Afghanistan updates: Biden to address nation as pressure builds to speed evacuations

HOSHANG HASHIMI/AFP via Getty Images

(KABUL, Afghanistan) — Chaos has enveloped Kabul after Afghanistan’s government’s collapsed and the Taliban seized control, all but ending America’s 20-year campaign as it began: under Taliban rule.

On Thursday, protests broke out in Kabul with Afghan men and women waving the nation’s flag in defiance of the Taliban on Afghanistan’s Independence Day.

The U.S. has evacuated approximately 9,000 people since Aug. 14, according to a White House official, with 3,000 people evacuated Thursday and double that number slated to be flown out Friday. Pentagon officials have said their focus remains on maintaining the airport perimeter and increasing the number of evacuees out of Kabul.

President Joe Biden returned to Washington from Camp David on Wednesday and sat down with ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos for an exclusive one-on-one interview at the White House, the president’s first interview since the withdrawal from Afghanistan. He is expected to address the nation on evacuation efforts Friday.

The Pentagon has said that 6,000 U.S. troops have been deployed to the country’s capital as the military races to evacuate people. Despite criticism, the Biden administration is sticking by its decision to withdraw troops from the country, though Biden told Stephanopoulos troops might stay beyond the original Aug. 31 date if it takes longer to get all Americans out of the country.

Here are some key developments. All times Eastern:

Aug 20, 10:33 am
Biden to brief nation Friday as 6,000 slated to be evacuated from Afghanistan

As chaos continues to unfold in Afghanistan, President Joe Biden will address the nation at 1 p.m. on evacuation efforts amid mounting pressure to get Americans and Afghans who have supported the U.S. out of the embattled country.

After about 3,000 people were evacuated Thursday, the State Department said another 6,000 are slated to be evacuated on 20 flights Friday. Between 5,000 to 7,000 people will have to be evacuated daily to beat the Aug. 31 withdrawal deadline, Biden told ABC’s George Stephanopoulos Wednesday.

Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris will meet with their national security team to be briefed on the evolving situation on the ground in Afghanistan on Friday before Harris departs on a foreign trip to Asia in the evening, and the House and Senate will also receive unclassified briefings at 2 p.m. and 3:15 p.m., respectively.

Pentagon spokesman John Kirby will also hold a briefing with Maj. Gen Hank Taylor at 2 p.m.

Aug 20, 9:08 am
Biden administration grapples with slow Afghanistan evacuations

Members of Congress will get more details on the state of affairs in Afghanistan in unclassified briefings Friday amid bipartisan calls for Americans and Afghan allies to be evacuated from Kabul faster after the Taliban takeover.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley will speak with members of the House of Representatives. Senators will also receive a briefing.

The briefing comes after another chaotic day at Kabul’s airport. The State Department said Thursday that 6,000 people were cleared to be flown out on 20 flights on Friday — the max capacity for each.

The number evacuated will have to be 5,000 to 7,000 per day to beat the Aug. 31 withdrawal deadline, President Joe Biden  Wednesday.

In order for that to happen, though, those looking to flee the ravaged nation need to be able to access the airport and there is currently no clear plan to resolve that. State Department spokesman Ned Price had a sobering message for those hoping for a safe route.

“At this point, we don’t have the resources to go beyond the airport compound,” Price told reporters Thursday.

While talks continue with the Taliban about allowing safe passage to the airport, no resolution has yet been reached.

Aug 20, 1:25 am
US evacuated about 3,000 people from Kabul on Thursday

The U.S. evacuated approximately 3,000 people from the airport in Kabul on Thursday as thousands clamor to get out of the country in the wake of the Taliban taking over the government.

The White House confirmed the latest number of evacuees early Friday, among them nearly 350 U.S. citizens. The others on the 12 C-17 flights were family members of U.S. citizens, special immigration visa applicants and their families and vulnerable Afghans, a White House official said.

The official said 9,000 people have been evacuated since Aug. 14 and 14,000 since the end of July.

Not included in those totals were 11 charter flights facilitated by the U.S. military, the official said.

President Joe Biden is scheduled to discuss the evacuations from Afghanistan in an address Friday afternoon.

Aug 19, 8:13 pm
Consular surge will only be as high as 40 people total: Sources

The State Department announced earlier this week that it is “surging” staff to the international airport in Kabul to assist with the massive efforts to evacuate as many as 15,000 U.S. citizens and tens of thousands of Afghans who helped the U.S. mission in Afghanistan.

But the total number of consular officials who will help process people will only be as high as 40 people in total, according to two sources familiar with the plans — raising questions about whether that is enough staff to process the tens of thousands left to evacuate.

The State Department declined to confirm how many consular officials would be based at Kabul airport, but referred questions to spokesperson Ned Price’s comments earlier on Thursday.

“We’re always going to be evaluating what we could be doing differently, what we could be doing more effectively. If it turns out that we need additional consular capacity in Kabul, we won’t hesitate to do that, but right now we are confident that … with the additional reinforcements, we’ll have what we need,” he told reporters.

