CLEVELAND, Ohio - When the Ohio Department of Health on Monday reported the largest single-day increase in coronavirus cases in more than a month it wasnt a blip, but rather a significant example of a trend that had been developing since late last week.
The long and generally steady decline of newly reported COVID-19 cases is over, at least for the time being. And the number of cases is trending up.
For 12 straight days - from June 6 through last Wednesday - the number of new cases reported each day ranged from 300 to 434, averaging 389 a day during this period.
Then, starting on Wednesday, the state has reported 700, 609, 531, 546 and finally 729 in its updates at 2 p.m. each day.
More clearly put, the seven-day average - a way to smooth out trends that could otherwise be affected by the timely processing lab work or paperwork - hit a two-month low on June 12 at 381. Since then, the seven-day average has increased nearly every day, hitting 566 on Monday - the highest point since May 27.
While the trend is clear, whats behind the spike is unknown for sure at this early stage with limited publicly available data on these new cases. At least three factors could be coming into play.
* Ohio gradually has resumed activities, from work to play, including the wider opening of restaurants and stores, and entertainment centers such as pools and parks.
* Early on, many people with symptoms were never tested. When supplies were limited, testing focused on the sickest and oldest patients, and healthcare workers. Now, anyone can get a test, Gov. Mike DeWine has said. In the seven days through Monday, the state reported 102,190 tests, up from 80,140 and 75,922 the previous two weeks.
* And some older cases are being added to the totals, such as those in which blood testing shows earlier presence of the virus. In the last week, 204 cases with an onset of symptoms from May or earlier have been added to the total, including 97 from April or earlier.
COVID-19 hospital stays until recently had been trending down in Ohio. This chart shows the number of patients on a given day, as reported by hospitals to the Ohio Hospital Association. Out-of-state patients are included. Totals for the most recent day or two may be revised later.Rich Exner, cleveland.com
One way to clean the data for uneven testing and reporting of cases is to look only at hospitalization records. These are among the most serious of cases, and also those for which state health officials were always most likely to know about.
The encouraging trend on hospitalizations to date is that they have not shown the same spike upward found in the overall case numbers.
The numbers for both total coronavirus patients and those in intensive care units are well below where they were from April through early June, though up slightly the last couple of days.
For example, the Ohio Hospital Association reported 549 coronavirus patients in Ohio hospitals on Monday, with 217 of those in ICUs. This compares with 760 and 323 on June 1, and 1,067 and 411 on May 1.
However, a patient could have coronavirus for several days or more before being hospitalized, or even being diagnosed. And the latest hospitalization numbers are often later revised up slightly.
Rich Exner, data analysis editor for cleveland.com, writes about numbers on a variety of topics. Follow on Twitter @RichExner. See other data-related stories at cleveland.com/datacentral.
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Ohios disturbing new trend of increasing coronavirus cases - cleveland.com
PITTSBURGH (KDKA) For the second day in a row, there was an increase in the number of coronavirus cases in Allegheny County.
On Tuesday, 19 new cases were reported on the heels of 45 new cases reported on Monday.
We dont want to backslide, says Allegheny County Executive Rich Fitzgerald.
And in the new numbers, Fitzgerald says, the cases are mostly young people, people in their 20s and 30s.
Kevin Havovick of Bethel Park says, I think that people are comfortable not wearing masks as much since we went green.
In fact, Madison Miranda, who lives in the Strip District and is careful about her mask-wearing, says her fellow millennials have been anxious to get back together.
The bars have opened up recently and a lot of millennials are out protesting, and I think the large grouping of people is why this is resurfacing, Havovick said.
Marvi Wahla agrees.
Now that places have opened up, people forget that the virus is still around. They think because places are open, they can do things and go about without the mask and do whatever, Wahla said.
Another millennial, Dwight Dwyer from Homewood, was blunt.
People are just losing it, man. People dont care, Dwyer said.
Fitzgerald concedes younger people may not face the dire sickness of their grandparents, but the spread can occur by anybody. It doesnt matter about your age or what you do. You can spread the disease.
That is a major concern for businesses like Simple Greek in Market Square, which has been devastated by the impact of coronavirus.
Owner Rich Machel says his business is down 70, almost 80 percent.
More information on the Coronavirus pandemic:
Machel says with many downtown offices empty, take-out business alone wont keep him afloat. He needs customers to sit inside and outside.
I need it to stay green and we all do, not only here but throughout the city, Machel said.
Fitzgerald says Allegheny County worked hard to get to the green phase and we dont want to go and close things down again. If we get too relaxed and dont keep the social and physical distancing, wear the masks and wash our hands as the medical experts have told us to, we could end up like Florida, Arizona and Texas.
A spike could mean the return to the yellow phase, which Marvi Wahla thinks will come once the schools reopen.
I think after a month or two, they are going to have to close again. And the same with businesses and offices. A lot of people are going to have to start working at home again because the virus is still here, cases are going up. I think its still a problem, Wahla said.
There is no set number of how much of an increase would prompt a return to the yellow phase.
