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(NEW YORK) — As the COVID-19 pandemic has swept the globe, more than 5.1 million people have died from the disease worldwide, including over 772,000 Americans, according to real-time data compiled by Johns Hopkins University’s Center for Systems Science and Engineering.

Just 59.2% of the population in the United States is fully vaccinated against COVID-19, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Here’s how the new is developing. All times Eastern:

Nov 23, 10:46 am
Unvaccinated 9 times more likely to be hospitalized, 14 times more likely to die: CDC

In September, unvaccinated people had a 5.8 times greater risk of testing positive for COVID-19 compared to vaccinated individuals, according to federal data pulled from 24 states and jurisdictions that has been published on the CDC website.

The unvaccinated are 14 times more likely to die from COVID-19, according to the CDC.

At Monday’s White House COVID-19 briefing, CDC Director Rochelle Walensky said unvaccinated adults are nine times more likely to be hospitalized for the virus compared to vaccinated adults.

-ABC News’ Arielle Mitropoulos

Nov 23, 9:34 am
Michigan hospital officials warn of strained health system

The Michigan Hospital Association is warning of strained health systems as COVID-19 surges across the state.

Michigan is fast approaching its highest number of COVID-19 hospitalizations since the pandemic began, with more than 3,900 patients currently receiving care, according to state data. The vast majority of patients in the ICU and on ventilators are unvaccinated.

“Most hospitals throughout the state have more patients in their emergency departments than they do available rooms and staff to care for them,” officials wrote in a statement on Monday. “This results in long wait times, patients being placed in hallways or conference rooms, and diverting patients away from a hospital because there is no physical room or medical staff available to accept more patients.”

“We are extremely concerned because our best predictions are that COVID-19 patients will continue to increase during the weeks ahead as we enter the yearly flu season,” they said.

-ABC News’ Arielle Mitropoulos

Nov 22, 2:31 pm
US sees another increase in pediatric cases

The U.S. has reported an increase in pediatric COVID-19 cases for the third week in a row.

Nearly 142,000 children tested positive in the last week, which is a 16% increase from the week prior and a 41% jump over the last three weeks, according to a new report from the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Children’s Hospital Association.

Nearly 6.8 million children have tested positive for COVID-19 since the pandemic began.

COVID-19 cases among children remain “extremely high,” the organizations said, and there have been almost 1.7 million additional cases since the first week of September.

The Midwest continues to see the highest number of pediatric cases.

Severe illness due to COVID-19 remains “uncommon” among children, AAP and CHA said. However, AAP and CHA continue to warn that there is an urgent need to collect more data on the long-term consequences of the pandemic on children, “including ways the virus may harm the long-term physical health of infected children, as well as its emotional and mental health effects.”

-ABC News’ Arielle Mitropoulos

Nov 22, 12:44 pm
Hospital admissions on the rise

Daily COVID-19-related hospital admissions are on the rise in the U.S., up 8.4% in the last week, according to federal data.

Nineteen states reported at least a 10% jump in hospital admissions over the last week: Georgia, Hawaii, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.

Michigan, which is now reporting more cases than at any other point in the pandemic, has the nation’s highest infection rate, followed by Minnesota, New Mexico, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Wisconsin and Maine.

Puerto Rico, Florida and Hawaii have the nation’s lowest infection rates, according to federal data.

-ABC News’ Arielle Mitropoulos

Nov 22, 10:01 am
TSA vaccine mandate won’t impact holiday travel

About 93% of TSA employees are in compliance with Monday’s deadline for the federal employee vaccine mandate, TSA spokesperson Lisa Farbstein said.

“In compliance” means employees have had at least one shot or have filed for a medical or religious exemption.

Holiday travel won’t be impacted by the mandate, Farbstein said.