In comparison, there are more than 5,200 U.S. troops on the ground, securing the airport and evacuating Americans and Afghans on military cargo aircraft. The military is able to airlift between 5,000 and 9,000 people per day, Gen. Hank Taylor told reporters Thursday, but they have not had that many evacuees ready to go.

Crowds are unable to access the airport, blocked by massive congestion and Taliban fighters beating back crowds. U.S. forces have also deployed tear gas and fired into the air to disperse crowds. Over the last 24 hours, Taylor said, only 2,000 passengers were taken out.

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Southwest pilots, flight attendants say they’re exhausted; pilots ready to picket

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(NEW YORK) — Southwest Airlines pilots are preparing to picket as front-line employees at the airline complain of mismanagement, low staffing, scheduling chaos and a lack of food and hotels for pilots and flight attendants.

Unions representing Southwest’s front-line employees say the airline is severely understaffed, but continues to pack its flight schedule as air travel rebounds, forcing pilots and flight attendants to regularly work the maximum number of hours permitted by federal law. Staffing and weather issues have forced Southwest to cancel thousands of flights this summer.

On Thursday, by late afternoon, Southwest had canceled 170 flights and delayed 852 others, the most of any U.S. airline. At the same time, United had 31 cancellations, while Delta had four.

“We are united on this issue. Our flight attendants are weary, exhausted, and they can take no more,” Lyn Montgomery, Southwest flight attendant and union president, told ABC News. “We’re asking that additional flights not be added to the schedule until the company can handle the flight schedules that we currently have. We all want to get back to the pre-pandemic days, but we have to be able to handle things the way they are right now, the way things are still with the pandemic.”

Crews say they routinely arrive in destination cities only to learn they have no hotel or food availability and cannot reach the company for help.

“We’re being asked to work longer hours, more shifts and extended duty days. We get to the curb and at the end of the day, and we have no idea what hotel we’re supposed to go to,” Montgomery said. “We have to wait for hours to call crew scheduling. There’s no food in the hotel, so we’re unable to get food. We’re not able to get food with the long lines at the airport. So food is the major issue. And we’re also being told that if we call in sick, we have to go see a company doctor to verify the illness.”

In July, Southwest offered its flight attendants double time to pick up extra shifts. The company is now offering its employees referral bonuses to try and fill vacancies.

“The safety of our Employees and Customers comes first, at all times, and that continues to be the priority in everything that we do, Sonya Lacore, Southwest vice president of inflight operations, told ABC News in a statement. “We are aware of the concerns the TWU 556 raised in their letter, and there is much work already underway to address many of the issues this summer.”

Casey Murray, a Southwest captain and pilot’s union president, said issues raised with the company have largely been ignored.

“Management’s refusal to even attempt any of our solutions, or have any real discussion has led us to this point, we must accept that our efforts to improve efficiency and make Southwest Airlines more competitive have fallen on deaf ears, time and time again, because the company has made it clear that they are comfortable with the operation as managed,” Murray said in a video to Southwest pilots Thursday morning.

Southwest Vice President Bob Waltz acknowledged some of the airlines’ challenges, telling ABC News in a statement: “The airline and travel industry have seen a multitude of operational challenges as we navigate the effects of the pandemic. We have teams across the airline working diligently to adapt to the current environment and support our employees during this peak travel season, including efforts focused on providing support to our pilots.”

“We routinely work with the Southwest Airlines Pilots Association on a variety of matters that affect our pilots, but we also have a responsibility to consider a number of factors before implementation of suggestions. We remain committed to listening to feedback and proactively working to address issues as we navigate the months ahead,” Waltz explained.

Southwest is not the only airline facing staffing challenges. American Airlines has had to cancel thousands of flights this summer due pilot and flight attendant shortages.

While airlines received billions of dollars in government aid to keep employees on the payroll, many front-line workers took early retirement or severance packages at the height of the pandemic, leaving airlines desperate to fill openings as air travel rebounded.

Southwest pilots say they will picket during the busy Thanksgiving and Christmas rush if their demands are ignored.

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Georgia governor enables businesses to reject COVID-19 mandates as hospitals overflow

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(ATLANTA) — Georgia businesses won’t have to comply with local COVID-19 measures like mask or vaccine mandates under a new executive order, as the state’s hospitals continue to be stretched to their limit.

Gov. Brian Kemp issued an executive order Thursday that will keep businesses from being forced to follow COVID-19 ordinances put in place by local jurisdictions. The Republican governor said the order was issued to protect recovering businesses from “another round of shutdowns.” It doesn’t prevent businesses from complying with local orders, but the ordinances won’t be enforced, he said.

“Local governments will not be able to force businesses to be the city’s mask police, the vaccine police or any other burdensome restriction that will only lead to employees being let go, revenue tanking and businesses closing their doors,” Kemp said during a press briefing announcing the order.

Several cities in Georgia have reinstated mask mandates amid rising COVID-19 cases. Last month, Atlanta issued a mandate requiring mask use in public indoor spaces, including private businesses. Nearby, Decatur issued a similar mandate, though businesses can opt out. Savannah has issued a mask mandate for some indoor public spaces, though it doesn’t include businesses.

The order comes as there is “substantial case incidence” of COVID-19 throughout counties in Georgia, according to the latest COVID-19 forecast from PolicyLab researchers at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia.

