Tag: pandemic

Leaked texts contradict DeSantis’s claims about vaccine scandal

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Ron DeSantis, the Trump-loving governor of Florida, is getting into more hot water over claims that his office steered vaccines toward wealthy communities filled with Republican donors.

The Tampa Bay Times reports that leaked text messages between donors and public officials indicate that DeSantis’s office was involved with directing which areas got special access to vaccines, despite the governor’s denials of favoritism.

At issue is the method by which officials in Manatee County had initially set up vaccination eligibility versus the way that vaccination eligibility was actually determined. Continue reading.

Trucker thought COVID would ‘disappear’ after the election – now he will be on oxygen the rest of his life

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In an interview with the Idaho Statesman’s Audrey Dutton, 63-year-old long-haul trucker Paul Russell admitted his career is over because he didn’t take the COVID-19 pandemic seriously, believing it would simply disappear after the November election.

After contracting the virus and nearly dying, he now admits he was a “jackass” who will have to spend the rest of his life on oxygen due to the damage inflicted on his body by the novel coronavirus.

According to Russell, he wasn’t taking precautions on a trip from Florida back to Boise — with a stop in Houston — when he thinks he was infected and felt ill before he got home. Continue reading.

A viral tsunami: How the underestimated coronavirus took over the world

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New Year’s Eve 2019: Ian Lipkin, a famed Columbia University epidemiologist, is having dinner with his wife and a fellow scientist. He gets a confidential phone call from a highly placed source in China: There’s a cluster of pneumonia-like illnesses in the city of Wuhan caused by a novel coronavirus. The source says it’s not that big a deal: It doesn’t look very transmissible.

“I was told not to worry about it,” Lipkin recalls.

It was something to worry about. Continue reading.

House votes to send $1.9 trillion COVID relief package to Biden’s desk

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The House voted 220-211 on Wednesday to approve the Senate’s revised version of President Biden’s $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief package, sending the bill to Biden’s desk to be signed.

Why it matters: The passage of the “American Rescue Plan” is the first — and potentially defining — legislative victory of Biden’s presidency, marking a key milestone in his pledge to steer the U.S. out of the coronavirus crisis.

The big picture: The package is being touted by Democrats as one of the most consequential anti-poverty bills of the modern era, with the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center projecting that it will boost incomes for the poorest 20% of Americans by 20%. Continue reading.

‘Russia is up to its old tricks’: Biden battling COVID-19 vaccine disinformation campaign

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WASHINGTON – The Biden administration said Monday it is taking steps to combat Russian disinformation aimed at undermining confidence in the COVID-19 vaccines produced by Pfizer Inc. and other Western companies.

“We will fight (the disinformation) with every tool we have,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki said during a press briefing on Monday.

On Sunday, the Wall Street Journal reported that four publications, all serving as fronts for Russian intelligence, have targeted Western-produced COVID-19 vaccines with misleading coverage that exaggerates the risk of side effects and raises questions about their efficacy. Continue reading.

Meet the GOP voters who could decide whether the U.S. reaches herd immunity

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Almost one-third of Republicans tell pollsters they ‘definitely won’t’ get vaccinated.

Margaret, an 80-year-old retiree who lives outside Tulsa, has spent the past year living in fear of the coronavirus. She’s constantly worn masks, toted hand sanitizer and used drive-throughs to run her errands. Her age and preexisting health conditions — including heart failure, diabetes and blood clots — put her at elevated risk if she gets sick.

But unlike many at-risk Americans seeking safety and an end to the pandemic, Margaret refuses to get a coronavirus vaccine.

“There’s too many unanswered questions,” said Margaret, who agreed to be interviewed only if her last name was withheld because of concerns she might be harassed. Margaret also said she’s fearful of possible side effects, like the headaches that some people have gotten from the second shot. “I’d just as soon as not go through that,” she said. Continue reading.

Nation takes baby steps to normality after year in lockdown

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New federal guidelines released Monday saying it is safe for fully vaccinated people to gather indoors with each other without masks is adding hope that a return to normality — or something close to it — might be getting closer as the nation hits one year in a locked-down state.

No one knows exactly when it will be normal again — if ever, given how the coronavirus pandemic has elevated concerns about contagious diseases in general.

There’s also quite a bit of uncertainty going forward, especially as variants of the virus continue to circulate. Continue reading.

States drop COVID-19 mask mandates but still expect people to mask up – will they?

The governors of Texas and Mississippi announced that they were rescinding their statewide mask mandates and allowing restaurants and other businesses to return to 100% capacity in early March. The moves come while new infection numbers in the U.S. are still higher than they were in September and just ahead of school spring breaks, known for large gatherings and crowded bars where the coronavirus can quickly spread.

Along with Iowa, Montana and North Dakota, which recently lifted their mask orders, these states are part of an emerging trend of some states bucking national and international public health recommendations. Alabama and Utah plan to do the same in April.

Residents and visitors in Texas and Mississippi will now face a situation where masks and capacity limits are no longer required. Yet, the same governors lifting the mandates are still urging people to take precautions. Continue reading.

Florida told hospital to divert vaccines to wealthy community as appointments were canceled for general public

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A Florida hospital diverted vaccines from the general public to an ultra-wealthy community where its CEO and Republican donors lived.

Gov. Ron DeSantis insists “the state was not involved” in helping to vaccinate 1,200 residents of the wealthy Ocean Reef community in January, but a spokeswoman for Baptist Health Systems, which administered the doses, told Tampa Bay Times and Miami Herald that state officials did intervene.

“It is our understanding that the Medical Center at Ocean Reef asked the State of Florida for vaccine doses, and the State of Florida asked Baptist Health to take delivery of the doses to our ultra-cold freezer storage for delivery to the Medical Center at Ocean Reef,” said Baptist Health spokeswoman Dori Alvarez in a statement. Continue reading.

World on brink of fourth wave of coronavirus

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A year after the frightening beginning of the coronavirus pandemic, the world stands on the brink of a fourth wave of infection as nations race to vaccinate their populations and stave off a new surge in hospitalizations and deaths.

Total reported cases rose across the globe in the last week of February after six weeks of decline, driven in part by new, more virulent variants that transmit between people at startlingly higher rates than the initial strains out of Wuhan, China, and northern Italy.

“This is disappointing, but not surprising,” World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told reporters last week. “This is a global crisis that requires a consistent and coordinated global response.” Continue reading.