(NEW YORK) — Tropical depression Fred continues to produce heavy rain across central Cuba as of Saturday morning.
Fred is located about 90 miles south of Key West, Florida, and moving northwest at 13 mph.
Sustained winds are traveling at 35 mph with higher gusts.
Tropical storm conditions are expected in portions of the warning area across the Florida Keys later Saturday.
A tornado or two may even be possible across central and South Florida.
Fred is expected to strengthen to a tropical storm as it passes near or west of the lower Florida Keys on Saturday afternoon.
It will move across the eastern Gulf of Mexico overnight and into Sunday, and move inland over the northern Gulf Coast on Monday.
Through Monday, 3 to 5 inches of rain are anticipated across the Keys and South Florida.
Across the Florida Big Bend and Panhandle, 3 to 7 inches with isolated maximum totals of 10 inches are expected. Flooding may occur. From Monday onward, heavy rain and flood impacts could extend into inland portions of the Southeast and into the southern and central Appalachians and Piedmont, as Fred interacts with a front in the area.
(BENA, Minn.) — A 3-year-old girl was fatally shot by a 5-year-old boy in a home in Bena, Minnesota, early Friday, officials said.
The Cass County Sheriff’s Office received a report of an accidental shooting around 3:50 a.m.
When deputies responded they learned the little girl “had been shot by accidental gunfire” by the boy, Sheriff Tom Burch said in a news release.
She was transported to the Deer River hospital by family members and intercepted by the Deer River Ambulance and lifesaving efforts were attempted on the child.
The girl was pronounced dead at the Deer River Hospital.
An autopsy is pending with the Midwest Medical Examiner’s Office and an investigation is underway.
The relationship between the boy and girl is not clear. It’s also not know how the child got a hold of the firearm.
It’s not clear whether possible criminal charges will be filed in the fatal incident.
So far this year 968 children have been killed by guns, according to the Gun Violence Archive.
In 2019, 3,371 American children and teens were killed with guns, the Children’s Defense Fund, a nonprofit child advocacy and research group reported.
(FORT WORTH, Texas) — A Texas mom is urging parents to send their kids to school wearing masks after she says her 11-year-old son was diagnosed with multisystem inflammatory syndrome a month after testing positive for COVID-19.
Angie Abbott said she and her son Cason went to see a doctor on Nov. 8, 2020 because he wasn’t feeling well; he’d been dealing with symptoms like a sore throat. Carson then tested positive for COVID-19, but they were sent home because his condition didn’t require hospitalization. Abbot said she monitored him from home, where he just “wanted to lay around and watch movies.”
Having just lost her fiancé, who she says died from a stroke, Abbot said she became “worried” that his “lethargy” was from depression and called a local pediatrician, who advised her to take him to a hospital.
“He always wanted to sleep and he didn’t feel good,” Abbott, 53, told “Good Morning America.”
In December 2020, Abbott said she twice brought her son to a local hospital in Abilene, but the doctors couldn’t figure out what was wrong. When Cason’s symptoms worsened, she said she took him to Cook Children’s Medical Center in Fort Worth.
“Immediately, they knew he had MIS-C,” she said. “His inflammation markers were extremely high with the swelling. He was swollen on the outside of his face, his hands and his feet. He had a rash pretty much all over him. His eyes were really bloodshot and red, and there were dark circles under his eyes.”
“I was scared to death,” Abbott continued. “I didn’t even know what MIS-C was.”
MIS-C is a condition where different body parts, such as the heart, lungs, kidneys, brain, skin, eyes and gastrointestinal organs can become inflamed. While it’s unclear what causes MIS-C, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says that many children who have MIS-C had COVID-19. The CDC has recorded 4,404 cases of MIS-C since May 2020.
“MIS-C has a median age of 9 years old,” said Dr. Priscilla Hanudel, an emergency medicine physician in Los Angeles and member of the ABC News Medical Unit. “Masking is crucial to preventing children from developing this severe illness, particularly because ages 11 and under aren’t yet vaccine-eligible.”
The morning after he was admitted, Abbott said Cason wouldn’t wake up and nurses couldn’t get a blood pressure reading on him. They rushed him to the intensive care unit, where he was in “critical condition,” she said.