The number of available intensive care unit beds is also dwindling in the state. According to the latest data from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, ICU capacity in Georgia is at 94%.

Northeast Georgia Health System’s hospital in Gainesville is overflowing with COVID-19 patients. Hospital officials confirmed with ABC News Thursday that as COVID-19 patients fill up beds, doctors have been treating some patients needing emergency care inside their ambulance while waiting for a bed to open up. The hospital has also set up a tent behind the emergency department for overflow patients.

Some hospitals in the Atlanta metro area are on diversion and are turning away ambulances when their emergency departments are full, hospital officials said.

On Thursday, doctors from some of the state’s largest hospital systems pleaded with people to get vaccinated as they’re being inundated with COVID-19 patients.

“Our hospitals are once again filling up, and they’re filling up with young people and old people and those with comorbidities who have not been vaccinated,” Dr. Danny Branstetter of Wellstar Health System said during a press briefing with doctors and officials from several metro Atlanta health systems. “We’re seeing this peak rise very, very quickly, and rising to match or exceed the peaks we saw in the winter.”

Over 92% of those hospitalized with COVID-19 are unvaccinated, Branstetter said.

Dr. James Fortenberry, the chief medical officer at Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta, told reporters the hospital is seeing a “significantly greater impact” on children during the surge of the highly contagious delta variant.

“Our teams are seeing more COVID-19-positive patients in our emergency departments, urgent care centers and hospitals than at any time in the pandemic,” Fortenberry said, noting that there were 31 patients across the system’s three hospitals with COVID-19 on Thursday. “Thankfully, only a small fraction of children who test positive for COVID-19 need to be hospitalized to treat their infection, but that doesn’t mean that they don’t experience illness, and what can be significant illness, and miss out on normal activities like school and sports.”

Fortenberry implored all teachers, staff, students and visitors at schools to follow recommendations from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the American Academy of Pediatrics and wear masks regardless of vaccination status.

“We owe it to our kids to do everything that we can to protect them,” he said.

In Georgia, 47.4% of residents ages 12 and up are fully vaccinated, compared to 59.8% nationwide, according to CDC data.

Kemp has not issued any vaccine mandates for state employees, though he has closed state offices on Sept. 3 to encourage public employees to get the shot.

“We have three lifesaving vaccines widely available,” he said Thursday while urging people to speak with someone they trust about getting vaccinated.

Copyright © 2021, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

COVID-19 live updates: J&J looking into booster of its single-dose vaccine

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(NEW YORK) — The United States is facing a COVID-19 surge this summer as the more contagious delta variant spreads.

More than 623,000 Americans have died from COVID-19 while over 4.3 million people have died from the disease worldwide, according to real-time data compiled by the Center for Systems Science and Engineering at Johns Hopkins University.

Just 59.5% of Americans ages 12 and up are fully vaccinated against COVID-19, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

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

Aug 20, 10:48 am
Unvaccinated Black people ‘biggest group’ driving COVID spike: Texas Lt Gov

Republican Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick told Fox News Channel host Laura Ingraham that “African-Americans who have not been vaccinated” are the “the biggest group in most states” driving the spike in COVID-19 cases, during a Thursday interview.

Patrick doubled down on his comment, adding that “over 90% of them vote for Democrats and their major cities and major counties.”

“It’s up to the Democrats to get — just as it’s up to Republicans to try to get as many people vaccinated,” he said. “In terms of criticizing the Republicans for this, we are encouraging people who want to take it to take it, but they are doing nothing for the African-American community that has significant high number of unvaccinated.”

NAACP President Derrick Johnson pushed back in a statement: “Lt. Governor Dan Patrick lives in an alternate reality, where facts don’t matter,” Johnson said.

“He’s delusional. Black Texans are not the driving force behind the surge of COVID cases in Texas. His statement is not only baseless, it’s racist. Falsely casting blame on the Black community is one of the oldest tricks in the book, and we expect better from an elected official.”

Aug 19, 5:57 pm
Mississippi’s only pediatric hospital sees record COVID-19 patients

Children’s of Mississippi, the state’s only pediatric hospital, reported a record number of patients Thursday.

There are 28 children, all unvaccinated, with confirmed or suspected cases of COVID-19, the highest since the start of the pandemic, the hospital said on Facebook. Among those, eight children are in the intensive care unit, including five not yet old enough to receive the vaccine, the hospital said.

“The best way to protect ALL of Mississippi’s kids from COVID-19 is for everyone age 12 and up to get vaccinated,” said the hospital, which is part of the University of Mississippi Medical Center in Jackson.

Nearly 43% of Mississippi residents ages 12 and up are fully vaccinated, according to CDC data, one of the lowest rates in the country.

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Afghans who helped US military plea for escape: Taliban will ‘cut our heads off’

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(NEW YORK) — The Taliban’s swift move to control Afghanistan has plunged the country into chaos with many fearing for their lives and trying to find any means to escape.