-ABC News’ Gio Benitez, Anne Flaherty

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(HOUSTON) — The funeral of the youngest victim in the deadly Travis Scott Astroworld concert will be held Tuesday at 11 a.m. Nine-year-old Ezra Blount was hospitalized following the violent crowd surge at the Nov. 5 concert and later died from his injuries, his family confirmed.

Ezra was “trampled and catastrophically injured” at the festival, when a wave of concertgoers began pushing one another during Scott’s performance, according to a statement issued by the Blount family attorneys.

Ezra was on his father’s shoulders when the crowd surge began, Ezra’s grandparents told ABC Houston station KTRK.

His father, Treston, passed out and fell, and Ezra fell along with him, getting trampled by others in the crowd, according to the family’s GoFundMe. He was separated from his father, and his grandparents said they found him alone at the hospital in a coma, suffering from major organ damage and severe brain swelling.

His family has joined more than 300 Astroworld concertgoers in lawsuits being filed by civil rights attorney Ben Crump and Texas trial attorney Thomas J. Henry against the event organizers, venue management and performers at the concert.

The family’s lawsuit, filed by Crump, alleges negligence regarding crowd control, medical attention and event staffing.

“The Blount family tonight is grieving the incomprehensible loss of their precious young son,” Crump said. “This should not have been the outcome of taking their son to a concert, what should have been a joyful celebration. Ezra’s death is absolutely heartbreaking. We are committed to seeking answers and justice for the Blount family. But tonight we stand in solidarity with the family, in grief, and in prayer.”

Following the concert, Scott released a statement on the tragedy, saying, “I’m absolutely devastated by what took place last night. My prayers go out to the families and all those impacted by what happened at the Astroworld festival.”

Scott announced he will cover the funeral costs and further aid to individuals affected by the tragedy and will refund all of the Astroworld concertgoers and ticket holders. He has also said he is cooperating with investigators.

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(BRUNSWICK, Ga.) — The lead prosecutor got the final word on Tuesday before a Georgia jury is to begin deliberating the fates of three white men charged with trapping Ahmaud Arbery with their pickup trucks and fatally shooting the 25-year-old Black man.

Linda Dunikoski, the Cobb County, Georgia, assistant district attorney appointed as a special prosecutor in the Glynn County case, is expected to take up to two hours to rebut the closing arguments made on Monday by attorneys for the three defendants.

The jury is expected to be given the case to begin deliberations following Dunikoski’s presentation and final jury instructions from the judge.

The panel, comprised of 11 white people and one Black person, heard wildly different summations on Monday of the same evidence in the racially-charged case. Dunikoski alleged the defendants pursued and murdered Arbery because of wrong assumptions they made that the Black running through their neighborhood had committed a burglary, while defense attorney’s countered that Arbery was shot in self-defense when he resisted a citizen’s arrest.

Travis McMichael, the 35-year-old U.S. Coast Guard veteran; his father, Gregory McMichael, 65, a retired Glynn County police officer, and their neighbor, William “Roddie” Bryan, 53, each face maximum sentences of life in prison if convicted on all the charges.

The defendants have pleaded not guilty to a nine-count state indictment that includes malice murder, multiple charges of felony murder, false imprisonment, aggravated assault with a 12-gauge shotgun and aggravated assault with their pickup trucks.

The McMichaels and Bryan were also indicted on federal hate crime charges in April and have all pleaded not guilty.

Here’s how the news developed. All times Eastern:

Nov 23, 10:03 am
Defense attorneys call for a mistrial

As prosecutor Linda Dunikoski continued her rebuttal argument, defense attorneys for Greg and Travis McMichael objected several times, accusing Dunikoski of misstating the law that pertains to citizen’s arrest.

After one of the defense attorneys called for a mistrial in front of the jury, Judge Walmsley sent the panel out of the courtroom.

Walmsley appeared frustrated at all the interruptions to Dunikoski’s rebuttal, saying, “I like to get the closing arguments done.”

Walmsley denied the motion for a mistrial, telling the attorneys, “I indicated the law is going to be provided to the panel. I’ve indicated the court’s position with respect to the law.”