Fitzgerald is hopeful a reinforcement of the mitigation efforts will return the curve to a downward trend and avoid a setback.
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As Louisiana experienced the largest one-day surge in coronavirus cases since the height of the outbreak in early April, state health officials raised the alarm about worsening numbers and urged people to take precautions to limit the spread.
In the past seven days, Louisiana has averaged more new cases, 775, than at any point since the week ending April 13, when the state was in the middle of a stay-at-home order aimed at slowing the spread of the virus enough to avoid overwhelming hospitals. The 1,356 new cases confirmed Tuesday was the most since April 7th.
Louisiana is testing more people now compared to earlier this spring, when the virus raged through greater New Orleans and elsewhere. But officials on Tuesday pointed to concerning data that could spell the beginning of new trends.
The rate of positive tests compared to total tests has ticked up, from under 5% in the first phase of reopening that began in mid-May to 6.84% last week, according to Health Department data. And the amount of confirmed coronavirus in the state is growing again at a faster clip.
The number of coronavirus patients in the hospital has risen for five days straight statewide, from 554 to 646, erasing the states gains in June for hospitalizations.
Once a national hotspot, the greater New Orleans region is experiencing slightly better trends than other regions, like Acadiana. Still, Dr. Joseph Kanter, the regional medical director for Region 1, which includes New Orleans, said the amount of coronavirus in the region is still high enough to cause concern.
Its like a slow-burning fire, Kanter said. It may be contained, but its not extinguished and it really doesn't take much to ignite it further.
The Louisiana Dept. of Health reported 1,356 more coronavirus cases, 17 more deaths and 16 more hospitalizations in its daily noon update Tuesday.
Kanter said increases in hospitalized cases is a strong signal that the virus is spreading. Young people, ages 18-29, have started contributing a greater share to the states total, in part because theyre likely contracting the virus at a higher rate and in part because more testing is available to them than early on. But Kanter noted that the rise in hospitalizations are mostly not 18-29-year-olds, and that officials believe young people will spread the virus to older and sicker cohorts.
Jefferson Parish has recently driven much of the growth in cases in the New Orleans region, Kanter noted, but he said the virus does not respect any boundaries. For instance, some of the cases confirmed at Tigerland bars in Baton Rouge were Jefferson Parish and Orleans Parish residents.
As of June 17, approximately one-third of Louisiana's 278 nursing homes had not complied with state and federal coronavirus testing guidelines
The dramatic spike in cases comes a day after Gov. John Bel Edwards announced the state would not move into Phase 3 of reopening on Friday, when the Phase 2 order was set to expire. Instead, the state will remain in Phase 2--where restaurants, retailers, barber shops and other businesses are limited to 50% capacity for another four weeks, in an effort to get a better handle on rising cases.
According to the Louisiana Department of Health, last week the state saw the third-highest rise in cases on record, behind only the first two weeks in April. The vast majority, 95%, of Tuesdays increase in cases is tied to community spread, instead of congregate settings like nursing homes and prisons. And 97% of the cases are from infections where the specimen was collected between Jun 15 and June 23, which the Health Department said means the increase was not tied to a backlog, which have plagued case data in recent weeks.
Fred's in Tigerland will host a drive-thru coronavirus testing site on Thursday for college students and staff who work at nearby bars.
About 7.6% of total tests came back positive Tuesday, which the Health Department said is below a goal of 10%. But the rate is uneven across the state. The Acadiana health region saw a rate of about 12%, while the New Orleans region had a 6.3% rate and greater Baton Rouge had 6.7%.
State health officials say its difficult to pin the rise in cases to specific events, though the state has confirmed some high-profile outbreaks, like one at Tigerland bars where more than 100 were infected and others at graduation parties in New Orleans. But officials have not tied the rising caseload to protests against police brutality, which brought thousands outside in New Orleans, Baton Rouge and elsewhere.
Dr. Dawn Marcelle, the states medical director for the Baton Rouge region, said any event where people are not distancing from one another or wearing masks poses a risk of spread. But she said its not clear whether the rising cases are from reopening businesses, people taking beach trips, protests or something else.
I think its a combination of factors, she said. I dont think its any one thing.
While Baton Rouge and New Orleans have seen slight upticks in hospitalizations and other metrics recently, the Acadiana region on Tuesday continued to see an alarming rise.
The 354 new cases in the Acadiana region far outpaced the states eight other health regions, representing more than a quarter of new cases across Louisiana. That represented an 11% positive rate, above a federal guideline of 10%.
Marcelle also noted that many in the Baton Rouge region arent wearing masks, echoing concerns that health officials have statewide. Health experts have urged people to wear face coverings when in public to reduce the spread of particles from the person wearing the mask. Marcelle implored members of the public to wear a face covering--over their nose--to help limit the spread of the virus.
This is not party politics, Marcelle said. This is public health.
Staff writers Ben Myers and Jeff Adelson contributed to this report.