“The doctor told me that if I would’ve waited until the next morning to drive him to the hospital, he probably wouldn’t have made it,” Abbott said.
Although Cason was released from the ICU and sent home a month later in January, he still has to return to Cook Children’s Medical Center for regular tests and lab work, Abbott said.
“His inflammation markers and several of his labs are way off,” she said. “He now has no immunity because of the MIS-C treatment.”
Treatments for MIS-C work to reduce inflammation in the body and include antibiotics, steroid therapy and intravenous immunoglobulin, which is a blood product made of antibodies, according to the Mayo Clinic.
Cason is now immunocompromised, Abbott said, and dealing with symptoms of MIS-C like fatigue and inflammation. She’s worried he might get reinfected when he returns to school at Wylie West Junior High, where he’ll be a sixth-grader starting Aug. 18.
“We just got released last week from his infectious disease doctor to go back to school wearing a mask,” Abbott said. “So here’s my thing that I’m worried about as a mom: what about these other kids that he’s going to be around? Most of them won’t be wearing masks and will not be vaccinated because they’re under 12.”
After Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s executive order banning government entities, including school districts, from requiring people to use masks, Cason’s school is one of many that will not be mandating mask use during the upcoming school year.
Abbott said that because of her son’s weakened immune system, Cason won’t be eligible for the vaccine when he turns 12 on Sept. 3. The CDC recommends people with MIS-C delay vaccinations for 90 days from the date of diagnosis.
“It’s the only thing that’s been on my mind,” Abbott said. “It’s not just a daily thing. It’s every moment of every day I’m worried about him. … I feel like we’re going into a war zone without any protection of our own.”
Cason’s school also won’t be offering any form of remote learning, Abbott said. As a working single mother, with no childcare options, she’s unable to pull Cason out of school and homeschool him.
“My child is still sick … it’s very scary to me if my child was to get COVID again,” Abbott said. “I don’t even want to think about what that might look like for us.”
Wylie West Junior High did not immediately respond to a request for comment from ‘GMA’ for comment about Cason’s remote learning.
Abbott is now urging parents to take the virus more seriously and to consider how valuable masks and the vaccine are in containing the spread.
“Be thankful that your world has not turned upside-down like mine has,” Abbott said. “COVID and MIS-C are very real in my home, and [it’s] very devastating the effects that it’s had on my home, so please don’t sit there and say it’s no big deal.”
She added, “If somebody was able to walk in my shoes and go through what I went through with my child, I think there’d be no doubt in their minds that they wanted the vaccine — that they never wanted to be that sick or give that to someone else.”
As for Cason, Abbott calls him a “trooper.”
“He’s a sweetheart,” she said. “He worries more about me getting sad for any time that we get a bad diagnosis or something to be concerned about. He’s never worried about himself ever. He’s never complained about this one time — he feels such a need to be protective of me.”
(WASHINGTON) — A group of House moderates is threatening to blow up Democrats’ plans of passing a $3.5 trillion budget resolution when the chamber is set to return the week of Aug. 23 unless the chamber also votes on the $1.1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill.
House Democrats intended to vote on the $3.5 trillion budget blueprint in late August after the Senate approved the measure this week. The budget blueprint allows both the House and the Senate to craft a reconciliation bill, filled with progressive priorities, that can be passed with a simple majority and without Republican support.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has said the House will not vote on the $1.1 trillion infrastructure bill until the larger $3.5 trillion reconciliation bill has also cleared the Senate, a condition which is wholeheartedly approved by progressives in her party.
“We have been clear for three months that we are not going to vote for the bipartisan package unless there is a reconciliation package that has passed that includes sufficient funding for our five priorities,” Rep. Pramila Jayapal, D-Wash., who heads the Congressional Progressive Caucus, told reporters earlier this month.
In the letter sent to Pelosi on Friday, moderate lawmakers insisted on a vote on the bipartisan infrastructure bill and have said their districts can’t afford “months of unnecessary delays.”
Democrats have just a three-seat majority in the House. Any handful of members can be potential roadblocks if they are determined enough to challenge Pelosi and the White House.
“The country is clamoring for infrastructure investment and commonsense, bipartisan solutions,” the letter states. “With the livelihoods of hardworking American families at stake, we simply can’t afford months of unnecessary delays and risk squandering this once-in-a-century, bipartisan infrastructure package. It’s time to get shovels in the ground and people to work.”
