Heres why it will take so long for our sacrifices to have visible effects. The thing were trying to reduce new coronavirus infections is invisible at first. It takes between 2 and 14 days for a newly infected person to start showing symptoms. After symptoms begin to show, it can take more than a week for them to be eligible for testing (many people are not eligible at all). And then, thanks to backlogs in testing availability, it can take days for them to learn they tested positive.
As a result, every positive test today reflects infections that occurred, on average, a few weeks ago. And it will be a few weeks from now before we see new case numbers start to fall if our lockdown measures today are successful.
In other words, once you shut down your city to fight the virus, you should actually expect things to get worse before they get better. And because of that, theres a very real risk that that will discourage us and prompt us to give up. We shouldnt.
Lets say we lock down a city to prevent the further spread of the coronavirus, and the lockdown works very well, as the one in Wuhan seems to have. Where previously the average infected person spread the disease to 2-3 other people, after the lockdown in Wuhan it is estimated that each infected person only spread the disease to .32 people.
If we accomplished the same thing, the number of new infections would start declining right away. But heres the thing: The number of new positive tests? It would keep growing.
Heres why: Symptoms of the coronavirus typically take some time to start showing after infection. The average incubation period is 5-6 days but may range from 2-14 days, according to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention. So keep that in mind when thinking about people who are starting to develop symptoms now those were people who were exposed to coronavirus about a week ago, in some cases even longer.
Now, most people cannot get a test as soon as they start to show symptoms. In some parts of the country, in fact, its impossible to get a test until you are hospitalized, unless you are a health care worker, or are otherwise considered high risk.
The coronavirus has a long course of illness people are usually sick for a while before they get sick enough to need hospitalization. In one study from China, the average time from symptom onset to hospitalization was nine days, and in another study, difficulty breathing usually surfaced 5-13 days after symptoms started.
That means that, in the parts of the US where most patients arent tested for the coronavirus until they are hospitalized, a patient may be tested 14 days after they were infected five days for the average patient to show symptoms and nine days after that to end up in the hospital.
Finally, tests dont always get results right away. There are some testing sites that advertise same-day turnaround, but other labs are backlogged, and in many parts of the country results take longer. Rand Pauls positive test for coronavirus reportedly took six days to come back.
Add it all up, and it will take at least two weeks, likely longer, for a coronavirus infection to be reported in official statistics.
That means that it will look for weeks like the measures were taking now like self-quarantines, school closures, and social distancing are not working, even if they are. And if theyre not actually working? Same thing we wont know for at least a couple of weeks.
On January 23, China locked down the city of Wuhan amid a growing epidemic. On that date, the country had 830 cases. Much of the rest of Hubei province locked down later that week, and then restrictions were imposed on the whole country.
For the next few weeks, things got worse. By February 13, the country had 63,851 cases most of them in Wuhans Hubei province. But things were starting to turn around. That day, China reported 5,090 new cases more than on any previous day (except the day of a one-time change in the types of cases reported). On February 14, however, officials reported 2,641 new cases. On the 15th, 2,008. New case numbers kept declining from there; China now reports no new local transmission cases (though they could be either missing some or hiding some, experts dont think theyre hiding a full-blown epidemic.)
Take a look at that gap again: The peak of new cases came fully three weeks after the lockdown started. In Italy, its starting to look like the same dynamic is at work.
These big social distancing measures take time to work, Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security director Tom Inglesby tweeted Monday. The impact of big interventions in Wuhan China took about 3 wks to start to reverse things. And then everyday after the situation got better.
Should the US expect the same thing?
Not necessarily. Some things are definitely different. The US implemented social distancing measures more gradually than Wuhan, which escalated quickly from few restrictions to a full lockdown. No place in the US is employing measures as strict as Wuhans. China separated symptomatic people from their families, and locked people in their houses. Enforcement of stay-at-home orders has, so far, been lax in the US.
But if our measures suffice to reduce transmission so that each new patient infects less than one person, it wouldnt be surprising if the overall trajectory of the disease in a city like New York looks somewhat like Chinas, with cases peaking three weeks after the measures went into place. That would put us into early April.
In other parts of the country, where those measures havent yet been put into place, the peak is even farther off.
We know when this started. We can get a good estimate on when it will end, former FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb argued Tuesday, projecting a peak in New York in 2-3 weeks.
