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Schools welcome back students, in-person and remotely, amid latest COVID-19 surge

January 3, 2022 by WDNY Radio

(NEW YORK) — In a hodgepodge of in-person, remote and delayed reopenings, millions of students across the country are set to head back to school after several weeks on winter break.

School districts in every state are using a variety of approaches and precautions to determine the best way to keep children and staffers safe amid the nation’s latest, and most significant, COVID-19 surge on record.

The return to school comes as the hospital admission rate among children has hit its highest point of the pandemic. Pediatric case rates are also approaching record highs.

During an appearance on ABC News’ “This Week” on Sunday, Dr. Anthony Fauci told George Stephanopoulos that even with the surge, he is still in support of keeping kids in school as much as possible.

“I plead with parents to please seriously consider vaccinating your children, wearing masks in the school setting, doing test-to-stay approaches when children get infected,” Fauci said. “I think all those things put together, it’s safe enough to get those kids back to school, balanced against the deleterious effects of keeping them out.”

Many districts in major cities across the country are forging ahead with reopening plans, with some requiring face masks or testing of students and staff ahead of the return as an additional precaution. However, dozens of other districts — including in Ohio, Georgia, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Michigan — are beginning the spring term remotely.

Atlanta

Citing a rapid surge in infections locally, Atlanta Public Schools will open virtually Tuesday for all students and all staff. The city plans to reopen in-person instruction on Jan. 10, according to the school district’s public guidance.

All staff are required to report to work on Monday, Jan. 3 for mandatory COVID-19 surveillance testing.

Boston

Students in Boston will return to the classroom Tuesday as the district rolls out its share of the state-supplied rapid COVID-19 tests.

Over the weekend, members of the Massachusetts National Guard began delivering 227,000 rapid COVID-19 tests to school districts across the state, to be used for teachers and staff.

Boston Mayor Michelle Wu and Boston Public Schools Superintendent Brenda Cassellius announced Monday that so far, 155 teachers and school staffers have reported positive COVID-19 tests.

Chicago

In Chicago, students returned to class Monday, according to the school district’s public guidance.

Testing is only mandatory for unvaccinated students who traveled to an “orange” state, per the city’s travel guidance, which now includes every state except Montana.

Unvaccinated students who are close contacts of a known COVID-19 case must stay home and quarantine for 10 days. Vaccinated students who are close contacts can attend school as long as they are not experiencing any COVID-19 symptoms.

The district also distributed 150,000 take-home test kits to schools to support the return.

Cleveland

Citing a “significant rise in COVID-19 cases in the community,” the Cleveland Metropolitan School District will move to remote learning for the week of Jan. 3.

Following a professional day for staff, students will log on and follow their class schedules Tuesday through Friday.

Detroit

The spring semester in Detroit will not begin until later this week at the earliest.

Employees will be required to take a COVID-19 test on Monday and Tuesday through the district, according to the school district’s public guidance. All students are also encouraged to take a test through the district this week.

The district said it cannot begin the semester online, due to the fact that not all of its students have laptops.

School officials said they expect to announce plans for Thursday and Friday on Wednesday afternoon or evening.

Los Angeles

Staff in all Los Angeles County schools are required to wear upgraded masks — surgical mask or higher-level PPE, according to the district’s latest guidance. Students are “strongly recommended” to wear well-fitted masks.

The district is also strongly recommending that all eligible staff and students receive a booster shot.

COVID-19 testing is required for all close contacts who are permitted to remain in school immediately after exposure, regardless of vaccination or booster status.

Miami

All staff will be required to wear face masks inside any Miami-Dade County Public School facility. Students are not required to wear face coverings, but masks are “highly encouraged”.

Protocols for the enhanced sanitization and cleaning of classrooms and common areas, which were implemented at the beginning of the pandemic, will continue, according to the district.

New York City

Beginning Monday, schools in New York City will distribute take-home COVID-19 tests to any student or staff who exhibits COVID-19 symptoms or has been potentially exposed in a classroom where a positive case has been identified.

“The numbers of transmissions are low; your children is in a safe space to learn and continue to thrive. We’ve lost almost two years of education … we can’t do it again,” New York City Mayor Eric Adams told Stephanopoulos on “This Week.”

Unvaccinated or not yet fully vaccinated students in kindergarten through grade 12 who were in close contact to a positive COVID-19 case will no longer have to quarantine, as long as they do not have symptoms and do not have a positive COVID-19 test.

Following an exposure, all students and adults will receive a take-home rapid test kit and take two tests over the course of five days. For students in 3-K and pre-K, the quarantine policy will remain the same, meaning students who were in close proximity to a positive case will still have to quarantine for 10 days.

Newark

Newark Public Schools began the semester Monday with remote instruction to continue through Jan. 14. The school anticipates a return to in-person instruction on Jan. 18.

Seattle

In-person school in Seattle is set to resume on Tuesday. COVID-19 testing is available Monday for students and staff.