The letter was spearheaded by Rep. Josh Gottheimer, D-N.J., a co-chairman of the bipartisan Problem Solvers Caucus, and endorsed by eight other moderate Democrats: Reps. Henry Cuellar of Texas, Jim Costa of California, Kurt Schrader of Oregon, Filemon Vela of Texas, Vicente Gonzalez of Texas, Jared Golden of Maine, Ed Case of Hawaii and Carolyn Bourdeaux of Georgia.
A senior Democratic aide downplayed the threat Friday and said the moderates represent a small fraction of the larger caucus that approves of Pelosi’s original plan.
“This is 9. There are dozens upon dozens who will vote against the [bipartisan infrastructure bill] unless it’s after the Senate passes reconciliation,” the aide told ABC News.
The aide added that there are “not sufficient votes” to pass the bipartisan infrastructure bill this month and noted Pelosi’s comments to her caucus during a private call earlier this week, when she said her plan reflected a “consensus” of House Democrats.
“The president has said he’s all for the bipartisan approach … bravo! That’s progress, but it ain’t the whole vision,” she said. “The votes in the House and Senate depend on us having both bills.”
(NEW YORK) — As the delta variant continues to ravage communities across the country, Hispanic populations in many states have been left behind in the race to get the country vaccinated, according to Salud America, a national Latino-focused research organization.
Health experts say misinformation, fear and a lack of access to vaccination sites have contributed to the lower rates of vaccination — despite the disproportionate impact of COVID-19 on the Latino community.
According to Kaiser Family Foundation, a nonprofit organization focusing on national health issues, Black and Hispanic people are less likely than their white counterparts to have received a vaccine, leaving the unvaccinated members of the group at an elevated risk of contracting the virus.
“It’s pretty much life or death if they are choosing not to vaccinate themselves because of myths,” said Arturo Vargas Bustamante, a professor of Health Policy and Management at the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health.
Health experts are pleading with people to learn more about the science, unlearn the myths and overcome the fears concerning the vaccine.
Activists, like Frankie Miranda, of the non-profit Latino advocacy group the Hispanic Federation, are also calling on local officials to provide culturally competent information to help stop the spread of coronavirus among Latinos, who may have a mistrust of the U.S. government.
Latinos and the virus
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), 70% of adults in the U.S. have received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine.
State-by-state percentages of Latino vaccination rates show the disparities in vaccination — as of Aug. 2, only about 26.9% of Latinos in Alabama have received at least one dose, according to Salud America, which analyzes state and CDC data. In Tennessee, 31.3% of Latinos have had at least one dose. In Texas, it’s 32% of Latinos.
However, more than 90% of Latinos in Vermont and more than 60% of Latinos in Virginia have received at least one dose, Salud America reports.
And in the last two weeks, people of color are being vaccinated more than white people, according to the CDC — which could be attributed to the recent rise in COVID-19 cases and deaths among unvaccinated populations.
Latinos make up 28.5% of overall confirmed cases in the U.S. since the start of the pandemic, the CDC reports.
Bustamante recommended that trusted Latino leaders and figures partner with local governments and health agencies to get the word out about vaccines, their efficiency and the importance of community health to stop the spread.
Miranda blamed the lack of Spanish-language resources and outreach to communities and said that the lack of access and awareness can cause confusion for many.
“It is okay to feel anxious, to feel nervous about it,” said Miranda. “By asking questions or going to a community-based organization in their communities, to ask these questions, many of these worries will go away and they will understand that this is the best way to protect themselves and their families.”
Vaccination misconceptions, myths and fears
“Chisme mata,” said Fernandez, which means “gossip kills” in Spanish. He and other health experts warned against believing posts, articles and memes from non-reputable sources.
One common fear about the vaccine that some people have heard is that there may be unknown long-term effects. But experts, like American Public Health Association President Jose Ramon Fernandez, said that there’s no need to fear long-term effects because they have rarely, if ever, occurred with past vaccines.
The Food and Drug Administration puts each vaccine candidate through a rigorous safety and efficacy process before granting approval. And safety monitoring continues after approval as well.