Its difficult to be patient and wait for that. The costs of social distancing measures upended routines, shuttered stores, and restaurants, lost jobs, vulnerable people put at risk are apparent already, while the benefits arent. Social distancing measures save lives, but the lives they save are a month away while the lives they throw into turmoil are visible right now.
Unsurprisingly, there is overwhelming pressure to identify results from these measures right now. And preliminary data that looks good is not hard to find. Articles have proliferated comparing states that implemented social distancing to states that didnt, or declaring that early data shows Californias stay-at-home order is working.
Its tempting to draw those conclusions. But its really too early to say any of those things with certainty. The numbers published today reflect measures taken in the last week of February before awareness of the virus in the US was widespread through the first week of March. They dont reflect the effects of the lockdowns or even the school closures. The states that are doing well cannot credit their success to measures theyve taken in the last few weeks, and the states that have imposed such measures shouldnt expect results yet.
Whats important to remember is that if the numbers suddenly get worse in a state that recently implemented stay-at-home measures, it wont prove that stay-at-home doesnt work. The confirmed cases we are seeing today are largely people infected a few weeks ago, and the data on how well our current measures are working wont be available for a while.
For a while it will feel like nothing is working but it takes time, Rivers wrote Monday.
When things are changing as rapidly as they are with this crisis and when families are struggling with lost jobs, wiped retirement accounts, sick loved ones, and closed schools the few weeks well need to wait before case numbers hopefully start declining feel like an eternity. But the best thing we can do is help our cities develop a plan for the next stage of virus response, support essential workers, stay home, and wait.
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Reporting was contributed by David E. Sanger, Maggie Haberman, Zolan Kanno-Youngs, Emma Goldberg, Stephanie Saul, Michael Cooper, Alan Blinder, Karen Zraick, Annie Karni, Jonah Engel Bromwich, Jennifer Steinhauer, Sheri Fink, Raphael Minder, Ben Hubbard, Hannah Beech, Mujib Mashal, Thomas Gibbons-Neff, Helene Cooper, Eric Schmitt, Najim Rahim, Caitlin Dickerson, Katy Reckdahl, Hana de Goeil, Campbell Robertson, Richard Fausset, Patricia Mazzei, Kirk Johnson, Julie Bosman, Nicholas Bogel-Burroughs, Marc Santora, Megan Specia, Julie Hirschfeld Davis, Iliana Magra, Elisabetta Povoledo, Abdi Latif Dahir, Daniel Victor, Emily Cochrane, Nicholas Fandos, Michael Corkery, Sapna Maheshwari, Mariel Padilla, Christine Hauser, Fatima Faizi, David Zucchino, Alex Marshall, Vivian Wang, Yiwei Wang and Pam Belluck.
When Californias governor ordered his state shut down to contain the spread of the coronavirus pandemic this month, semiconductor equipment manufacturer Lam Research shut down its Silicon Valley factories and complied.
In Oregon, though, Lam has kept its massive Tualatin plant running and ordered employees to keep reporting for work. The decision confounds Lam technician Michael Borek, who said theres no way he and his colleagues can do their jobs and remain six feet apart, as Oregon Gov. Kate Brown mandated in Mondays stay-home order.
Technicians work in teams around hazardous chemicals and electricity, he said, a basic safety measure to prevent a potentially serious accident. By continuing to work in close quarters, though, Borek said he fears efforts to contain the coronavirus will come to naught and that it could spread widely throughout the factory, and the community.
Lam said it has been four weeks since Borek has been on site and that the company has made significant changes in that time designed to ensure the six-foot separation and has added protective equipment and gear in situations where its not possible to keep workers that far apart.
Lam said its products represent critical infrastructure. The company said it has taken additional steps to keep workers safe by sanitizing their work areas, keeping people apart in the cafeteria and monitoring their temperatures when they come in for work.
My concern is theyre not going to catch something, its going to spread to a lot of people, lots of people are going to get sick, said Borek, 29. I just dont feel safe.
Several dozen workers across a variety of industries reported similar concerns to The Oregonian/OregonLive in the time since Brown issued her Monday order. They complain its inherently impossible to do their jobs and maintain the six-foot buffer from their colleagues that health authorities recommend.
Unlike governors in other states, Brown gave Oregon businesses enormous latitude to decide for themselves whether to close during her indefinite stay-home order. She said some businesses, among them shopping malls, theaters, spas and barbers, must close because their are inherently unable to operate without putting people at risk of spreading the virus.