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More than 100 days into the coronavirus pandemic, heres where things stand in the United States: 2.3 million people have been infected, and some 120,000 people more than in any other country have died. Early epicenters like New York and New Jersey appear to have gotten their outbreaks under control, but several new hot spots have emerged, including in Florida, Texas and Arizona, where daily case counts are higher than ever. Over all, the number of new cases a day is rising, and the rest of the world is taking note: The European Union is mulling travel restrictions that would prohibit Americans from entering any nation in the bloc because the United States has failed to contain the pandemic.
None of these developments have put an end to the denialism that has prevailed at the White House from the start. In an op-ed for The Wall Street Journal last week, Vice President Mike Pence argued that reports of a coming second wave of infections were exaggerated. That argument was seconded by Larry Kudlow, the administrations top economic adviser. Scientists do not agree: On Tuesday Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nations leading infectious disease expert, told a House panel that the country has yet to clear the first wave of the pandemic and that a second wave of outbreaks is possible. Were still in the middle of a serious outbreak, he said. There is no doubt about that.
A few days after the publication of Mr. Pences op-ed, President Trump noted at a rally in Tulsa, Okla., that the nations case counts would not rise quite so egregiously if the U.S. stopped testing so many people for the virus. When you do testing to that extent, youre gonna find more people, youre gonna find more cases, he told the crowd. So I said to my people, Slow the testing down, please. Administration officials later insisted that the president was joking about requesting a testing slowdown, but its difficult to see the humor in that punchline: If the U.S. reduces testing, case counts will decrease, but death counts will undoubtedly increase.
The presidents remarks were hardly surprising. They harken back to the earlier days of the outbreak, when Mr. Trump suggested that coronavirus-exposed passengers be kept onboard the Grand Princess cruise ship so they would not contribute to the case count on American soil. At that point, hed already spent weeks downplaying the risks of the virus, saying, among other things, that it would disappear like a miracle come spring.
Its hard to see the benefit of such magical thinking, especially now, when the truth is so plain that even some of Mr. Trumps reluctant fellow Republicans are starting to acknowledge reality. In recent days, Gov. Greg Abbott of Texas has finally allowed individual cities and counties to mandate wearing masks, after initially overruling such orders. (The reversal came after several local Republican leaders joined their Democratic colleagues to request more autonomy in responding to the crisis.) But the pattern is clear: The president and his most loyal supporters keep acting as though if they ignore the seriousness of the coronavirus, it will cease to exist. This game of make-believe is made easier for them by the fact that the pandemic is doing the worst damage behind the walls of prisons, nursing homes and meatpacking plants.
There is still hope to be found in this morass. For all the denialism and politicking, scientists have managed to learn quite a bit in recent months about this coronavirus: Theyre fairly certain now that it can spread from normal breathing (as opposed to just coughing), that an infected person who isnt showing any symptoms can pass the virus to others and that even simple cloth masks can prevent such transmissions.
Doctors also say that at least two medications have been shown to help treat Covid-19 and that refined treatment protocols including for when and how to use ventilators are helping to improve patient outcomes.
But it would still be better if the nations leaders worked to prevent as many people as possible from contracting the virus in the first place and to do that, theyll have to start by acknowledging that the threat is real. On Tuesday, Dr. Robert Redfield, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, called the pandemic the greatest public health crisis our nation and world have confronted in a century. Its past time for the rest of the administration to start taking it that seriously.
Read more here:
The Coronavirus Is Still Raging. Trump Remains in Denial. - The New York Times
WASHINGTON Federal health officials tell Congress to brace for a second wave of coronavirus infections in the fall and winter of this year.
Drs. Anthony Fauci of the NIH, Robert Redfield of the CDC, and FDA head Stephen Hahn agreed under questioning before the House Energy and Commerce Committee.
"It's simple," said Redfield. "We are going to experience significant coronavirus infection in the fall and winter."
Other respiratory viruses follow a usual pattern of resurgence during the cold weather months, when people are likelier to be indoors, making it easier to transmit infection.
HHS assistant secretary for health Brett Giroir concurred with the other officials, adding that he wants to have enough supplies stockpiled so the health care system can treat COVID-19 patients without having to shut down access for people needing care for other conditions.
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HERE'S WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT THE VIRUS OUTBREAK:
Dr. Anthony Fauci cites institutional racism for virus' impact on African Americans
France's official contact-tracing app has been downloaded 1.9 million times but sent only 14 notifications in three weeks
Novak Djokovic and three other top tennis players test positive for virus after Balkans tournament.
Hotels in Greece will have basic isolation and treatment areas, doctors on call this summer.
One of the Arab world's most prestigious universities has endured civil war, staff kidnappings and economic crises in its 154-year history. The American University of Beirut now confronts a triple threat simultaneously in a pandemic, a recession and the collapse of Lebanon's currency. Meanwhile, a Saudi official says the hajj pilgrimage that usually draws up to 2.5 million Muslims is likely to see only a few thousand pilgrims.