All three current COVID-19 vaccines granted an emergency use authorization (EUA) by the FDA have undergone three phases of testing, including large trials that lasted several months. The CDC says currently authorized vaccines are safe and effective and Pfizer expects to apply for full approval next month.
“We have over [200] years of experience with vaccines, and there’s no record at all of having long-term effects of a vaccine,” said Fernandez.
Skepticism on the speed of vaccine production, and how quickly it was made available, is also easily explained, according to the CDC.
Other diseases caused by coronaviruses in the past are closely related to the COVID-19 virus. Because researchers had been developing vaccines for those diseases when the novel coronavirus was discovered, the basis for this vaccine was already in the works, according to the CDC.
Combined with billions of dollars funding expedited research and millions of volunteers working on this effort — the vaccine was made faster than normal.
“I know that it’s difficult to feel confident about science, especially right now during the pandemic where the advice given by scientists changes so regularly,” said Bustamante.
“You need to understand that science evolves,” he said. “Knowledge is not one static product. We, as scientists, contribute to science and see how trends evolve over time, and that many times makes us change our guidelines.”
Among the many false narratives about vaccines is they can cause problems with fertility.
“It has been completely debunked,” Fernandez said. “It’s an absolute lie. There’s no evidence anywhere around the world where this has been proven to be true.”
Given substantial data supporting the safety of vaccines, the CDC now strongly recommends that people who are pregnant and considering becoming pregnant to get vaccinated.
Another fear about the vaccine is that there are other cures to COVID-19, or that a healthy lifestyle is sufficient in protecting people from the illness. That is false, said Dr. Ramon Tallaj from SOMOS Community Care, a network of health providers in New York City.
He said that doctors, scientists, and public health experts believe that the vaccine, alongside other COVID-19 safety precautions like masking and social distancing, is the best protection against the virus and drastically protects the infected from severe illness.
“Somebody told me that they prefer the natural immunity … but natural immunity means that 600,000 people die in the United States,” said Tallaj about the growing COVID-19 death toll in the United States. “The only reason why humans live so long now … is because of vaccines and antibiotics.”
Some people are also in fear of getting symptoms after receiving the vaccine and may have to take off work or be disciplined by their bosses, Fernandez and Tallaj said.
But side effects like headache and fevers are temporary, and they don’t happen to everyone. Meanwhile, many employers will give workers a paid day off to rest after getting the shots, so public health officials recommend asking employers what options exist to take time off.
“It’s in their interest to make sure that you’re healthy,” said Fernandez. “Do it for your mother. Do it for your children. Do it for your friends. Do it for your co-workers. Do it for your community.”
And for undocumented immigrants or uninsured Latinos, there is no need to fear — people getting the vaccine will not be asked about their legal status and insurance isn’t needed. The vaccine is completely free and no one will be billed for it.
“As a Latino man, I’m deeply concerned about the health of our community, and I want to do anything I can to make sure that we have access to accurate information to help people make a decision that they will be happy they made down the line,” Fernandez said.
To find more information, and to find Spanish-language guidance on the vaccine, experts recommend heading to the CDC website for more information, or to the CDC’s vaccine finder to look for vaccination sites nearby.
(MIAMI BEACH, Fla.) — Tropical Depression Fred may restrengthen to a tropical storm Friday as it closes in on Florida.
The biggest threat from Fred is flash flooding, especially in South Florida, where up to 10 inches of rain is possible. A flood watch has been issued across South Florida, including Miami.
Fred will move over the Florida Keys early Saturday morning and then graze Tampa on Sunday morning with some rain and gusty winds. Fred is expected to make landfall as a weak tropical storm near Apalachicola in the Florida panhandle Sunday night into Monday early morning.
Meanwhile, another tropical threat developing in the Atlantic is expected to become Tropical Storm Grace by Saturday morning. A tropical storm watch has been issued for portions of the Leeward Islands in the Caribbean.
Grace is expected to remain a tropical storm as it passes over Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic.
By the middle of next week, Grace will approach the Bahamas and South Florida. The storm will likely be weak at that point but the forecast could change.
Some long-range models track the storm heading to the Carolinas, but it is too early to tell.
Ty O’Neil/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images
(NEW YORK) — Scientists are learning more about how widespread wildfires affect human health — and if there is a link between severe COVID-19 cases and regions that experience fires on a regular basis.
