Trump recruits FoxNews favorite to Covid-19 task force
Florida’s grim tally keeps growing, Texas testing slows down, and the White House acts as if Covid-19 is only a political issue. Ask the families of the 164,329 lives lost in the USA so far.
Lots going on today, but the overall message feels sadly like the weather forecast in Groundhog Day: continued rise in new cases and more lives lost, including among healthcare workers, and President Trump now has another COVID-19 skeptic as a White House advisor.
The state of the states
Florida stays in the hot zone: Although hospitalizations are down slightly, Florida officials today reported their highest-ever number of new deaths, 276, and the percent of positive COVID-19 tests increased to nearly 15%. That’s up from 12% just five days ago but short of the 16% and higher rates observed in July. Counting only people tested for the first time, the positivity rate is just over 10%.
Texas: What are the real numbers? COVID-19 testing has dropped more than 40% from two weeks ago, according to the Texas Tribune.
Healthcare workers on the front line … of death
Over 900 US healthcare workers have died from COVID-19, according to a compilation by Kaiser Health News and The Guardian.
In Hialeah, Florida, two doctors — a father and his son — both died from COVID-19 after treating patients with the disease.
COVID-19 hasn’t gone away
School’s open but staff and students must stay home: 826 students and 42 teachers in the Cherokee County, Georgia school district have been ordered to isolate at their homes for 14 days due to possible exposure to COVID-19. Schools in the county, serving 42,000 students, opened last week with masks required only for staff.
New Zealand’s prime minister ordered a swift, three-day lockdown in Auckland, New Zealand after four COVID-19 cases were discovered within one family. These were the first new cases identified in the nation in 102 days.
Politics and policy
Hoover Institution Senior Fellow Scott Atlas, a frequent FoxNews guest and critic of COVID-19 lockdowns, has been added to the White House Coronavirus Task Force. According to Presidential Medal of Freedom recipient Rush Limbaugh, “Scott Atlas is a brilliant guy and he thinks by early October that we could well be burned out of COVID.” Among other things, Atlas said concerns about COVID-19 spreading when schools reopen was “absurd” and that “kids have nearly zero risk.”
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office of Civil Rights has taken action against hospitals after receiving complaints that COVID-19 policies such as certain visitor restrictions violate religious freedom, the Wall Street Journal reports.
Border authorities might be able to bar US citizens from returning to the United States from Mexico if they are suspected of COVID-19 infection, according to a draft policy under consideration at the White House, the New York Times and Washington Post reported.
Any questions or suggestions? What is happening in your community?