Washington, D.C.

Last month, Mayor Muriel Bowser announced that D.C. public schools would require all students and staff to provide proof of a negative COVID-19 test result before returning to school on Thursday.

Schools were closed on Monday due to inclement weather faced by the district.

The district will make free rapid antigen tests available on Tuesday and Wednesday. DCPS families will need to upload their child’s negative test results.

Elizabeth Holmes trial jury says they are ‘unable to come to a unanimous verdict’ on 3 counts

January 3, 2022 by WDNY Radio

(NEW YORK) — After over 45 hours of deliberation, the jury in the trial of Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes said in a note on Monday they “are unable to come to a unanimous verdict on three of the counts.”

Judge Edward. J. Davila read the jury a deadlock instruction, reiterated Holmes’ presumption of innocence, and sent the 12 back to the deliberation room to continue weighing the three counts of fraud on which they could not agree.

The jurors are tasked with weighing 11 fraud charges leveled against Holmes following weeks of witness testimony from insiders who worked at the blood-testing startup, and patients and investors who prosecutors say were defrauded by the Theranos founder once lauded as the next Steve Jobs.

Holmes, 37, is charged with nine counts of wire fraud and two counts of conspiracy to commit wire fraud. She could face decades in prison if convicted.

If the jury cannot come to a unanimous verdict on the three counts, a mistrial will be declared on those charges, according to Santa Clara Law professor Ellen Kreitzberg. If they can, however, all agree on the other eight counts, the judge can take those verdicts.

The jury began deliberating on Dec. 20. In the two weeks since, which included some time off for holidays, they have been largely quiet. In seven days of deliberations before the note Monday, they sent only two notes and have been publicly quiet since Dec. 23.

Of the three notes, this is the first substantive indication of where the jury stands. The first two notes included requests to take the jury instructions home and to listen to a recording of a pitch call Holmes had with investors.

Winter storm hits East Coast, brings major snowfall to Mid-Atlantic and the Southeast

January 3, 2022 by WDNY Radio

(NEW YORK) — A winter storm passing through the Mid-Atlantic on Monday has covered cities like Washington, D.C., in more than half a foot of snow.

The National Weather Service issued a winter storm warning affecting portions of southern New Jersey, eastern Maryland, northeast Virginia and all of Delaware until 4 p.m.

The winter storm is producing strong gusty winds which could contribute to power outages in the Southeast, mid-Atlantic and the Appalachians.

Areas from Asheville, North Carolina, to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, also reported snow on Monday.

The storm has already caused major power outages in Virginia and North Carolina. More than 760,072 customers were left without power overnight in Georgia, South Carolina, Tennessee and Maryland.

Videos on social media showed roads shut down in parts of Alexandria, Virginia, with cars stuck on hills due to heavy snowfall.

Total storm snowfall accumulations on the East Coast could be near a foot.

Early afternoon reports from D.C. showed blizzard-like conditions at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport with sightings of downed trees after the airport had already proactively canceled several flights.

D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser declared and extended a snow emergency beginning midnight on Monday to 7 a.m. local time Tuesday, deploying the district’s Snow Team and prohibiting vehicular parking along snow emergency routes to make way for snowplows.

A number of school districts in the Washington metropolitan area were closed because of the weather.

D.C. public schools, however, were already scheduled to be closed Monday and Tuesday following last week’s announcement about schools requiring negative COVID-19 test results upon returning from winter break.

Federal offices in D.C. were also closed on Monday with emergency employees told to follow their agency’s policies and some non-emergency employees offered weather and safety leave, the U.S. Office of Personnel Management announced.

Residents of the district were discouraged from leaving their houses for non-essential travel by the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority, which is running on a “severe snow service plan” with service limited only to major roads.

D.C. Police Department also took to Twitter to advise against non-essential trips.

Images of snow-covered Washington were shared on social media.

A livestream from The National Zoo, which is closed due to the inclement weather, captured the giant pandas outside their grottos enjoying the winter weather and playing in the snow.

COVID live updates: More than 100,000 Americans hospitalized with COVID-19

January 3, 2022 by WDNY Radio

(NEW YORK) — As the COVID-19 pandemic has swept the globe, more than 5.4 million people have died from the disease worldwide, including over 826,000 Americans, according to real-time data compiled by Johns Hopkins University’s Center for Systems Science and Engineering.

About 62% of the population in the United States is fully vaccinated against COVID-19, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

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

Jan 03, 10:34 am
More than 100,000 Americans are hospitalized with COVID-19

More than 100,000 Americans are currently hospitalized with COVID-19, according to data from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

A total of 103,329 people are receiving medical care, which is an increase of 130% from the number recorded two months ago.

Of those patients, more than 17% — about 18,000 — are in intensive care units.

The newly updated figure is just shy of the hospitalization peak seen during the summer wave fueled by the delta variant, when 104,000 Americans were hospitalized with COVID in early September.