In 2020, a record-breaking fire season in the U.S. saw more than 10.2 million acres scorched in wildfires, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Both California and Oregon had historic wildfire seasons, and several small towns were destroyed in California, Oregon and Washington, according to NOAA. The dense smoke from the wildfires produced hazardous air quality for millions of people in the U.S. for weeks, the agency said.
Increases in the fine particulate matter from the wildfire smoke, the pollutant in smoke that poses the greatestrisk to health, were associated with spikes in severe COVID-19 cases and deaths in many counties in three West Coast states in 2020, according to a study published Friday in Sciences Advances.
Researchers studied COVID cases in 92 counties California, Oregon and Washington — all states that host annual wildfires during the dry season — ranging from mid-March to mid-December, Francesca Dominici, professor of biostatistics at Harvard University’s T.H. Chan School of Public health and author of the study, told ABC News.
They found that wildfires had the largest potential effect on COVID-19 cases in the counties of Butte, California, and Whitman, Washington, where 17.3% and 18.2% of total cases, respectively, were attributable to high particulate matter levels on wildfire days, according to the study.
Wildfires had the greatest potential influence on COVID-19 deaths in Butte and Calaveras counties in California, scientists said. The COVID cases analyzed were based on reported tests, which covers more than 95% of the population in the three states, according to the study.
The effects on COVID cases from the wildfire smoke were observed up to four weeks after the exposure to the particulate matter, the researchers said.
“This is really attributable to the wildfire events, which is concerning us,” Dominici said, adding that they “keep coming” as a result of climate change.
While recent studies had reported that short-term exposure to particulate matter associated with increased risk of COVID-19 cases and deaths, the degree of how much the 2020 wildfire season exacerbated the severity of the pandemic had not been clear, the researchers said.
Dominici said she was “surprised” about the findings, adding that the research suggests an association between wildfire emissions and asymptomatic cases becoming symptomatic and an association between fine particulate matter accelerating spread of the airborne virus.
The scientists believe the research will likely apply to the 2021 fire season, which is already on track to break more records due to an early start caused by a megadrought and climate change.
“Especially for the unvaccinated,” Dominici said. “I think the vaccinated people will be more protected this year for having less severe cases.”
Dominici continued, “If I were to conduct the the same study among the unvaccinated, I think the results would probably be the same, if not even worse, as we have been learning that the delta variant is even more contagious.”
(WASHINGTON) — As the situation in Afghanistan continues to deteriorate and criticism mounts over the Biden administration’s handling of the U.S. troop withdrawal from the country after the 20-year war, President Joe Biden has kept a low profile.
Spending the day in Wilmington, Delaware, before departing for Camp David, a presidential retreat, Biden has no public events on his schedule as he resumes what was supposed to be a week of vacation and the president did not stop to speak with reporters as he and first lady Jill Biden departed Wilmington Friday afternoon.
Biden was scheduled to receive his presidential daily briefing at 10 a.m. Friday, though the White House did not say if Biden had received additional briefings on Afghanistan Thursday evening or Friday.
A senior administration official said Biden would continue to be engaged on the issue and stay in close contact with his team about the situation Thursday afternoon.
In the hours surrounding the U.S.’s decision Thursday to send 3,000 troops into Afghanistan to assist the drawdown of the embassy in Kabul, Biden did not engage publicly on the issue.
Delivering remarks about his plan to lower prescription drug prices Thursday — his only public event before departing for Delaware — the president ignored a shouted question from the press as he left the East Room.
“Is Afghanistan lost?” someone had yelled.
Behind the scenes, Biden was briefed by Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin and National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan on the worsening situation in Afghanistan Thursday morning. It followed a meeting Biden held with principals Wednesday night, tasking them to come up with recommendations for next moves, according to a senior administration official.
After they met Thursday morning to review the recommendations, Biden gave the order to move forward with the new plans. The president separately spoke with Secretary of State Antony Blinken Thursday to discuss a diplomatic strategy, the official added.
The administration is on defense over its handling of the situation, saying it was not caught off guard or surprised at the speed of the Taliban’s advancement, arguing that there were a number of contingencies in play.