A coronavirus outbreak linked to a slaughterhouse in Germany has led a state government to impose week-long lockdown measures. More than 1,500 people tied to the slaughterhouse have tested positive. Thousands more are quarantined. The governor of North Rhine-Westphalia says area cinemas, fitness studios and bars will be closed again. In related news, China's ban of imports from one Tyson Foods poultry plant with infected workers has raised concerns for the U.S. meat industry.
People are flocking to beaches for vacation after being cooped up by COVID-19 for months. But the coronavirus is taking no vacation. The U.S. state of South Carolina now has the fourth-highest new infection rate in the nation when adjusted for population. One hot spot is around Myrtle Beach, which has seen COVID-19 cases jump from fewer 300 at the start of June to nearly 1,600. And that only counts residents, not visitors. Local entrepreneurs fear more infections could result in bad publicity.
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Follow all of AP's pandemic coverage at http://apnews.com/VirusOutbreak and https://apnews.com/UnderstandingtheOutbreak
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HERE'S WHAT ELSE IS HAPPENING:
AUSTIN, Texas Republican Gov. Greg Abbott says Texas has surpassed 5,000 new coronavirus cases in a single day for the first time, recording another troubling milestone as America's largest pediatric hospital, Texas Children's Hospital, begins taking adult patients to free up bed space in Houston.
The announcement Tuesday comes days after Texas eclipsed 4,000 new cases for the first time just last weekend.
Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation's top infectious disease expert, told lawmakers in Washington on Tuesday that "the next couple weeks are going to be critical" in Texas and other states that are trying to curtail an alarming spike in new cases.
The infection rate in Texas has doubled since late May to nearly 9%. And on Monday, Texas recorded an 11th consecutive day of record COVID-19 hospitalizations with more than 3,700.
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WASHINGTON -- The chairman of a House committee conducting an oversight hearing on the Trump administration's COVID-19 response says the panel was snubbed by the head of Medicare and Medicaid.
Seema Verma, administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, would have joined Dr. Anthony Fauci and other top health officials testifying Tuesday before the House Energy and Commerce Committee.
Chairman Frank Pallone, D-N.J., says Verma turned down repeated invitations.
She "could have provided valuable insight (about) what is working, what still needs to be improved and what more we can do to help these vulnerable communities," said Pallone. "Unfortunately, she decided not to come."
There was no immediate comment from the Medicare agency. Pallone said he will keep pushing for Verma to appear before the committee.
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SALT LAKE CITY Utah's Republican governor says he has no plans to shut down the economy even though he shares some of the concerns raised in a memo by the state's epidemiologist who warned a "complete shutdown" might be imminent if the state can't stop a prolonged spike of coronavirus cases.
Gov. Gary Herbert tweeted late Monday night that he appreciated the analysis by epidemiologist Angela Dunn in her memo that detailed the severity of a spread of COVID-19 that has doubled the infection rate and daily case count since Herbert allowed many businesses to reopen in mid-May.
But he reiterated his stance that economic growth can happen while keeping people safe.
"We will work to stem this tide, but I have no plans to shut down Utah's economy," tweeted Herbert.
Dunn recommended that the state reimpose some restrictions on businesses and group gatherings unless the state lowers its weekly average of case by more than half by July 1.
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WASHINGTON -- Top federal health officials say they continue to deal with the World Health Organization despite President Donald Trump's decision to pull out of the U.N. health agency, which serves as a forum for the global coronavirus response.
Dr. Anthony Fauci of the National Institutes of Health and Dr. Robert Redfield, head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, told the House Energy and Commerce Committee on Tuesday that they continue to have regular interactions with scientific peers at the WHO.
Trump pulled the U.S. out of the World Health Organization after complaining about its response to the coronavirus and alleged favoritism toward China.
Fauci and Redfield both said they were not directly consulted about the president's decision.
Fauci said his National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases has a memorandum of understanding that governs regular collaboration with the WHO. Redfield said his agency is working with the world body on Ebola, polio and influenza.
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BATON ROUGE, La. -- The number of new COVID-19 cases reported in Louisiana jumped by more than 1,356 Tuesday, and the number of people hospitalized with the disease ticked up by 16.
The statewide increase to a total of 51,595 cases was the largest single-day rise in reported cases since early April excluding days when delayed reporting of backlogged cases accounted for increases.
The daily record was reported by the state health department a day after Gov. John Bel Edwards announced that the recent surge in cases would prevent Louisiana from further easing restrictions aimed at keeping the new coronavirus from spreading.
On Twitter, the state health department said 95% of the cases reported Tuesday were the result of "community spread," as opposed to infections in nursing homes or other such settings.
The pandemic death toll in Louisiana as of Tuesday was 3,021.
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ANKARA, Turkey Turkey has registered 27 more virus-related deaths over 24 hours, pushing thecountry's overall COVID-19 death toll to 5,001.
Health Minister Fahrettin Koca on Tuesday also reported 1,268 new confirmed virus cases since the day before. They bring Turkey's total confirmed cases to 190,165. The death toll now stands at 5,001.