ABC News obtained audio recordings from English-speaking Afghans, including Afghan Air Force pilots, translators and teachers, still trapped inside Afghanistan. They’re pleading to get out and looking to the United States for help. Several Afghans who had worked with the U.S. military said they would be killed if the Taliban found them. They said they felt abandoned by the Americans.

All of them were given pseudonyms below due to concerns for their safety. The recordings were obtained from human rights attorney Kim Motley.

“Why have the American soldiers forgotten about us after everything we did? The sacrifices we did, why are they leaving us behind?” said Abdul, who worked as an interpreter for the U.S. military, and recorded the audio on Aug. 17. “I don’t want to be killed by the Taliban. They are going to cut our heads off if they find my location. Please help.”

“The Taliban is trying to find us and they [are] searching for us,” said Khalil, who had worked with U.S. special forces, and recorded the audio on Aug. 18. “They told me that anywhere I should go, they will find me and kill me. I asked the Americans, ‘Please help us.’”

Idriss, an Afghan pilot, said in a recording from Aug. 18 that he worked for U.S. special forces and that he and his family had been stuck in their home for three days, terrified that the Taliban was hunting them.

“We are very scared, and the Taliban are looking for us 24/7. … This is the time the U.S. should help Afghan pilots, get them out of the country to a safe place. We don’t care where that safe place [is], we need to move. Our family is in danger. We are at high risk now. We can’t live like this for the rest of our lives, being scared and [escaping the] Taliban,” Idriss said. “We have no safe place in Afghanistan.”

There’s an entire generation of Afghans who didn’t grow up under Taliban rule, but that all has changed in a matter of weeks. Now in power, new images from the capital city of Kabul showed Taliban fighters carrying out armed patrols where Afghan men and women protested.

The previous Taliban regime enforced severe restrictions on women, who were largely confined to their homes. They also held public executions and banned television and music prior to the U.S.-led military invasion in the wake of the September 11, 2001, terror attacks.

“My wife was beaten by the Taliban,” Abdul said. “My kids, they are young kids … they were all beaten by the Taliban. The Taliban have no mercy on anybody. So we are really left behind. We really need immediate evacuation from here.”

People desperate to escape have continued to fill Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul as the U.S. military races to evacuate people out of the country. Ali, an English teacher who claimed to have ties to the U.S., said she was in “huge danger” in a recording from Aug. 19.

“I’m so afraid to be out in that area of the airport,” Ali said. “It is insane. There are people holding their American passports, there are people that work with the Americans and they aren’t letting anyone in. … There is chaos everywhere. At least for the people who have citizenship, please let them in. I don’t understand.”

Laila, another teacher who said she was close to the airport, described in recordings made within the last week a “big mob” scene that included armed Taliban fighters and looters attacking citizens.

“They are coming up from everywhere,” she said. “We stay here for one more hour, there is going to be a massacre. I’m telling you there is going to be a massacre. Everyone will be killed here, I’m telling you, because I see a lot of armed people here. They are attacking us from every possible corner.”

President Joe Biden told ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos on Wednesday that his administration is sticking by its decision to withdraw troops from the country. However, Biden said troops might stay beyond the original Aug. 31 date if it takes longer to get all of the Americans out of the country.

For some Afghans still waiting for help inside the country, many believe that they’ll have to remain in hiding until they could find a way out.

“I don’t know how much more we can handle this situation, I have already lost my mind,” said Abdul. “The situation is not good. They can find me anytime.”

Copyright © 2021, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

US diplomats warned of Afghanistan’s collapse in dissent cable last month

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(WASHINGTON) — U.S. diplomats at the embassy in Kabul warned in a classified memo to Secretary of State Antony Blinken and the department’s leadership last month that the Afghan government was at risk of collapse as the Taliban offensive swept across the country, a source familiar with the memo confirmed to ABC News.

The dissent cable, as such memos are called at the agency, was sent on July 13 and was immediately brought to Blinken’s attention, the source said.

State Department spokesperson Ned Price declined to comment on the cable, saying dissent cables are “strictly between the Department’s leadership and the authors of the dissent messages,” but said Blinken reads and responds to each and values their use.

It’s another example of how U.S. officials had been warning senior Biden administration officials about the risks of the president’s decision to withdraw from Afghanistan, although even diplomats on the ground had no idea the collapse could come so quickly.

The cable, which was first reported by The Wall Street Journal, called on the Biden administration to begin an airlift operation immediately for Afghans who helped the U.S., according to the source.

It also urged the U.S. government to use stronger language to condemn the Taliban’s atrocities as they swept across the country and gained control of provinces, per the source — something the embassy, its top diplomat Ambassador Ross Wilson and eventually the department started doing around that time.

Blinken read the cable and responded to it, according to the source, who said the “thoughts of the drafters reflected much of the thinking at the department.” The day after the cable was sent, the administration announced Operation Allies Refuge to begin relocating Afghans who assisted the U.S. military and diplomatic missions and their families to the U.S.

But that operation did not begin until late July, and before Kabul fell on Sunday, it had only brought under 2,000 Afghans to the U.S. — those who had been approved for special immigrant visas and already undergone security vetting. In total, some 20,000 Afghans who worked for the U.S. have applied for these visas, according to the State Department, for themselves and tens of thousands more family members.