Many other businesses could remain open but Brown called on those employers to take personal responsibility in ensuring worker safety by keeping employees at least six feet apart.
If they cannot, Brown said, Then those businesses should shut down.
The governor has no firm enforcement mechanism to make sure they are complying, though, or to make businesses close if they dont follow her orders. At various times this past week Brown has designated three different state agencies as responsible for taking complaints about workplace violations.
The confused message concerns workers who fear exposing themselves to the virus, or worry crowded workplaces will thwart efforts to contain the outbreak. The state, meanwhile, says it is fielding many hundreds of complaints daily about alleged social distancing violations. (Oregon is taking complaints here but has yet to conduct any inspections or issue any citations.)
Workers in factories, grocery stores, warehouses, delivery services, restaurants, a flight-training school even the states own Employment Department call center all have said they feel uncomfortable continuing to work during the outbreak. But the employees said they cant afford to quit or take vacation time without knowing how long the outbreak will last.
Most of my coworkers currently believe that we have to choose between showing up or not getting paid unless we have accrued sick time or vacation time, said one Precision Castparts employee, who asked not to be named discussing his employer. There are also fears of retaliation if we do choose to take a leave of absence in order to self-quarantine.
Photos shot at job sites this week and shared with The Oregonian/OregonLive show many apparent violations:
Intel and Precision Castparts couldnt be immediately reached for comment Thursday. Both companies have acknowledged positive coronavirus tests at their Oregon sites in the past week, and both companies have said they are taking steps to ensure their workers remain safe.
Construction has been allowed to proceed in the state of Oregon, as it supports so many other essential businesses such as healthcare and public services, J.E. Dunn vice president Emily Gallagher wrote in an email Thursday. She said Oregons order allows the company to support its contractors and employees with jobs that support their families.
However, we know that there will inevitably be a period of transition as individual behavior is modified and jobsite culture and methods are adjusted, Gallagher wrote. Workers have been doing things a certain way for decades, and changing behavior, although critical, will take some effort.
J.E. Dunn has assigned two people at each jobsite to enforce social distancing, she said, and taken other steps to ensure workers remain safe.
We are committed to being as proactive as we can based on a new normal one that changes daily, Gallagher said.
Washington Gov. Jay Inslee issued a stay-at-home order Monday, shortly after Brown issued hers in Oregon. He followed up Wednesday with a new, more specific directive that Commercial and residential construction is not authorized under the proclamation because construction is not considered to be an essential activity.
Manufacturing and construction are two of Oregons most vital industries and shutting them down would be a severe blow to the states economy, which is already staggering during the coronavirus outbreak. Economists say Oregon faces a severe recession.
While Brown specifically exempted construction and manufacturing from her stay-home order, she said such employers must still take steps to protect their workers. On Tuesday, before Inslee acted, Brown said she didnt see a need to shut down Oregon construction.
The six feet of distancing, telecommuting, that probably doesnt work on a construction site, Brown said. But they also have equipment, from masks and helmets, that should provide a layer of protective gear.
Violators of Browns stay-home order are subject to a misdemeanor citation that could include a $1,250 fine, 30 days in jail or both. But the governor has said repeatedly she doesnt want to use law enforcement to enforce her rules.
I cant have police in every single law office or every single business office around the state of Oregon, Brown said this week. I am asking people to take personal responsibility and act with consideration for your employees and for your customers.
Big Oregon employers that continue requiring workers to report to the job include all the states major grocery chains, many restaurant kitchens that offer takeout or delivery service, construction contractors, and manufacturers large and small among them Intel, Precision Castparts and Boeing.
Boeing shut down its Washington factories on Monday. Like Lam Research, though, it kept its Oregon factories operating.
Lam, which has had as many as 3,000 people working at its Tualatin campus in recent years, said Thursday that The health and safety of our employees remains our highest priority.
To protect our workforce, we have implemented robust workplace protections including enhanced and frequent disinfecting, social distancing controls, and active temperature monitoring, Lam said. We continue to monitor the situation closely to ensure we have the highest health and safety protocols.
A memo that Lam issued to workers late Wednesday, obtained by The Oregonian/OregonLive, appeared to acknowledge the hazards and the need for a fix.
We have too many people in the cleanroom and not enough controls for keeping physical distance between employees, the memo read. The note from a supervisor instructed employees to take the day off while supervisors and managers work on social distancing control.