Turkey has seen an increase in new cases since the government authorized cafes, restaurants, gyms, parks, beaches and museums to reopen and eased stay-at-home orders for the elderly and young at the start of June.
The country has reported new daily cases numbering around 1,200 or above since June 13, up from around 800 to 900.
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WASHINGTON The head of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration says his agency is maintaining an arm's-length relationship with a White House-led effort to quickly produce a COVID-19 vaccine once it's approved.
The White House effort is called "Operation Warp Speed," and it's geared at having ready the manufacturing capacity and distribution channels for a massive vaccination program.
But FDA Commissioner Stephen Hahn told the House Energy and Commerce Committee on Tuesday that his agency is careful not to work in tandem with Warp Speed.
"We absolutely must maintain regulatory independence and make the right decision for the American people based on the science and the data," said Hahn.
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WASHINGTON Dr. Anthony Fauci says he thinks the United States will be better prepared if the country has a second wave of coronavirus infections this fall and winter.
Fauci told members of the House Energy and Commerce Committee on Tuesday that the U.S. should have the ability to do 40 million to 50 million tests per month by that time, giving public health officials the ability to understand the dynamics of the spread of the virus.
The director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases says that supplies of masks, gowns and other equipment are also being replenished in the national stockpile, and U.S. production is being built up.
Fauci also told the committee he doesn't regret the American public wasn't urged sooner to wear face masks because health personnel needed equipment when there wasn't enough to go around early on.
Republican Rep. David McKinley of West Virginia asked Fauci if he thought President Donald Trump was being judged unfairly about his response to the pandemic.
Fauci said the question is unfair and replied, "I work in the White House, and I believe everyone there is doing everything" they can.
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LAS VEGAS The U.S. state of Nevada has reported its biggest one-day increase in new coronavirus cases for the fourth time in the past eight days.
The record 462 new confirmed cases reported Tuesday came amid an uptick that started about two weeks after casinos in Las Vegas reopened.
Nevada's governor said last week that he plans to leave current restrictions on businesses and gatherings in place at least through the end of June while the state's climbing number of infections is evaluated.
Overall, Nevada has reported nearly 14,000 virus cases and 492 deaths from COVID-19.
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WASHINGTON-- The head of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration tells House lawmakers he hasn't felt any political pressure from the Trump administration to make decisions related to therapies for COVID-19.
The FDA last week pulled its emergency authorization for hydroxychloroquine, a malaria drug aggressively promoted by President Donald Trump for treating COVID-19.
The FDA in March initially green-lighted use of the drug but said new studies strongly suggest it doesn't work against the disease caused by the coronavirus.
Hydroxychloroquine also can sometimes cause dangerous heart side effects. The FDA said that risk outweighed the drug's unproven benefit for COVID-19 patients.
Democratic Congresswoman Anna Eshoo asked FDA Commissioner Stephen Hahn to immediately report any political pressure on the FDA to members of Congress. Hahn said he would.
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PHOENIX Arizona reported a new daily record of nearly 3,600 additional coronavirus cases on Tuesday as the state continued to set records for the number of people hospitalized, in intensive care and on ventilators for COVID-19.
The state Department of Health Service reported 3,591 new confirmed cases, breaking the previous record set Friday by 345 cases. A total of nearly 7,900 confirmed cases were reported Saturday, Sunday and Monday.
Tuesday's report took the state's total caseload in the pandemic to 58,179, while 42 more deaths reported Tuesday raised the death toll to 1,384.
The health department said 2,136 patients were hospitalized for the new virus as of Monday, 614 were in intensive care beds and 386 were on ventilators.
Arizona has emerged as a COVID-19 hot spot in the U.S. since Republican Gov. Doug Ducey lifted his stay-home orders in mid-May.
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WASHINGTON The leading infectious disease specialist in the United States has told lawmakers that institutional racism plays a role in the disproportionate burden of COVID-19 on African Americans.
Dr. Anthony Fauci is testifying before the House Energy and Commerce Committee on Tuesday.
Rep. Bobby Rush, Illinois Democrat, asked Fauci about the virus' toll on Black people.
Fauci cited two main reasons for the disproportionate impact. He says one is that many African Americans are in jobs that are considered essential and involve interactions with the public.
The second reason he gave is that Black people are more likely to suffer from health conditions like high blood pressure and diabetes that worsen the symptoms of COVID.
Fauci said, "It's a sort of double whammy...through no fault of their own."
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WASHINGTON American infectious disease expert Dr. Anthony Fauci says neither he nor any members of the White House Coronavirus Task Force have been asked to slow down testing.
The question arose after U.S. President Donald Trump said at a weekend political rally in Oklahoma that he'd asked his aides to slow down testing because it was turning up too many positive cases.
Other top health officials also told the House Energy and Commerce Committee on Tuesday that nobody has asked them to slow down testing.
The U.S. has tested more than 27 million people, with about 2.3 million or 8.4% -- testing positive.
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WASHINGTON The top infectious disease expert in the United States has told House lawmakers it's a question of "when, not if" the United States will have a vaccine for COVID-19.