But according to a U.S. official, the precarious Afghan control over major cities growing more tenuous over the last day was a significant factor in Biden’s decision to go forward with the reduction in staffing and the new military mission.
And just over a month ago, the president doubted the country would fall to Taliban control.
“The likelihood there’s going to be the Taliban overrunning everything and owning the whole country is highly unlikely,” he told reporters on July 8.
The conditions for total withdrawal from Afghanistan were initially put in place by President Donald Trump. In February 2020, the Trump administration struck a deal with the Taliban under which the U.S. would pull out all of its troops from Afghanistan by May 1 if the Taliban met certain requirements, including refraining from attacks on U.S. forces.
In April, Biden announced his intention to withdraw all troops from Afghanistan before the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks because it was “time to end America’s longest war.”
“We will not conduct a hasty rush to the exit. We’ll do it responsibly, deliberately, and safely,” Biden said of the plan.
But in the months since that announcement, the U.S. has struggled to follow through on that promise. U.S. forces departed Bagram Air Field, its de facto headquarters in Afghanistan, in the middle of the night, without notifying Afghan commanders, Afghan military officials said.
The White House did not announce a plan to evacuate Afghan interpreters and contractors who have aided U.S. forces and diplomats, and who are now targets of the Taliban for their work, until July. While some flights for these Afghans to the U.S. have begun, thousands remain stranded in Afghanistan.
“Please send my word to the officials, if they don’t evacuate us there will be a slaughter. I have no idea what to do. I need help to leave this country or I will be dead, I need evacuation. I need help!” one Afghan interpreter wrote in a note shared with ABC News.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has requested a full House briefing on Afghanistan when the House returns to session Aug. 23, and congressional Republicans issued a swift rebuke of Biden.
“President Biden’s strategy has turned an imperfect but stable situation into a major embarrassment and a global emergency in a matter of weeks. President Biden is finding that the quickest way to end a war is to lose it. The costs and ramifications will echo across the world,” Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said in a statement Thursday night.
“America’s enemies know that the slogan ‘ending endless war’ actually means unconditional surrender. That is what we are seeing in Afghanistan today. American weakness is dangerously provocative,” GOP Rep. Liz Cheney tweeted.
Still, even as reports of the deteriorating situation in the region emerged this week, Biden stood by his decision to withdraw all troops.
“Look, we spent over a trillion dollars — over 20 years we trained and equipped with modern equipment over 300,000 Afghan forces. And Afghan leaders have to come together. We lost thousands — lost to death and injury thousands of American personnel. They’ve got to fight for themselves. Fight for their nation.”
“[W]e are continuing to keep our commitment. But I do not regret my decision,” he added.
ABC’s Luis Martinez, Matt Seyler and Conor Finnegan contributed to this report
(NEW YORK) — A teenager who was struck by lightning Thursday at a New York City beach has died, officials said.
Carlos Ramos, 13, of the Bronx, died at Jacobi Medical Center, city officials confirmed to ABC News Friday.
He was one of seven people who were struck by lightning while at Orchard Beach in the Bronx around 5 p.m. when a fast-moving storm approached, according to city officials.
Stacy Saldivar, 13, was among those struck when she and her parents and two sisters were running off the beach, she told New York ABC station WABC outside the hospital Friday.
“A huge lightning just went in front of me, hit in front of me and I passed out,” Saldivar told the station. “Then I was shaking and blood started coming out of my mouth.”
When she woke up, she was in the ambulance, she said.
The lightning felt like “a little tingle, it really hurt a lot,” Saldivar said. “I feel lucky because Jesus revived me.”
Saldivar told WABC she didn’t know Ramos.
“I feel lucky because Jesus revived me,” she said.
The others struck included a 41-year-old man and a 33-year-old woman and three other children — two boys ages 14 and 5 and a 12-year-old girl, according to city officials.
EMS responded and transported them to the hospital, officials said. They are expected to survive, WABC reported.
Prior to the incident, lifeguards had cleared all swimmers from the water, and NYC Parks staff instructed visitors to clear the beach, according to NYC Parks Department spokeswoman Meghan Lalor.
“Our hearts go out to the victims of this tragic incident,” Lalor said in a statement.
ABC News’ Aaron Katersky contributed to this report.
(NEW YORK) — The United States is facing a COVID-19 surge this summer as the more contagious delta variant spreads.