Lam declined to discuss the memo. The company reiterated it has already taken steps to provide safety equipment and spacing within its factory.
The coronavirus has already arrived at many of Oregons largest workplaces. Precision Castparts acknowledged an infected worker last week and Intel said this week a contractor helping build its multibillion-dollar factory expansion in Hillsboro has been infected.
RVP Construction in Ontario shut down Monday after Brown issued her order. The small kitchen remodeler said it learned the next day that one of its employees had tested positive for the coronavirus and now has had seven employees and the family member of one worker become sick.
RVP didnt say whether any of those others have been tested for the virus, but did say in a statement Thursday that All are recovering at home and seem to be over the worst of it.
While highly contagious, the coronavirus presents little risk for most people the vast majority of those infected recover, and many have mild or no symptoms.
The potential consequences of infection, though, are high. Estimates vary widely about the fatality rate but scientists believe COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus, to be significantly more deadly than the flu. It appears especially dangerous for older people and those with underlying health conditions.
Thats why Oregon and many other states have instructed people to stay home during the outbreak. Government officials hope that if they can slow the spread of the virus that will reduce the strain on hospitals and give testing and treatment regimens a chance to catch up.
Oregon has had 317 people test positive for the virus and 11 deaths attributed to COVID-19. The outbreak is much more severe elsewhere, with cases overwhelming hospitals in New York City, Italy and Spain.
Pressed this week for details about how Oregons stay-home order applies, Brown insisted repeatedly she has been very clear that people should stay home and businesses should not operate if they cannot ensure workers safety.
The governors message has been muddled, though, on how workers should respond if they see workplace violations. Her office initially directed workplace complaints to Oregons Occupational Safety & Health division (OSHA), but on Tuesday the governor said concerns should go to the Oregon Employment Department. On Wednesday, the governor said workers should direct concerns to the states Bureau of Labor & Industries.
On Thursday, shortly after this article posted, the governors office said complaints and coronavirus safety violations should go only to Oregon OSHA, not to the other state agencies.
OSHA said it is taking hundreds of complaints per day, but said it has yet to perform any inspections or write any citations.
The governor ordered restaurants and bars to close last week, but allowed them to continue offering delivery and takeout meals. Andy Ricker, owner of Portlands renowned chain of Pok Pok restaurants, opted Wednesday to close his businesses altogether. His decision followed the death of a fellow chef, Floyd Cardoz, and Ricker said he wished he had acted sooner.
Keeping our kitchens open is a microcosm of the tension between the economy and public health that is playing out on the world stage. The fact is, we all need to stay at home to stop the spread of Covid-19, all of us, now, Ricker wrote in a letter to employees.
Pok Pok is a restaurant, not a hospital, not a fire station, not a police station, not a vital food delivery service, He wrote. Though it is nice to have a familiar food available during this time of isolation people do not need fish sauce wings to survive.
This article has been updated with additional comment from Lam Research.
-- Mike Rogoway | mrogoway@oregonian.com | twitter: @rogoway |
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President Trump takes questions from reporters Monday. Joining him at the press briefing on coronavirus are Vice President Pence; Attorney General William Barr; Dr. Deborah Birx, White House coronavirus response coordinator; and Navy Rear Adm. John Polowczyk, who leads FEMA's task force on the supply chain. Alex Brandon/AP hide caption
President Trump takes questions from reporters Monday. Joining him at the press briefing on coronavirus are Vice President Pence; Attorney General William Barr; Dr. Deborah Birx, White House coronavirus response coordinator; and Navy Rear Adm. John Polowczyk, who leads FEMA's task force on the supply chain.
At a time when the nation is desperate for authoritative information about the coronavirus pandemic, the country's foremost agency for fighting infectious disease outbreaks has gone conspicuously silent.
"I want to assure Americans that we have a team of public health experts," President Trump said at Tuesday evening's coronavirus task force briefing a bit of reassurance that probably would not have been necessary if that briefing had included anyone from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The CDC normally takes the lead in outbreaks, ranging from the 2009 flu pandemic to Ebola to the lung injuries caused by vaping. Its recent absence from the national stage has led to fears that the agency's objective, science-based approach is being ignored, especially as Trump signals that he hopes to relax restrictions on social gatherings by Easter to help revive the economy.