Dr. Anthony Fauci of the National Institutes of Health told the House Energy and Commerce Committee on Tuesday that he thinks a coronavirus vaccine could be available by the end of this year or early 2021.
One vaccine candidate will enter advanced trials next month.
Fauci says "we feel cautiously optimistic based on the concerted effort."
The White House has launched an effort called "Operation Warp Speed" to make sure a vaccine can be quickly mass produced and distributed when it's approved by the Food and Drug Administration.
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RIO DE JANEIRO -- A Brazilian federal judge on Tuesday ordered President Jair Bolsonaro to comply with local rules to wear a face mask whenever he is outdoors in the capital of Brasilia.
Here is the original post:
As the City of Milwaukee plans to allow some restaurants to open at full capacity, Milwaukee County and 18 other Wisconsin counties had "high" levels of coronavirus activity as of last week, according to the state health department.
The Department of Health Services has begun rating counties' activity levels from low to high, depicted in shades of blue on an online mapmade public on Tuesday.
In a news release, DHS said the dashboard was published at the request of "our local health partners" and should help local decision-makers make sense of their current COVID-19 situations.
The map will be updated on Wednesdays, DHS said. On Tuesday afternoon, itwas updated through June 17.
Also Tuesday, DHS reported 263 new positive results in nearly 12,000 tests. That positivity rate, 2.2%, is the lowest since June 9 and down from 4.6% on Sunday.
Five more people died of COVID-19, taking the pandemic's Wisconsin death toll to 750.
There were 240 known COVID-19 inpatients in Wisconsin hospitals as of Tuesday morning and 142 other inpatients awaiting test results, according to the Wisconsin Hospital Association.
That's the fewest COVID-positive inpatients since April 2 and the fewest awaiting test results since the WHA began reporting hospital admissions in early April.
Ninety-three known COVID patients were in intensive care Tuesday morning.
The DHS county activity ratings are based on two measures that DHS refers to asburden and trajectory.
A county's "burden" is the number of confirmed cases it reported per 100,000 residents over the past two weeks. A county's burden is considered to be at least"moderately high" if that case rate is greater than 50.
As of June 17, counties with the highest burdens were Milwaukee (170), Trempealeau (170), Winnebago (160), Racine (120) and Kenosha (98).
A county's "trajectory" is the percent change in cases over two weeks. Trajectory is said to be "growing" if the percent change is greater than 10% and measures as statistically significant.
Counties with statistically significant caseincreases were Brown, Grant, La Crosse, Trempealeau and Sheboygan.
Department of Health Services matrix used to determine county activity levels.(Photo: Courtesy of Department of Health Services)
Counties rated as having "high" activity were: Brown, Clark, Fond du Lac, Forest, Grant, Jefferson, Kenosha, La Crosse, Lafayette, Milwaukee, Outagamie, Portage, Racine, Rock, Sheboygan, Trempealeau, Walworth, Waupaca and Winnebago.
Counties with "medium" activity were: Adams, Barron, Calumet, Columbia, Dane, Dodge, Eau Claire, Green, Green Lake, Jackson, Juneau, Kewaunee, Langlade, Manitowoc, Marathon, Marinette, Marquette, Menominee, Monroe, Oconto, Oneida, Ozaukee, Pierce, Polk, Rusk, St. Croix, Shawano, Taylor, Vernon, Washington, Waukesha, Waushara, Wood.
Counties with "low" activity were: Ashland, Bayfield, Buffalo, Burnett, Chippewa, Door, Douglas, Dunn, Florence, Iowa, Iron, Lincoln, Pepin, Price, Richland, Sauk, Sawyer, Vilas and Washburn.
For more information about the new activity dashboard, click here.
DHS said in a news release that it will include more information on the dashboard in coming weeks.
In Juneau County rated as having "medium" activity aWisconsin Dells strip club is the site of a COVID-19 outbreak, county health officials say.
Patrons who visited Cruisin' Chubbys Gentlemen's Club between June 10 and June 14 may have been exposed to the virus and shouldmonitor themselves for symptoms, the Juneau's health department said in an advisory.
The club had announced its reopening on Facebook two weeks prior to the exposure period, writing that it was "open and back in action."
Juneau County health officer Amanda Dederich declined to provide the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel with a number of cases tied to the club,citing an ongoing investigation.
An outbreak is defined by the Wisconsin Department of Health Services as two or more laboratory-confirmed cases of the illness within the same facility, ortied to the same event, within 28 days of each other.
According to covidexitstrategy.org which rates states' COVID-19 progress by measures of cases, symptoms, hospital capacity and testing Wisconsin was one of seven states "trending better" as of Monday night, while 27 states were "trending poorly."
Some Milwaukee restaurants would be allowed to open at full capacityin time forthe Fourth of July holiday weekendunder a pilot program the city plans to launch Friday.
Restaurants but not bars could open at 100% capacity if they apply and theirplans for preventing the spread of coronavirus are approved by city officials,Health Commissioner Jeanette Kowalik said Tuesday.