The administration has been criticized by U.S. lawmakers of both parties and veterans groups, among others, for not beginning that operation sooner, moving Afghans to the U.S. quickly enough or securing agreements with safe countries to host Afghans who have not yet passed security vetting.

“There was a concern that if we moved too quickly that it would undermine the confidence of the Afghan government and it would lead to a collapse even faster,” Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman told ABC News Wednesday.

“I appreciate that in hindsight people are saying, ‘Why didn’t you do this? Why didn’t you do that?'” she added. “The focus now today is getting all those SIVs out.”

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Louisiana doctors struggle as COVID patients flood hospitals

ABC News

(BATON ROUGE, La.) — In Louisiana, the COVID-19 crisis is leaving hospitals teetering on the edge of collapse.

The state currently has the nation’s highest case rate, and hospitalization levels — more than 3,000 at last count — are stretching the health system to a breaking point with patients overwhelming intensive care units and staffing in short supply.

“Our volume, over the past couple of weeks, has been outrageously high,” Dr. Jon Michael Cuba, service line chairman for emergency medicine at Ochsner Health in Baton Rouge, told ABC News. “There has been a ton, a ton of COVID. We are built to deal with this, but with this surge, there is a lack of nurses, a lack of beds and it’s hard to get enough physicians to see the onslaught of patients that are coming in.”

In the last month alone, hospital admissions have surged by more than 340%, amidst a steady rise in daily cases over the last seven weeks.

The situation in Louisiana, driven by the highly infectious delta variant, is mirrored in other Southern states where vaccination rates are relatively low.

In Florida, more patients are currently hospitalized than at any other point in the pandemic, and in Alabama, there no remaining ICU beds available statewide.

In Louisiana, less than 39% of the state’s population is fully vaccinated. Nearly all of those currently hospitalized with COVID-9 in the state — 91% — are unvaccinated, according to state data.

“We’re seeing people come in, they’re getting sicker more quickly,” Dr. Ryan Richard, a pulmonary and critical care physician with the Baton Rouge General Hospital told ABC News, adding that “the vast majority of people are unvaccinated.”

Hospitals in crisis mode

Hospitals across the state are struggling to keep up with the rapidly changing pandemic. There is simply not enough staff to deal with the influx of COVID-19 patients, in addition to the non-COVID-19 patients, doctors said, thus greatly straining the healthcare system

“We are seeing crazy outrageous numbers of patients,” Cuba explained.

At the beginning of July, there were 10 COVID-19 patients receiving care at Baton Rouge General Hospital. As of Wednesday, there were more than 200 COVID-19 patients.

The hospital is now at a breaking point, Richard said. “We do have people calling in to try to get to this hospital that we’re unable to accept,” he said, adding that they have had to send patients to other facilities because they simply do not have the means to care for them. “That’s hard on us, because we want to take everybody that we possibly can and do everything we can, but we don’t have the right means. It’s very frustrating.”

With so many patients needing care, and critical care at that, hospitals have been forced to create makeshift ICUs.

Baton Rouge General opened its eighth COVID-19 ward this week, including one unit in the hospital’s burn unit. Other hospitals in the state have been transforming endoscopy suites, or other medical rooms into untraditional places to care for patients.

In addition, the wait time in the emergency rooms is getting increasingly longer, with critically ill patients forced to stand by for care that was once immediate.

“We are getting crushed in our emergency rooms, our hospitals are filled to the brim,” said Cuba. “If somebody is coming in today with a heart attack, there is a wait. Something we aren’t accustomed to, or comfortable with, but it’s just overwhelming and a cold hard fact of the capacity in the hospitals are starting to get to the bursting point.”

Patients getting younger, and sicker

With more than 80% of Americans 65 and older fully vaccinated, the burden of disease has shifted largely to younger Americans. As of Aug. 7, Americans between the ages of 18-49 make up more than 40% of the patients currently hospitalized with COVID-19, across the country.

Many of the patients who are coming in tend to be younger and sicker, Dr. Abdul Khan, pulmonary critical care physician in the COVID ICU at Ochsner Medical Center in New Orleans noted. He recalled a 40-year-old father, who before being placed on a ventilator, told staff that he was the primary caretaker of a 10 year-old son.

There has also been a staggering increase in younger patients being hospitalized.

“The other thing that we didn’t see in the beginning, is parents visiting their kids,” Khan explained. “The thought of having to visit my kids in the hospital is mind numbing. And that’s what we are seeing.”

Even more concerning, added Khan, is the dreadful reality that “we are having to have conversations with people’s parents about end of life care and things like that. These aren’t kids, but they are 20 years old and 30 years old, and the people that are at their bedsides are their parents.”

One of the patients at Baton Rouge General is 39-year-old disaster relief worker Jessica Cooper, of Baton Rouge, who has been hospitalized with the virus for over 12 days. Cooper, who was unvaccinated, told ABC News, she had wanted to wait for the shot until after she completed an upcoming surgery.

Cooper told ABC News that the infection had depleted her, with every breath a battle. At her worst, she had even written out a goodbye text to her 11-year-old daughter, in case she did not make it out of the hospital.