That idea has horrified public health experts outside of the government, who say that the virus is spreading rapidly and that social distancing measures still need time to work.
"This has never happened before. In the nearly 75 years that the CDC has existed, in every single infectious disease outbreak the country has dealt with, the CDC has been central. It's been at the decision table, and it's been at the podium," says former CDC director Tom Frieden, who is now president and CEO of the global health initiative Resolve to Save Lives.
"I feel less safe because it's not clear that the CDC's expertise is feeding into the decisions that are being made, and these are life and death decisions," says Frieden. "We are less safe because the CDC doesn't have the voice and the role it needs to have."
The CDC is normally a credible, reliable source of infectious disease knowledge, led by physicians, scientists and epidemiologists capable of fielding detailed questions about what is scientifically known and what is not.
In past health emergencies, the agency has not only provided specific numbers and data about the changing status of an epidemic, but also offered informed commentary on the likely course of an outbreak and the best known strategies for mitigation and containment. The agency is usually in close contact with state public health agencies, and has an overview on what is happening across the entire country.
Though represented behind the scenes on the White House's coronavirus task force, the CDC hasn't held its own press briefing for reporters in two weeks. Those briefings had been happening frequently as the novel coronavirus outbreak began, but stopped abruptly early this month. The last one was held on March 9. An inquiry from NPR to the CDC about why the agency's briefings stopped and whether they would resume went unanswered.
Meanwhile, various members of the White House task force have taken over the job of informing the public. Much time is spent in briefings on economic or political considerations like legislation or the performance of the stock market, with questions often being answered by the president or Vice President Mike Pence.
Asked, for example, why Easter was targeted as a possible timeline for lifting social distancing measures, the president replied, "I just thought it was a beautiful time. It would be a beautiful time, a beautiful timeline. It's a great day."
A follow-up question asked whether the time was based on any data, and the president again said that he thought it would be a beautiful timeline.
"I am concerned that I haven't seen CDC as a participant in the briefings in days, and that CDC does not seem to be speaking otherwise directly to the public, which is really a break with how they have communicated about past epidemics in the United States," says Tom Inglesby, director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security.
"We're in the middle of the most serious epidemic that this country has experienced probably in 100 years, and CDC is the organization that studies and prepares for and responds to epidemics, and is known throughout the world for that expertise," says Inglesby. "To me, it seems like they should be a central participant in all communications with the public."
At the White House briefings, science and public health questions often get addressed by Anthony Fauci, the head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, or the coronavirus response coordinator, Ambassador Deborah Birx.
The two, both doctors, seem to walk a tightrope of trying not to annoy the president while deftly attempting to temper some of his more optimistic assertions, like the potential of the drug chloroquine to treat COVID-19.
Fauci's absence on Monday led to speculation that his willingness to contradict the president had led to his banishment. But on Tuesday, Fauci spoke during the White House briefing, and received praise from Trump.
Inglesby says of the doctor: "Dr. Fauci is a national treasure and is extraordinary. But he has many, many things to explain and be responsible for, including the entire development process for vaccines and medicines and the research agenda."
It is CDC officials who actually have the mission of preparing the nation to control epidemics, he says, "so they should be there with Dr. Fauci."
"Dr. Fauci is one of the world's greatest researchers. He has a fantastic career; he is a wonderful human being. He is able to navigate very complex scientific and political issues extremely well," agrees Frieden. "But CDC is the country's public health agency. Fighting this pandemic without CDC central to that fight is like fighting it with one hand tied behind your back."
Dr. Anthony Fauci (left), director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, confers with Dr. Robert Redfield, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, at a congressional hearing on March 11. Patrick Semansky/AP hide caption
Dr. Anthony Fauci (left), director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, confers with Dr. Robert Redfield, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, at a congressional hearing on March 11.
Top officials who could be communicating with the public more regularly include CDC Director Robert Redfield; CDC principal deputy director, Anne Schuchat; and Nancy Messonnier, who is director of the CDC's National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases.
"Those are the most important people to have out there because of the positions they hold, what they represent, the fact that many of them are physicians, and all of them have expertise in public health and particularly in infectious disease," says Bill Pierce of APCO Worldwide, who served as spokesperson for the Department of Health and Human Services under President George W. Bush.
"I think we need to hear from them more consistently," says Pierce. "Clearly, we have heard a lot from Tony Fauci. But I think we need to hear from more of them. And I think there needs to be more than just the briefing at the White House. That's important, but also I think the agencies themselves can do briefings."