Nov 23, 9:42 am
‘This isn’t the Wild West’: Prosecutor

Prosecutor Linda Dunikoski went through the felony counts against the defendants, telling the jury that the evidence shows they are guilty of each charge, including malice murder.

“This isn’t the Wild West,” Dunikoski said, referring to the actions the McMichaels and Bryan allegedly took.

“But for the criminal intent at false imprisonment, but for the false imprisonment, but for the assault with the motor vehicles, but for the aggravated assault with the shotgun, he (Arbery) wouldn’t be dead. That’s how you think about it,” Dunikoski said. “You can’t take out any of these crimes. You take out any one of these crimes that they committed and he’s still alive.”

Dunikoski added, “All of the underlying felonies played a substantial and necessary part in causing the death of Ahmaud Arbery.”

Nov 23, 9:18 am
‘Ignorance of the law is no excuse’: Prosecutor

Prosecutor Linda Dunikoski began her rebuttal argument by telling the jury she wants to make sure “we are on the same page as far as the facts and the law goes.”

She said the law requires “a fair-minded and impartial juror to honestly seek the truth.”

“In other words, do you think they committed the crimes? That’s all you need. Oh, if you go, ‘Yeah, I think they committed the crimes, you’re good. That’s all you need.”

Dunikoski’s statement prompted objections from the defense attorneys that she was misstating the law. Judge Timothy Walmsley told the jury he will instruct them on the law once Dunikoski is finished.

The prosecutor then told the jury that “ignorance of the law is no excuse.”

“If you’re going to take the law into your own hands, you better know what the law is,” Dunikoski said, referring to the laws of self-defense and citizen’s arrests that the defendants are claiming.

“The state is not saying that Greg and Travis McMichael ran out of their house to go murder him,” Dunikoski said. “It started out as one thing and it escalated and it escalated until it became murder.”

Nov 22, 8:30 pm
Jury sent home for the night

After Kevin Gough, the attorney for William “Roddie” Bryan, wrapped up his closing argument, Dunikoski informed the judge that she’d need another two hours to present her rebuttal argument.

Judge Walmsley polled the jury and they said they didn’t want to stay longer.

Dunikoski will present her rebuttal argument on Tuesday morning before the jury is given final instructions on the law and sent to begin deliberations.

Court will resume at 8:30 a.m. on Tuesday, about a half-hour earlier than usual.

Copyright © 2021, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(NEW YORK) — Good Morning America co-anchor Michael Strahan will fly to space on Blue Origin’s next space flight.

The Dec. 9 mission will be the New Shepard rocket’s third human flight this year and marks the first with a full astronaut manifest of six crew members in the capsule, according to Blue Origin.

Liftoff is targeted for 9:00 am CT on Thursday, Dec. 9 from the company’s “Launch Site One” facility in a remote area in the West Texas desert.

Strahan joins Laura Shepard Churchley, the eldest daughter of Alan Shepard, the first American to fly to space and the namesake of New Shepard, and four others on the space flight.

Space industry executive and philanthropist Dylan Taylor, investor Evan Dick, and Bess Ventures founder Lane Bess and his child, Cameron, will also be part of the crew for New Shepard’s 19th mission. Lane and Cameron Bess will become the first parent-child pair to fly in space.

Blue Origin invited Strahan to join the crew of this flight. As a crew member, Strahan will receive a stipend, which is being donated to The Boys & Girls Club.

On July 20, 2021, Amazon and Blue Origin founder Jeff Bezos was among the history-making crew aboard Blue Origin’s first human flight along with his brother, Mark Bezos, as well as the oldest and youngest people ever to go to space, pioneering female pilot Wally Funk, 82, and Oliver Daemon, 18.

On Blue Origin’s second crewed mission in October 2021, actor William Shatner, 90, set a new record as the oldest person ever to go to space.