More than 618,000 Americans have died from COVID-19 and over 4.3 million people have died worldwide, according to real-time data compiled by the Center for Systems Science and Engineering at Johns Hopkins University.
Just 58.9% 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 13, 5:36 pm
ACP says masks should be required in schools
The American College of Physicians said Friday that masks should be required in all schools “as part of a comprehensive effort to reduce the spread of COVID-19.”
The statement follows similar recommendations from the American Association of Pediatrics and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and comes as some school districts have been defying bans on masks mandates in states including Texas and Florida.
“Masks are a key public health tool in keeping everyone in our school communities safe,” ACP President Dr. George Abraham said in a statement. “Especially with such a large segment of our schools’ populations unable to yet access COVID-19 vaccines, masks remain a necessity in our fight to control the COVID-19 pandemic.”
The ACP is the largest medical specialty society in the U.S., with over 161,000 internal medicine members.
Aug 13, 4:45 pm
CDC director endorses recommendation for additional dose for immunocompromised
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s advisory panel voted unanimously Friday to recommend an additional dose of Pfizer or Moderna for immunocompromised people. (This recommendation applies only to people who already had an initial series of mRNA — it does not apply to people who received J&J.)
Immunocompromised people will not need a doctor’s note, prescription or proof of their condition to get their third dose, CDC officials said at Friday’s meeting.
“This is a self-attesting. We do not anticipate — we are not recommending that either prescriptions or a physician sign off, or be necessary for individuals to receive an additional dose of mRNA if they’re immunocompromised,” said Dr. Kathleen Dooling, Medical Officer for the Division of Viral Diseases, the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, and the CDC.
CDC Director Rochelle Walensky signed off on the recommendation later on Friday.
-ABC News’ Cheyenne Haslett, Sasha Pezenik
Aug 13, 4:44 pm
Mississippi governor says request for military hospital ship denied
Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves said Friday that the state’s request for a military hospital ship has been denied by the federal government.
Reeves said the request for a ship “was as much about the over 500 personnel that come with it as it was the actual physical facilities.”
“I don’t anticipate that the USS Comfort is going to come to Mississippi, although we would welcome any of the 550 health care professionals that are on that particular facility that the federal government would like to send us,” he said.
-ABC News’ Will McDuffie
Aug 13, 4:21 pm
In Dallas ‘your child will wait for another child to die’
Dallas has no ICU beds left for children.
“That means if your child’s in a car wreck, if your child has a congenital heart defect or something and needs an ICU bed, or more likely if they have COVID and need an ICU bed, we don’t have one,” Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins said at a Workers Defense Action Fund event.
“Your child will wait for another child to die,” Jenkins added. “Your child will just not get on the ventilator, your child will be CareFlighted to Temple or Oklahoma City or wherever we can find them a bed, but they won’t be getting one here unless one clears. And that’s been true for 24 hours.”
Aug 13, 4:15 pm
Daily case average has skyrocketed nearly 884% since mid-June
The daily case average in the U.S. has surged to about 114,000, skyrocketing nearly 884% since mid-June, according to federal data.
Several states, including Florida, Hawaii, Louisiana and Mississippi, are now experiencing their worst surge yet, averaging more daily cases than at any point in the pandemic, according to federal data. New York City’s case average is now nearly five times higher than it was one month ago.
And more people are dying every day.
The nation’s daily death average has now climbed to nearly 500, a 183% jump in the last month. Seven weeks ago, daily deaths were at their lowest point since late March 2020.
-ABC News’ Arielle Mitropoulos
Aug 13, 3:29 pm
Kids must get caught up on routine vaccinations, officials say
Federal health officials said Friday it is now more critical than ever for parents to get their kids’ routine vaccinations.
“There are a lot of vaccine doubters,” said Dr. Peter Marks, director of the FDA Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research, “in part because we have been so successful with vaccination.” People no longer know what the havoc that diseases like polio, measles or smallpox can cause, because we no longer have them around, and thus, “we’re in some ways, victims of our own success,” he said.
Dr. Anne Edwards of the American Academy of Pediatrics noted that pediatricians are seeing a large number of respiratory illnesses now, and not all are COVID-19. She said that underscores the importance of having their routine vaccinations.