“I had prayed, made my peace with God. And started typing a text message to her, that way if something happened, and I didn’t make it, she knew I loved her,” Cooper said, adding that this virus is “ageless, it’s colorless — what you can do to protect yourself, it’s not even about you, it’s to protect others.”

Richard noted that people who are coming into the hospital appear to be getting sicker, more quickly, and while in the first three waves of COVID-19, the medical staff felt that it could predict, to some degree, who would get sick, and which people were most vulnerable to the disease, it is no longer the case.

“We’re fooled everyday for what we thought and we’re seeing a lot of young people with no medical problems that were significant or it,” he said. “I thought we had kind of turned the corner and on our way out of this thing… but the delta has truly thrown us a curveball.”

Hospital workers overworked and overwhelmed

The nationwide shortage of nurses has also left frontline workers stretching their teams responsibilities, in an effort to meet all patients’ needs.

“The amount of nurses is never enough,” said Khan. “We are redeploying physicians. That’s how sick the patients are, and how fast they are coming in. If we have 5, 10, 15 extra nurses, there will be a job for them. That’s how many people are coming to the hospital.”

Teams are also ultimately facing the burden of the physical and emotional toll yet another wave has placed on the staff.

“We are already stressed in our job with the extra hours covering the surge, and then when you see your patients, and worried about what’s in the lobby, worried about who is in the ambulance, am I going to be able to get this heart attack out to the right place, will I find a place for the patient to land? I worry a lot about our teams,” Cuba concluded.

Copyright © 2021, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

Afghanistan updates: Protesters fly Afghan national flag in defiance of Taliban

HOSHANG HASHIMI/AFP via Getty Images

(KABUL, Afghanistan) — Chaos has enveloped Kabul after Afghanistan’s government’s collapsed and the Taliban seized control, all but ending America’s 20-year campaign as it began: under Taliban rule.

As the crisis intensifies, images from Kabul Thursday show Taliban fighters forcefully patrolling streets where Afghan men and women were protesting. Meanwhile, Pentagon officials said their focus remains on maintaining the airport perimeter and increasing the number evacuees out of Kabul.

President Joe Biden returned to Washington from Camp David on Wednesday and sat down with ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos for an exclusive one-on-one interview at the White House, the president’s first interview since the withdrawal from Afghanistan.

The Pentagon said that 6,000 U.S. troops have been deployed to the country’s capital as the military races to evacuate people. Despite criticism, the Biden administration is sticking by its decision to withdraw troops from the country, though Biden told Stephanopoulos troops might stay beyond the original Aug. 31 date if it takes longer to get all Americans out of the country.

Here are some key developments. All times Eastern:

Aug 20, 1:25 am
US evacuated about 3,000 people from Kabul on Thursday

The U.S. evacuated approximately 3,000 people from the airport in Kabul on Thursday as thousands clamor to get out of the country in the wake of the Taliban taking over the government.

The White House confirmed the latest number of evacuees early Friday, among them nearly 350 U.S. citizens. The others on the 12 C-17 flights were family members of U.S. citizens, special immigration visa applicants and their families and vulnerable Afghans, a White House official said.

The official said 9,000 people have been evacuated since Aug. 14 and 14,000 since the end of July.

Not included in those totals were 11 charter flights facilitated by the U.S. military, the official said.

President Joe Biden is scheduled to discuss the evacuations from Afghanistan in an address Friday afternoon.

Aug 19, 8:13 pm
Consular surge will only be as high as 40 people total: Sources

The State Department announced earlier this week that it is “surging” staff to the international airport in Kabul to assist with the massive efforts to evacuate as many as 15,000 U.S. citizens and tens of thousands of Afghans who helped the U.S. mission in Afghanistan.

But the total number of consular officials who will help process people will only be as high as 40 people in total, according to two sources familiar with the plans — raising questions about whether that is enough staff to process the tens of thousands left to evacuate.

The State Department declined to confirm how many consular officials would be based at Kabul airport, but referred questions to spokesperson Ned Price’s comments earlier on Thursday.

“We’re always going to be evaluating what we could be doing differently, what we could be doing more effectively. If it turns out that we need additional consular capacity in Kabul, we won’t hesitate to do that, but right now we are confident that … with the additional reinforcements, we’ll have what we need,” he told reporters.

In comparison, there are more than 5,200 U.S. troops on the ground, securing the airport and evacuating Americans and Afghans on military cargo aircraft. The military is able to airlift between 5,000 and 9,000 people per day, Gen. Hank Taylor told reporters Thursday, but they have not had that many evacuees ready to go.

Crowds are unable to access the airport, blocked by massive congestion and Taliban fighters beating back crowds. U.S. forces have also deployed tear gas and fired into the air to disperse crowds. Over the last 24 hours, Taylor said, only 2,000 passengers were taken out.

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As delta variant surges, remote learning in the spotlight for another school year

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(NEW YORK) — Rhashonna Cosby’s two children fared very differently during their months of remote learning. Her son thrived working independently, going on to graduate from high school in the spring of 2020. Her 17-year-old daughter, meanwhile, struggled academically without face-to-face instruction, before transferring this past spring to a school where she could go on-site a few days each week.