Copyright © 2021, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(NEW YORK) — Malikah Shabazz, a daughter of Malcolm X, was found dead in her Brooklyn, New York, home Monday, police told ABC News.

Shabazz, 56, was found by her daughter just before 5 p.m. ET, police said.

The death does not appear suspicious.

The news comes as two men found guilty in Malcolm X’s assassination are expected to have their convictions thrown out.

Minister and human rights activist Malcom X was killed 57 years ago in the New York City neighborhood of Washington Heights.

Shabazz was one of Malcolm X’s six daughters.

This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.

Copyright © 2021, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(HOLYOKE, Mass.) — A Massachusetts judge has dismissed all criminal charges against two former officials from the Holyoke Soldiers’ Home, citing no “reasonably trustworthy evidence.”

The facility made national headlines last year, when 77 veterans, who were residents of the home, died of coronavirus in the early months of the pandemic.

In September 2020, Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey asked a grand jury to indict former superintendent Bennett Walsh and ex-medical director Dr. David Clinton, on charges of elder neglect, and on permitting bodily injury.

The prosecution focused on a decision, taken on March 27, 2020, to consolidate two dementia units into one.

Healey alleged that Walsh and Clinton were “ultimately responsible for the decision” that led to tragic and deadly results” of combining the 42 veterans into a single unit that usually accommodates 25 beds. Six or seven veterans were placed in rooms meant to hold only four people. Due to overcrowding, nine beds also were placed in a dining room.

The placement of symptomatic residents, including confirmed COVID-19-positive residents, and asymptomatic residents, within feet of each other, thus increased their risk of exposure, Healey said.

“There is insufficient reasonably trustworthy evidence that, had these two dementia units not been merged, the medical condition of any of these five veterans would have been materially different,” wrote Hampden Superior Court Judge Edward J. McDonough, Jr., in a dismissal on Monday. “Therefore, because the evidence does not support a finding of probable cause to believe Mr. Walsh or Mr. Clinton committed any crime, I must dismiss the indictments against both.”

The five specified veterans in the original suit had “already” been exposed to COVID-19 before the merger took place, the judge wrote.

In a statement to ABC News, a spokeswoman for Healey wrote that the office is considering other legal options moving forward.

“We are very disappointed in today’s ruling, especially on behalf of the innocent victims and families harmed by the defendants’ actions. We are evaluating our legal options moving forward,” wrote spokeswoman Jillian Fennimore.

When the suit was filed in September of 2020, Susan Kenney, whose father, Charles Lowell, served in the Air Force from 1960 to 1965, during the Vietnam War, and died at the facility as a result of the outbreak, told ABC News that she welcomed the charges.

“I think that Bennett Walsh and Dr. Clinton should have to dig every grave that hasn’t been dug yet — as well as whatever time they receive if they’re found guilty,” Kenney said last fall. “They need to accept responsibility and account for their behaviors and the actions that they took.”

Copyright © 2021, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla.) — NASA astronaut Jessica Watkins will take to the skies in 2022 on a historic debut spaceflight to the International Space Station.

Watkins will become the first Black woman to embark on a long-duration mission at the space station, where she will live and conduct research in the microgravity laboratory as it orbits the Earth.

NASA announced that Watkins will serve as a mission specialist for the SpaceX Crew-4 mission, the fourth rotation of astronauts on the Crew Dragon spacecraft to the ISS. This will be her first journey to space since becoming an astronaut in 2017.

She will join NASA astronauts Robert Hines and Kjell Lindgren, as well as European Space Agency astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti. The group is scheduled for liftoff in April 2022 from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

Watkins was born in Maryland and now calls Colorado home. Previously, she worked as a geologist with a bachelor’s degree from Stanford University and a doctorate from the University of California, Los Angeles.

She joined NASA as an intern and has worked at various research centers in California. At the time of her astronaut selection, Watkins worked as a post-doctoral fellow on the science team for the Mars Science Laboratory rover, Curiosity.