Messonnier is scheduled to speak at a teleconference on Thursday but it's one organized by the State Department, aimed largely at foreign media, to discuss how the CDC is coordinating with other countries.
Some question whether Redfield is up to the task of serving as a strong public communicator, noting that his recent testimony before lawmakers about the coronavirus outbreak did not inspire confidence.
"He did a terrible job in front of Congress. If that's any indication of the way he would communicate, we probably don't want to see him," says Paul Argenti, professor of corporate communication at the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth.
In a crisis, says Argenti, there ideally needs to be one voice delivering one consistent message, much as Gov. Andrew Cuomo has been doing in New York.
And if multiple officials are addressing the public, they shouldn't be sending mixed messages, Argenti adds.
"They don't have to be maniacally consistent, but they have to actually make sense when put together. They cannot be contradictory," he says. "And what we are seeing right now are contradictory messages."
In difficult times, Argenti says, people are desperate for the voice of a leader.
"And so I do think it is a good idea for President Trump to continue to try to get this right," he says. "But boy, it would be good if he conferred with his health experts to make sure that that message is both correct and consistent."
karenfoleyphotography/iStock/Getty Images Plus
This article was published in partnership with the Marshall Project, a nonprofit news organization covering the U.S. criminal justice system. Sign up for their newsletter, or follow The Marshall Project on Facebook or Twitter.
Most Fridays, Yezenia Guzman knows where her incarcerated mother-in-law is: at a hospital near the Central California Womens Facility in Chowchilla, receiving treatment for the melanoma in both her legs.
But now, as the coronavirus spreads in the state, Guzman is worried. She hasnt heard from her mother-in-law in over a week. Prison visits are suspended to reduce exposure to the virus, but she hasnt received any word if visits to the hospital are canceled too. She fears that her mother-in-law, who is 65 with a weakened immune system from the cancer treatments, is at a higher risk of contracting the coronavirus and infecting other women in the prison.
We are panicking, Guzman said in a phone interview.
With the threat of coronavirus looming large over the nations prisons, the Marshall Project emailed a list of people with family and friends behind bars to understand how they are weathering the crisis. Nearly 450 people in 32 states responded. They fear for their relatives physical and emotional health, and they are scrambling to get even basic information about preventive measures the facilities are taking to keep their loved ones from becoming infected.
As reports of coronavirus crop up in prisons and jails, families say they are left in the dark about facilities plans to contain and treat the virus, sending their ever-present anxiety to new heights. They get no or only spotty information from prison authorities. Visitation is suspended at all state and federal prisons, so families cannot see their loved ones for themselves to determine if they are safe. If the prison is on lockdown or if their loved ones are in quarantine, even phone calls cannot get through.
Many facilities have offered additional phone minutes and video calls in place of in-person visits. But, while a limited number of calls are free in some facilities, many families say they still have to pay for the extra time. Federal prisons, for example, are offering 200 extra minutes each month, which can cost up to 21 cents a minute for long distance calls.
Laurie Shenk says she was 30 minutes away from the Federal Medical Center in Rochester, Minnesota, last weekend when her husband, who is incarcerated there, called to say visits were canceled. She had already driven five hours from her home inIowa with her 2-year-old granddaughter in tow.
Shenk, like many family members whose relatives have health issues that could put them in high-risk categories for the virus, is worried about her husband. She says he has chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and had a heart transplant. Prison officials say they will call her if something were to happen to him, she says, but she fears that means theyll only call if he is dead.
I just have to keep faith, she said. Its the only thing thats keeping me going.
Even in the days before the pandemic, it was a struggle to reach prison officials, family members say. A few months ago, Guzman made the four-hour trip to visit her mother-in-law, but when she arrived at the womens prison she wasnt there. Prison staff took her to the hospital unexpectedly. Officials told Guzman it was just a routine visit, but when her mother-in-law called a week and half later, she told Guzman she was hospitalized because of a dangerously high temperature.
Guzman says she tries to keep in touch with phone calls and emails, visiting in person when she can. But when she hasnt heard from her mother-in-law, Guzman says the prison medical staff rarely return her calls. And when they do pick up, she says, officials often transfer her from one voicemail box to another.
Its always just up in the air, she said.