The Milwaukee Health Departmentwould evaluate a restaurant's application and COVID-19 mitigation plans and then give a seal of approval, she said.
"This will begin on Friday and then it will take effect the following Friday, so right before the Fourth of July holiday weekend,"Kowalik said.
Under current city restrictions, restaurants are only allowed toopen at 25% capacity.
Some restaurant owners have said such a plan would have a dramatic effect on their ability to reopen.
"Well, that's sort of a game changer," said Paul Bartolotta after first hearing of the idea during a Visit Milwaukee webinar on executing events during the pandemic last week. Bartolotta Restaurants has 17 restaurants and catering facilities that include some of the top fine-dining establishments in Milwaukee.
Bartolotta said it was untenable for his group to open restaurants at 25% capacity and had opted to wait. He said the company has put together an exhaustive plan of best practices to reopen the restaurants with precautions like all staff and customers asked to wear masks.
Ristorante Bartolotta in Wauwatosa will likely be the first to reopen, he said.
Triciclo Peru owner Amy Narr said the restaurant would not take part.
"We feel like it's way too soon to be opening at all," Narr said.The empanada restaurant has not yet reopened its doors to dine-in customers.
"Ive talked to my staff I had to let 14 people go in March theyre still not comfortable coming back to work from a safety standpoint," she said.
Milwaukee officials areexpected to announce Friday whether they believe the city is ready to move to the next phase of loosening coronavirus restrictions.
Meanwhile, though 2020 will go by without a Wisconsin State Fair canceled due to the pandemic for the first time in 75 years Wisconsinites won't have to endure an August without the signature cream puffs.
Cream puffswill be available for curbside pickup at Wisconsin State FairParkand select locations from Aug. 6 through 16, the original State Fair dates.
Contact Matt Piper at (920) 810-7164 or mpiper@gannett.com. Follow him on Twitter at @matthew_piper.
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Above: The San Diego Unified School District headquarters is shown on March 19, 2020.
Dave Erving, who teaches ceramics at Hoover High School, said he wants district leaders to know that for its reopening plan to help keep him and his students safe it should be clear, well understood and guided by science.
Aired: June 23, 2020 | Transcript
The coronavirus pandemic has posed enormous new challenges for teachers and their students. Now the San Diego Unified School District has announced it will start the new school year by giving parents the choice: send their child back to school, keep them at home to continue distance learning or a hybrid of the two.
Kisha Borden is president of the San Diego Education Association. She also taught at Zamorano Elementary school for over 20 years. When imagining what teaching in person this fall could be like, she thought back to her fifth-grade classroom where there were up to 35 students.
"If all students are there, there has to be some way to split the class. Because there's no way you can have 30, 35 kids in a classroom and implement social distancing," Borden said. "There's a lot to consider if we're going to come back to school."
RELATED: San Diego Unified Has Plan For Reopening Schools, But Needs More Funding
Dave Erving, who teaches ceramics at Hoover High School in City Heights, said he wants district leaders to know that their reopening plan to help keep him and his students safe should be clear, well understood and guided by science.
"Going with everything that has been consistently stated since February, and that is social distancing and mask-wearing and avoiding large groups, which is going to be next to impossible in schools," Erving said.
Borden and Erving joined Midday Edition Tuesday to talk about teaching during COVID-19.
KPBS Midday Edition is a daily radio news magazine keeping San Diego in the know on everything from politics to the arts.
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San Diego Teachers Reflect On Returning To The Classroom During The Coronavirus - KPBS
OLYMPIA Gov. Jay Inslee Tuesday announced a statewide mandate requiring facial coverings in public to slow the spread of the new coronavirus, as cases again begin to rise in Washington.
And for Yakima County which has nearly as many COVID-19 cases as the state of Oregon and where health care workers are struggling with the surge Inslee ordered even more stringent requirements to make sure people cover their faces while at businesses.
The new orders, set to take effect Friday, come after King County last month put in place its own requirements to wear facial coverings.
In a news conference where he was joined by state Health Secretary John Wiesman and the presidents of Costco and the union UFCW 21, Inslee called the new orders imperative as economic activity increases.
I think this is the way we need to look at this, said the governor. We just cannot wish this virus to go away. We have to use tools that are available to us that we know, that work.
The statewide mandate to be formally issued by Wiesman requires people over the age of 5 to wear face coverings generally while they are in any indoor or outdoor public space.
Masks will not be required outdoors when people can stay more than 6 feet apart from each other, while indoors at home with others, or while alone in a vehicle.
While children under 5 are exempt, the order recommends kids between the ages of 3 and 5 wear facial coverings.
Also exempt from the governors order: people who cannot wear a mask for medical reasons, or who are deaf or hard of hearing, specifically when they are communicating with another person.
And the order will recognize times when people can remove their masks, such as when they are eating at a restaurant, or engaged in a recreational activity either alone or with members of their household.
Violations of the statewide order are a misdemeanor, Inslee said, but we dont want to have enforcement of this.