-ABC News’ Arielle Mitropoulos
Aug 13, 3:03 pm
Canada to require plane passengers get vaccinated
The Canadian government will soon mandate vaccinations for commercial plane travelers, cruise ship passengers and people on trains between provinces, according to The Associated Press.
Transport Minister Omar Alghabra said this will go into effect “as soon as possible in the fall and no later than the end of October,” according to the AP.
Aug 13, 2:57 pm
Louisiana hospitalizations at highest point of pandemic
Hard-hit Louisiana has 2,907 COVID-19 patients in hospitals — more than any point of the pandemic so far, the state’s Department of Health said Friday.
Louisiana’s Ochsner Health said they have 1,063 hospitalized COVID-19 patients in their system, exceeding all previous surges. Of those patients, 88.99% are unvaccinated, officials said.
Gov. John Bel Edwards said 399 patients in the state are on ventilators.
Fifty-seven people died of COVID-19 in Louisiana in the last 24 hours, the health department said.
The governor warned Friday that Louisiana isn’t near the peak of this surge and hospital leaders are more alarmed now than at any point in the pandemic.
“We are really close to the breaking point,” Edwards said.
Aug 13, 1:46 pm
Feds send ‘fatality management trailers’ to Texas
Federal officials are deploying extra resources to COVID-19 hot spots, including sending five “fatality management trailers” to Texas, according to a federal planning document obtained by ABC News.
Oklahoma was set to receive 100 ventilators on Thursday, according to the planning document, while Mississippi has requested enough medical personnel to staff more than 1,000 beds.
Aug 13, 11:49 am
Chicago requires school employees to be vaccinated
Chicago Public Schools, the nation’s third-largest school district, is requiring all employees to be vaccinated.
Seventy-eight percent of district employees were already fully vaccinated, partially vaccinated or had a vaccination scheduled as of June, the district said.
“For the social and emotional well-being of our young people, they need to be in school, and the vaccine adds another layer of protection to our plan to safely re-open schools,” the city’s department of public health commissioner, Allison Arwady, said in a statement.
Chicago’s school year starts on Aug. 30.
-ABC News’ Whitney Lloyd
Aug 13, 8:03 am
Former acting CDC head talks next steps for booster shots
Dr. Richard Besser, president and CEO of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and former acting director of the CDC, told Good Morning America that he expects booster shots will “be available to people with immune disorders very quickly.”
The FDA announced late Thursday that immunocompromised Americans – such as cancer patients, transplant recipients, people with HIV and people on immunosuppressant drugs — will be able to get a third shot of Pfizer or Moderna.
But Besser stressed, “I think about this less as a booster shot” and more of “a recognition that for certain people with immune problems, two doses wasn’t enough” and “the third dose is necessary for them to get the same high level of protection that the rest of people do.”
The CDC panel is expected to vote to recommend the third dose when it meets Friday at 11 a.m. and CDC Director Rochelle Walensky will likely sign off after a Friday afternoon vote.
Aug 13, 5:27 am
Alabama children’s hospital sees rise in patients
Children’s of Alabama reported a significant increase in the number of COVID-19 positive patients being treated at the hospital in recent weeks.
As of Thursday, the hospital said it is treating 22 COVID-19 positive patients, five of whom are on ventilators.
The hospital said in January, at the height of the last surge, their highest number of patients was 13.
“There are three proven ways to slow the spread of this highly transmissible strain of the virus: Vaccination for everyone 12 and up, masking, especially when indoors, and social distancing,” the hospital wrote in a Facebook statement.
Aug 12, 11:48 pm
FDA authorizes booster shot for immunocompromised
Immunocompromised Americans will be able to get a third shot of either of the mRNA vaccines, Pfizer or Moderna, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration announced late Thursday.
The booster will be targeted specifically for people who did not have an ideal immune response to their initial vaccines, which has proven to be the case for many cancer patients, transplant recipients, people with HIV and people on immunosuppressant drugs.
“The country has entered yet another wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, and the FDA is especially cognizant that immunocompromised people are particularly at risk for severe disease,” acting FDA Commissioner Janet Woodcock said in a statement. “After a thorough review of the available data, the FDA determined that this small, vulnerable group may benefit from a third dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna Vaccines.”