When Watkins launches into space next spring, it will be the realization of a dream she’s held since she was in elementary school.

“A dream feels like a big faraway goal that’s going to be difficult to achieve or something you might achieve much later in life,” Watkins said in a video released by NASA last year. “But in reality, what a dream realized is just one putting one foot in front of the other on a daily basis. If you put enough of those footprints together, eventually they become a path towards your dreams.”

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(BOSTON) — The death of Elijah Lewis, the 5-year-old boy from New Hampshire who went missing before being found dead in Massachusetts last month, has been ruled a homicide, authorities said Monday.

Lewis died from “violence and neglect,” John Formella, the New Hampshire attorney general, said in a release. The boy suffered “facial and scalp injuries, acute fentanyl intoxication, malnourishment and pressure ulcers.”

The Office of the Chief Medical Examiner in Massachusetts conducted the autopsy.

Lewis’ body was found late last month, after “credible information” led investigators to a wooded area near Boston, the local district attorney said at the time. There, a cadaver dog found Lewis’ remains “buried in the ground.”

Two people — Lewis’ mother, Danielle Dauphinais, 35, and her boyfriend, Joseph Staph, 30 — remain held without bail on charges of witness tampering and child endangerment, which were brought against them last month after they were arrested in New York City.

Both allegedly asked other people to lie about where the 5-year-old was living, “knowing that child protection service workers were searching for Elijah,” the New Hampshire Attorney General’s Office said.

“The endangerment charge alleges that they violated a duty of care, protection or support for Elijah,” the office said.

The two pleaded not guilty to both charges in a New Hampshire court.

The Merrimack Police Department began investigating Lewis’ disappearance on Oct. 14, after the Rhode Island Department of Children, Youth, and Families reported to police that his whereabouts were unknown, according to the state’s attorney general’s office. The child welfare agency’s involvement with the boy is unclear.

The search for Lewis involved multiple New Hampshire and Massachusetts state and county agencies, as well as the FBI.

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(GROVELAND. Fla.) — A judge in Florida posthumously exonerated four Black men, known as the “Groveland Four,” who were falsely accused of raping a white woman in the central Florida town of Groveland in 1949.

Their families have been fighting to clear their names for decades, and in October, Florida State Attorney Bill Gladson filed a motion to posthumously clear the “Groveland Four” of their criminal records after the state determined that the evidence against the men was falsified.

Charles Greenlee’s daughter, Carol Greenlee, told ABC News that knowing her father has been exonerated has cleared a “cloud” that has followed her for 72 years.

“All my life I’ve been waiting to hear those words: ‘Restore presumption of innocence,'” she said.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis granted posthumous pardons to the men — Charles Greenlee, Ernest Thomas, Samuel Shepherd and Walter Irvin — in 2019.

“Even a casual review of the record reveals that these four men were deprived of the fundamental due process rights that are afforded to all Americans,” Gladson wrote in the motion that was heard in court Monday morning. “The evidence strongly suggests that a sheriff, a judge and prosecutor all but guaranteed guilty verdicts in this case.”

Following the rape accusation in 1949, an angry mob shot and killed Thomas before he could be arrested. Charles Greenlee, Shepherd and Irvin were all put to trial and convicted.

Charles Greenlee was given a life sentence. Irvin and Shepherd were sentenced to death and successfully made an appeal. In 1951, the U.S. Supreme Court vacated their convictions and ordered a new trial for each. Following the new indictment, a Florida sheriff, Willis McCall, shot and killed Shepherd and attacked and injured Irvin.

Records show that the indictment against Thomas and Shepherd were never dismissed by the court, according to Gladson’s motion.

Irvin was retried, convicted and again sentenced to death, but later had his sentence commuted to life in prison.

Following the hearing, Gladson addressed reporters in a press conference and was joined by family members of the Groveland Four.

The first of the family members to speak was Carol Greenlee, who broke down in the court when the judge announced her father’s name would be cleared.