A representative for the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation said staff are working around the clock to provide information to families, but that it is entirely impossible to keep every single inmates support system updated without redirecting the staff who are working to keep their loved one safe. The department has posted their coronavirus precautions online, noting that routine medical visits and appointments with specialists may be delayed or rescheduled.
Many corrections systems across the country have used Twitter or Facebook to notify the public about the steps they are taking to prevent the transmission of coronavirus within their facilities. But many of the families and friends who responded to the callout say they havent received the messages and lack a direct line into the prison to find out more.
Some friends and family members arent surprised by prison officials lack of communication during this crisis. For others, the experience is eye-opening.
Before last year, Debbie Sessa didnt believe the horror stories shed heard about prison. She didnt know anyone behind bars until her friend and former coworker was sent to Danbury Federal Correctional Institution in Connecticut in January. Her friend, who is 62, stays in a dorm with more than 30 other women. Sessa says her friend called a few days ago to say that two women in her dorm went to the hospital for a routine test, but when they returned to the prison, they were placed in isolation.
Her friend doesnt know why they were moved out of the dorm. But Sessa is worried that if they were exposed to the virus at the hospital, her friend and all the other women living in her proximity could be at risk.
I cant relax. I cant sleep, Sessa said. I used to hear things about prison and think:Thats not really happening. And now I am hearing things and I am like: Oh my God!
The Federal Bureau of Prisons, which oversees several of the facilities included in this article, did not respond to requests for comment.
Providing incomplete information or downplaying the threat the coronavirus poses couldhave unintended consequences, some family members say. Many respondents noted their loved ones and other prisoners are watching the news, seeing entire cities shut down around them as governors across the country issue shelter-in-place orders to prevent the spread of coronavirus. As the stress mounts, and the threat of an outbreak or lockdown intensifies, many say theyre worried about violence erupting.
Thats Hannah Benjamins biggest fear. Her boyfriend is incarcerated at McKean Federal Correctional Institution in Pennsylvania. I am concerned the lack of adequate attendance will incite panic and a riot, which will do far more violence to the prison population than the COVID-19 will, she wrote.
We cant see each other and support each other now, wrote another respondent, Lacona Darrah, whose husband is incarcerated at North Central Correctional Facility in Ohio. I am concerned about him being hurt by violence breaking out due to pent up emotions and stress.
Aminah Elster spent 15 years in prison in California. Shes been out since 2007, but she still keeps in touch with some of the women she left behind at Central California Womens Facility. She says officials have passed out flyers on the importance of hand-washing and are attempting to practice social distancing by sending smaller groups to the dining hall and only allowing two women per table.
But Elster says such measures may well be in vain because the women are still expected to work in the prison industries, where they interact with workers from the outside. And, she says, the prison hasnt provided the incarcerated workers with face masks or gloves.
They are confused, she said. They are piece-mealing a lot of information together. A lot of folks may not understand the gravity of the situation.
A representative for the California Corrections Department did not specifically address questions about whether incarcerated workers have gloves and masks.
Several respondents noted the facilities have supplied bleach as a cleaning supply for the first time in yearsnormally such potentially toxic materials are not distributed.
Hes part of the shower washing team, wrote Cherly Floyd, whose son is incarcerated at Bent County Correctional Facility in Colorado. The facility has been spraying the showers with bleach water and my son and another inmate wipe the surfaces down.
Imagining the havoc the coronavirus could wreak on their friend or family member in prison is terrifying, respondents say. And many say they have added reason to worry: If there is one thing theyve learned in their collective years of dealing with the prison system, its that when their loved ones behind bars are sick or in need, families on the outside are often the last to know.
Anne Weiss hasnt heard from her boyfriend at Butner Federal Correctional Facility in North Carolina for a month. The two are usually in regular contact, but their relationship came under strain when her boyfriend was diagnosed with lymphoma.
As the days pass and the coronavirus spreads, Weiss mind races. I dont know whats going on, she said. Is he sick again? Is he on lockdown? What are they doing for him in terms of the virus outbreak? Are they testing people in this condition?
Her boyfriend is in remission, but hes still at risk of serious health complications should he become infected. The only information she has comes from a bulletin on the Bureau of Prisons website announcing a temporary suspension of visitation. After decades of unanswered phone calls and letters, Weiss says pressing for more details is pointless.
Nobody talks to you, she said, because you are just another loved one of a criminal.