“She definitely needs in-person,” Cosby, of Linden, New Jersey, told ABC News. “That’s ideal for her because she doesn’t get distracted. She can focus.”

As students head back for a third school year impacted by the pandemic, COVID-19 continues to complicate the education landscape and the impact of remote learning has yet to be fully assessed. As achievement gaps have emerged, many districts are planning to return fully in person learning in hopes of restoring traditional learning, even as safety concerns mount around the highly contagious delta variant.

But remote learning will remain a part of students’ lives for the foreseeable future, experts say, with tens of thousands of students in quarantine just weeks into the school year for some. How schools approach remote learning is varied: While some view it as a Zoom extension of the classroom, others are taking novel and holistic approaches to try to improve the quality of instruction.

For now, in-person learning is the only option for students like Cosby’s daughter, a rising senior, as New Jersey’s governor was among several leaders to require full-time, in-person K-12 instruction this school year. Other large school districts, like New York City, are starting the year without a remote option.

In recent days, however, the New Jersey state education department has issued guidance that “strongly encouraged” schools to provide remote instruction for students during quarantine, NorthJersey.com reported.

In Philadelphia, Maritza Guridy had the option of a fully remote school, though she decided to have her four children in person “as long as it’s safe,” she told ABC News. Once they were able to return to the classroom last school year, her children did better with face-to-face instruction, she said. While working as the secretary for her children’s school, Guridy heard from many parents struggling with remote learning last year.

“I got many phone calls with families telling me that they had to choose between working or being able to help their child, so there are children that didn’t even log on the entire school year, as a result, because their families could not afford to be at home,” said Guridy, who now works as the Northeast Regional Organizer for the education advocacy group National Parents Union. “It was just so many things that I personally experienced, saw, heard about from parents calling the school. It was a lot.”

Achievement gap in math and English

While some students may do well learning remotely, others have fallen disproportionately behind.

A spring report by the think tank Rand Corp. found that fully remote students learned less in mathematics and English language arts and were more likely to be absent than those learning in person. In a new poll from the Kaiser Family Foundation, nearly 40% of parents of school-age children said their child fell behind academically during the pandemic — with Hispanic parents and households with incomes less than $40,000 a year most likely to report that.

Even for those opting for in-person classes, virtual learning will be inevitable this school year, especially in areas of low vaccination, Daniel Domenech, executive director of AASA, the School Superintendents Association, told ABC News.

Case in point: Just a week into the school year, over 10,000 students and staff in one Florida school district were isolating or quarantining due to COVID-19 cases or exposure.

And over 20,000 students in Mississippi, the state with the lowest vaccination rate, were in quarantine after the first week of school.

“Remote learning is not going to disappear,” Domenech said. “It’s going to continue as a major supplement to help us catch up with the learning loss.”

Deliberate about who goes remote

Amid rising worries over the delta variant, Kenny Rodrequez, the superintendent of the Grandview C-4 School District in Grandview, Missouri, has seen a growing interest in remote learning ahead of the first day of school on Aug. 23 — from about 5% of the district’s roughly 4,000 students last month to around 10 to 12%, he told ABC News last week.

“Certainly the variant has many people very concerned,” he said, though the district is encouraging in-person learning if possible.

“We’re trying to do it a little bit more deliberately this time, a little bit more in the student’s best educational interests,” he said. “If your kid was virtual last year and they were not successful, we’re going to have a real, personal conversation with you about, maybe this is not in their best interest.”

For parents concerned about safety, the district has been communicating about its COVID-19 protocols, such as requiring students and staff to wear masks regardless of vaccination status, the superintendent said.

As for remote instruction, the district took a few more lessons to heart. For one, teaching both in-person and remote at the same time was too challenging, so it is looking to have educators who just focus on remote learning. Additionally, teaching kindergarten in particular was too difficult via a screen, so the grade will only be in person this school year, Rodrequez said.

Dedicated virtual staff and a targeted student approach have factored into other school districts’ plans. Georgia’s Bibb County School District marked the debut this month of its virtual school, VIP Academy — an investment in remote learning that was in the works pre-pandemic. About 2% of the 21,000-person student body is enrolled in the school, which serves grades 4 through 12, school officials said.

Students had to apply to the school “to make sure that they are a quality candidate to be successful in virtual learning,” Rose Powell, chief information officer for the school district, told ABC News. “It’s not for everyone.”

In the event students attending school in-person in the district aren’t able to show up — such as due to COVID-19 quarantine or isolation, another illness or a family matter — they can shift virtually at their district school. Classrooms are also equipped with audio and video technology, so teachers can record and upload lessons into the district’s learning management system.

“[This] provides our teachers and our students and our parents access like they’ve never had before,” Powell said.

Communication key in unclear environment

One key component during months of pandemic learning has been, simply, communication.

“You cannot communicate enough, because people do not necessarily know what’s going on,” said Rodrequez, who started posting weekly videos online for families. “I think for us, just trying to be as open and honest as possible and communicate everything that’s going on that we know, knowing that sometimes we’re not gonna know what’s gonna happen — some things will change around us and we’ll have to adapt to that as well.”