“This is a day that God has made,” she told reporters and thanked everyone who has helped her along her journey to fight for her father.

Carol Greenlee, who is 72, is just as old as the case of the Groveland Four. She was born a few months after her father was wrongfully imprisoned for rape.

Charles Greenlee, who was only 16 at the time, received a recommendation of mercy from the jury and received a life sentence instead of a death sentence. He did not appeal the verdict, but he was released on parole when his daughter was 11 years old. He died in 2012.

In an emotional interview with ABC News, Carol Greenlee, who said she took on the fight to clear her father’s name because he didn’t appeal his conviction, reflected on the “hole” in her life that the Groveland Four case has left and how it impacted her relationship with her father.

She said that she grew up visiting her father in prison until she was 3, when he asked her mother not to bring her back because it was “too painful.” But he continued to send her things from prison and didn’t miss a birthday card, she said.

Carol Greenlee said it took her years to understand the story of the Groveland Four and why her father didn’t want to see her.

“As a child, I would play in the courtyard while they talked and this one particular Sunday, he told her not to bring me back,” she said. “And that gave me a sense of being rejected, not being wanted. For a long time, I couldn’t understand. I didn’t do anything wrong.”

Carol Greenlee said that the charges against her father made her feel “guilty” growing up, and she felt like “other children that knew about it looked at me in a very strange and unforgiving way, that I was dirty.”

But as she got older, she learned more about what happened to the Groveland Four, and when she was 40 years-old, she finally asked her father and heard the story from him for the first time.

“I decided that in order to get rid of this hole that was inside of me that nobody could fill, that marching on picket lines couldn’t fill that, that everything that I did could not fill that hole — the desire to know more about my father,” she said.

Carol Greenlee said she can now begin to heal spiritually, because this journey has taught her that “hate destroys you from within, anger tears you apart.”

“But compassion, forgiveness, and hope builds you up. And as long as you got hope, you can look forward,” she added.

When asked how she wants the world to remember her father, she said, “I want the world to know Charles Greenlee as a compassionate, loving family man who cares dearly about his children and wants to protect them at all costs.”

Other family members who spoke at the press conference on Monday included Dr. Beverly Robinson, the cousin of Samuel Shepherd; Eddie Irvin and Gerald Threat, nephews of Walter Irvin; and Aaron Newson, the nephew of Ernest Thomas.

Author Gilbert King — who won a Pulitzer prize for “Devil in the Grove,” his 2012 book about the Groveland Four — also spoke following the hearing. He was joined by Thurgood Marshall Jr., the son of the late Supreme Court justice who represented Irvin in the trial.

Marshall Sr. was with the NAACP at the time before becoming the Supreme Court’s first Black justice. His son said the case always haunted his father.

ABC News’ Rachel DeLima contributed to this report.

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(WASHINGTON) — The Department of Justice has reached a settlement with parents of the Parkland  shooting victims, court documents obtained by ABC News show. 

Parents Fred and Jennifer Guttenberg sued the DOJ in 2018, alleging that the FBI knew shooter Nikolas  Cruz was “going to explode” at some point and did nothing to stop him from starting a massacre at  Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School. 

Other parents of Parkland victims joined the suit. 

On Feb. 14, 2018, Cruz opened fire at the school, which he attended, and killed 17 fellow students. In  October, he plead guilty to 17 counts of murder, and a jury will decide if he should face the death penalty or not. 

“He wanted to kill people, and he had the means to do so—he had spent the last several months  collecting rifles and ammunition,” the complaint filed in federal court in 2018 says. “Forty days later, Mr.  Cruz did just what tipster warned the FBI he would do. He entered his former high school—Marjory  Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida—and executed 17 people.” 

While the DOJ did not offer any settlement details, in their most recent court filing, the details are being worked out between the parties.

The court asked that the specifics of the settlement to be reached by Dec. 20.

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