They dont care, she added. They just dont care.
After his recent discharge from the intensive care unit, he did the same for them, leaving a heartfelt note that the center posted Wednesday on Instagram. His sentiments reflect the widespread sense of gratitude to health care workers on the front lines of the coronavirus pandemic.
"This window has been the most impactful window in my life.
"On days when I watched you work hard to keep me and others alive, unable to thank you for the time that you poured into me -- and although I will probably never get the chance to pour that same love and support into you, I want you to know that I think you all are rockstars.
"I watched some of you have good nights and some bad nights but what was consistent every night was that you care for people.
"Today I leave this ICU a changed person, hopefully for the better, not only because of your medical healing and God's direction and guidance, but with the fact of knowing that there are such wonderful people dedicated to the care and concern of others.
"God bless each of you."
Executive Summary
The dramatic speed of the operating-model transformation prompted by the coronavirus is raising truly existential challenges for traditional firms, and for the many employees that depend on them for income. Thats because an existing digital transformation effort thats creating competitive advantages for select companies has been thrust into the realm of the workplace itself. Firms that are already far along this transformation will transition smoothly as in-person work is less necessary or even preferable, while many others will struggle.This is creating a new digital divide that will deepen fractures in our society.Can business and government save us from that future?
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As workplaces mandate that employees work from home, universities shift fully to online teaching, restaurants transition to online ordering and delivery, and automakers shut down their plants, were seeing the most rapid organizational transformation in the history of the modern firm.
Yes, companies have dealt with financial crises like the 2008 Great Recession or the dot-com bust of the early 2000s. And many have endured wars and terrorist attacks, election surprises, and previous health crises. But never before have established and evolved economies faced this kind of shock. And nothing quite compares to the physical-digital divide Covid-19 is revealing and how it affects thenature of work.
In some ways, you can trace whats happening today to a huge digital transformation thats already well underway. Firms have been moving to an increasingly digital core based on software, data, and digital networks for years, requiring a fundamentally new operating architecture.From Ant Financial to Facebook, the new digital firm gains its competitive advantage in three ways: by producing more at a lower unit cost (scale), by achieving a greater production variety (scope), and by pushing for improvement and innovation (learning).
This digital scale, scope, and learning paradigm is already difficult for even established organizations to adopt. The pandemic is only making this more challenging by adding an increasingly important fourth dimension to digital operating models: virtual work. Today,rather than digitizing the relationship between firm and customer alone, the virtual model digitizes the relationship between firm and employee. As a result, offices are less important; working from home is not only possible, but often even preferable.
This need to virtualize work due to Covid-19 is driving digital transformation and deepening differences across people and across firms at an incredible rate. In a period of days, almost any process that could be rapidly digitized has been virtualized think of video conferencing enabling a case discussion and telemedicine enabling remote diagnosis and treatment. We are seeing the digitization of many ancient bastions of traditional business; the New York Stock Exchange just closed its trading floor and has moved to electronic trading.
But some businesses and processes still intrinsically require physical closeness think of hotels, big-box stores, car dealerships, and grocery stores, and traditional retail. In addition, not all businesses with a digital operating core can be virtualized to the same extent. Despite having a largely software- and data-centric operating core, Uber and Lyft leverage huge communities performing traditional work to fulfill operating needs. Similarly, Amazon employs tens of thousands of manual workers working in warehouses and driving delivery trucks.
The stakes for digital transformation have increased dramatically. Now, digitizing the operating architecture of the firm is not simply a recipe for higher performance, but much more fundamental for worker employment and public health. This is creating a new digital divide that will deepen fractures in our society. The firms that cannot change overnight will be left way behind, exposing their employees to increasing risk of financial and physical distress. This divide is not only across firms, but is also driving fissures within firms. At Amazon, arguably one of the most successful digital firms in the world,warehouse workers are starting to protest.
The divide is sure to spread. While easily virtualized businesses like education and software continue to operate, closures and layoffs are mounting in others. On March 26 the U.S. Labor Department reported that3.3 Million Americans had filed initial unemployment claims during the week, the highest such number in history. At a fragile moment like this, we must acknowledge that the economy cannot be run by digital firms alone. The COVID-19 crisis is giving us a terrifying, up-close view of how the digital divide will continue to play out. Can business and government work together to save us from that future?
(Editors note: This article was updated on March 26 to reflect the latest U.S. unemployment number.)