That captures what many parents are feeling as the school year starts amid high COVID-19 transmission across most of the United States.

Debra Garrett of Troy, New York, is hoping her four children, who are between the ages of 7 and 11, can safely stay in school after they largely learned remotely last year.

“This year was a struggle, but I think a lot of the sacrifices fell on me as a parent, and of course other parents can vouch for that as well,” said Garrett, who left her job working for the state’s retirement system to be home with her children. She also was in school virtually herself, recently graduating with a bachelor’s in health sciences.

Her children did better academically and socially with face-to-face instruction, especially her 10-year-old, she said. After he went back to the classroom a few days a week to receive speech therapy services, he improved so much he currently doesn’t need them this upcoming school year, she said.

As cases continue to rise in her area, though, Garrett is getting more anxious about both the prospects of staying fully in-person once her children go back to their charter school on Aug. 23, and what it means for their safety.

“I’m nervous, but I really want them back in the building,” she said. “I know that they learn better when they’re there. I also need a sense of normalcy.”

Copyright © 2021, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

How to prepare kids for back to school without fixating on ‘learning loss’

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(NEW YORK) — As students across the country head back to school, a top priority for many educators and parents is how to help students who have experienced “learning loss” during the COVID-19 pandemic.

With kids leaning remotely since early 2020, “learning loss” — or gaps in understanding and skill knowledge that prevent academic progress — has been a natural worry for many parents.

But instead of dwelling on how much students may have fallen behind during their time away from school, some educators are focusing on meeting students where they are rather than focusing on what they’ve “lost.”

“Sometimes the phrase ‘learning loss’ doesn’t value and uphold all of the hard work that teachers, students and families did over the last year and a half to really try to stay the course and really keep their students learning,” Juliana Urtubey, the Council of Chief State School Officers’ 2021 national teacher of the year, told Good Morning America.

“One of the things that I like to tell families and my students is that we’re going to be OK. We’re going to work really hard to catch all the kids up,” Urtubey said. “But what we want to focus on is the future and how to meet all the needs of all of our students instead of working, fixating on the pressure of catching up.”

Urtubey, who is a special education teacher at Kermit Booker Elementary School in Las Vegas, said that even if the COVID-19 pandemic didn’t exist, teachers still assess where students stand academically each year. But if learning loss is the main focus this school year, Urtubey said it could put a lot of pressure on students.

“I think that one of the biggest things we can do is really be critical about how we think about this concept and push back on the idea that our students are going to have to be running the whole year to catch up,” said Urtubey.

Urtubey said that in-person learning will provide a support system for students as they return to school and teachers will meet their needs to help them stay engaged and help them get to where they need to be academically.

“We’re going to work really hard to make sure all of our students have the foundational knowledge they need to be able to apply critical thinking,” Urtubey added. “Each student benefits and thrives in different ways, which is why it’s so important for us to have community within our learning spaces no matter what grade you’re in. Students do better when they know that they’re part of a community and that there’s lots of support for them.”

Ahead of the upcoming school year, Urtubey shared some advice for parents to help their kids feel supported as they transition back to in-person learning.

Co-write a letter with your child to the teacher

Urtubey said co-writing a letter with your child to their teacher is a good way for teachers to get to know students, but also a good way for students to introduce themselves to their teacher. Students can talk about anything from their family to their favorite activities. It can also include what they struggle with in school or what they’re excited to learn. Parents can also include their concerns in the letter.

“As a teacher, I loved getting these letters at the beginning of the year,” Urtubey said. “They made me feel like I already knew the child and I already had a first step in terms of building this kind of trust with families.”

Do activities that are both academic and of interest to your child

If your child expresses an interest in certain subjects like art or reading, Urtubey said it’s good to push them to explore the topics more. For example, if a child is interested in space, Urtubey said a trip to the library can help get your child reading books about space.

“You’re carving out time at home for them to read, so that learning is enjoyable, so that learning is self-guided and self-motivated and that the child has some kind of way to share the learning at home,” Urtubey said. “I think that especially during this last year, we have to make sure that all students feel joy in what they’re learning.”

Visit school before the year begins

For big transition years, like kindergarten or the start of middle school, one way to help prepare students for the upcoming year is to visit the school before the year begins. That way students know where they’re having lunch, where their classroom is, who their teacher is and more.

“A lot of schools will already schedule this,” said Urtubey. “I know that this is really helpful in reducing stress before the first days of school.”

Help students practice introductory questions

Urtubey said when she taught fifth grade students, one way to help them prepare for middle school was spend time with them on things like switching classes or practicing opening a locker. Another way they prepared for the school year was to practice social skills to make new friends.

Urtubey suggested practicing different conversations for different scenarios with your student to help them take the stress or anxiety out of forming friendships or meeting new people.

Encourage deeper conversations about school

At the end of each day, Urtubey suggested asking your child questions beyond “How was your day?” since that doesn’t necessarily start a conversation with them about what happened during school.

Instead, Urtubey suggested questions such as, “Tell me about a time that you felt really happy today,” “Tell me about a time you felt challenged today,” or “Tell me a bit about what you learned today,” will help foster more discussions about what they’re feeling.

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