Mandates for facial coverings have caused concern among some Black men about racial profiling by law enforcement or as being seen as a threat for covering their faces. But Inslee urged residents to also weigh the risks of contracting the virus, which has disproportionately hit people of color.
And given the ability to save somebody you love, or even a stranger that youll never meet, we hope that on the scale of things to think about, that that will be tipping the scales towards safety of everybody else around you, he said.
For Yakima County, the governor announced an emergency proclamation that will specifically bar businesses from operating, or allowing customers to enter any business, unless customers cover their faces.
Businesses in Yakima County could face sanctions or the loss of their business licenses if they dont comply with the new order, Inslee said.
Tuesdays announcement was made as health officials try to get a handle on the increasing spread of the virus in the county of about 255,000 people.
Yakima County through the end of Monday had reported 6,435 cases of COVID-19, according to the state Department of Health. The county remains in the first and most restrictive phase of the states four-part reopening plan.
State health officials confirmed 516 new coronavirus infections in Washington on Tuesday, as well as eight additional deaths.
The update brings the statestotals to 29,386 cases and 1,284 deaths, meaning about 4.4% of people diagnosedin Washington have died, according to the state Department of Healths (DOH)data dashboard. The data is as of 11:59 p.m. Monday.
Inslee had earlier in the pandemic stayed away from issuing a facial-covering requirement. But on Tuesday, he said the outbreak in Yakima County and an increasing body of research on facial coverings swayed him.
In the news conference, Wiesman, the Health Department secretary, cited a review in the Lancet, a peer-reviewed medical journal.
Published earlier this month, the review of about 172 observational studies over how factors like physical distancing, face masks, and eye protection affect the spread of the new and other coronaviruses.
Analysis of 10 studies found that masks reduced the risk of transmission of coronaviruses from about 17% to 3%, according to a news release about the study, which did note limitations on the certainty of the evidence.
Solutions should be found for making face masks available to the generalpublic. However, people must be clear that wearing a mask is not an alternativeto physical distancing, eye protection or basic measures such as hand hygiene,but might add an extra layer of protection, said Dr. Derek Chu, aco-author of the analysis and an assistant professor at McMaster University, in thenews release.
Dr.Jared Baeten, the vice dean of the UWs School of Public Health, called Tuesdaysannouncement a good policy decision.
Masks take us a long way to prevent infection in other people and ourselves and to everybody coming together to defeat coronavirus, said Baeten, who is also an infectious-disease physician.
The message from some scientists and public health experts about masks and face coverings has changed and evolved during the course of the pandemic, which Baeten acknowledged might be confusing or frustrating to people.
Threemonths ago, we were all worried there werent enough masks in the country tokeep our frontline workers safe and our hospitals open, Baeten said, referringto medical-grade masks. At that time, there wasnt a mandatory push formasking, in large part, to make sure we didnt have a run on masks that wouldhave made all of us less safe.
Now, supplies have improved and health officials better understand how the virus can spread from infected people without symptoms or those who have yet to develop them.
Several people hanging out in a park in Seattles Ravenna neighborhood Tuesday afternoon didnt have strong objections to the new order.
Mary Kachel and Erin Sekulich, who were chatting on a picnic bench, said they thought the statewide mandate was a good idea.
It doesnt seem like much of a stretch than what were already doing, said Sekulich, 45, though she added her mask made her feel like [she] was wearing a political statement when she recently made a trip out to Leavenworth, where the general public wasnt as diligent about covering their faces.
Kachel, 42, said she didnt think the statewide order was the end of the world.
I think the science supports it, Sekulich said.
David Rodriguez, 35, said he approved of the new order and he hoped it would target more rural communities, where outbreaks have recently gotten worse.
I dont feel like were in the clear, Rodriguez said.
He added that he would be worried about the penalty of forgetting a face covering in public.
It depends on how much a citation would be, he said. Im not working now But I think warnings are appropriate.
For some Yakima business owners, it doesnt matter whether they agree with Tuesdays mask directive: Theyll follow it to ensure their business survival. Many businesses in the county wont reopen until the infection rate falls.
Businesses just want to be open, said Melissa DeRosier,the owner of Nouveau Spa and Salon in western Yakima. The salons eight hairdressersare out of work, and DeRosiers federal coronavirus aid is about to expire.Were afraid the whole valley will just be a ghost town. Some clients arentgoing to like it [wearing a mask], but if theyre going to want to get theirhair done, theyre going to have to do it.
The number of Yakima residents wearing masks while shoppinghas nearly doubled from late May, according to a Yakima Health District survey.By mid-June, nearly 65% of residents wore masks while shopping.
That means that nearly 35% of Yakima residents arentcovering their faces in public. Nestor Hernandez, the president of YakimasHispanic Chamber of Commerce, said he sees a divide between how people behavewhen theyre on and off the clock.
A lot of agricultural workers wear the mask at work but assoon as they get off work, its like everything is back to normal, he said.Its hard culturally. Everyones anxious to be out shopping.
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Gov. Inslee orders masks to be worn in public to help stem spread of coronavirus - Seattle Times