-ABC News’ Arielle Mitropoulos

Jan 03, 10:34 am
More than 100,000 Americans are hospitalized with COVID-19

More than 100,000 Americans are currently hospitalized with COVID-19, according to data from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

A total of 103,329 people are receiving medical care, which is an increase of 130% from the number recorded two months ago.

Of those patients, more than 17% — about 18,000 — are in intensive care units.

The newly updated figure is just shy of the hospitalization peak seen during the summer wave fueled by the delta variant, when 104,000 Americans were hospitalized with COVID in early September.

-ABC News’ Arielle Mitropoulos

Jan 03, 10:20 am
FDA authorizes Pfizer’s booster shot for 12- to-15-year-olds

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration authorized booster shots of Pfizer-BioNTech’s COVID-19 vaccine in children between ages 12 and 15 on Monday.

Booster shots have been touted as a key tool in fighting the surge in COVID cases linked to the omicron variant, which has shown an ability to — at least partially — evade protection offered by two doses.

The FDA also shortened the wait period for adults and adolescents to receive boosters from six months down to five months.

In addition, the agency authorized COVID booster shots for children aged five to 11 who are immunocompromised.

Jan 03, 9:43 am
‘Mrs. Doubtfire’ pauses performances amid COVID surge

“Mrs. Doubtfire the Musical” has becomes the latest Broadway show to announce it is pausing performances amid the rapidly rising number of COVID-19 cases in New York City.

In a post shared on Twitter, producers announced the musical will “be taking a hiatus” between Jan. 10 and March 14.

Anyone with tickets for performances during the hiatus can either exchange for performances after March 15 or request a refund.

Jan 03, 9:34 am
Puerto Rico’s COVID positivity rate jumps from 2% to 33%

Puerto Rico’s COVID-19 positivity rate spiked to 33% on Monday, according to the island’s health department COVID dashboard.

This is a 16-fold jump from the 2% positivity rate reported just two weeks ago, which was a record low.

Scientist Mónica Feliú-Mójer from Ciencia PR, an organization that focuses on scientific education in Puerto Rico, said the rapid increase is due to many factors, including people’s behavior.

She said people gathering over the holidays, while a highly transmissible variant continued to spread, led to the spike in the positivity rate.

“The holidays are culturally very, very important and everyone thought this would be a different Christmas. People were eager to get together,” Feliú-Mójer told ABC News.

-ABC News’ Cristina Corujo

Jan 03, 3:28 am
South Korea reports first 2 omicron deaths

South Korea on Monday reported the deaths of two patients in their 90s who tested positive for omicron.

Both were receiving treatment in Gwangju, about 200 miles south of Seoul, the semi-official Yonhap News Agency said.

South Korean health officials reported 111 new omicron cases on Monday, bringing its total to 1,318 omicron cases.

About 83% of South Korea’s population has been fully vaccinated, according to the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency. About 36% received a booster.

Jan 03, 2:17 am
Israel approves 4th vaccine dose for people 60 and over

Israel’s Ministry of Health approved a fourth dose of COVID-19 vaccine for health care workers and people over 60 years old, Prime Minister Naftali Bennett said.

“Israel will once again be pioneering the global vaccination effort,” Bennett said at a press conference in Jerusalem. “Omicron is not Delta — it’s a different ball-game altogether.”

Fourth doses will be administered four months after booster shots, Bennett said.

ABC News’ Jordana Miller

FDA authorizes Pfizer boosters for 12- to 15-year olds

January 3, 2022 by WDNY Radio

(WASHINGTON) — The Food and Drug Administration on Monday approved Pfizer boosters for 12- to 15-year-olds.

The moves comes as schools reopen after the holiday break.

In a release, the FDA said it has amended the emergency use authorization for the Pfizer vaccine to also shorten the time between the completion of primary vaccination of the Pfizer vaccine and a booster dose to at least five months, instead of six, and to allow for a third primary series dose for certain immunocompromised children 5 through 11 years of age.

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

Fauci: Testing negative to end COVID isolation now under consideration

January 3, 2022 by WDNY Radio

(NEW YORK) — Amid pushback from some public health officials on new Centers for Disease Control guidance for individuals who have tested positive for COVID-19, which does not require a negative test to end isolation after five days, Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation’s top infectious disease specialist, said changes to the guidance are being considered.

“You’re right there has been some concern about why we don’t ask people at that five-day period to get tested. That is something that is now under consideration. The CDC is very well aware that there has been some pushback about that,” Fauci told This Week anchor George Stephanopoulos on Sunday.

He continued, “Looking at it again, there may be an option in that, that testing could be a part of that. And I think we’re going to be hearing more about that in the next day or so from the CDC.”

The CDC issued new guidelines for those who test positive on Tuesday, recommending a five-day isolation period, if asymptomatic at that point, followed by five days of masking when around other people.

The CDC said in a statement: “The change is motivated by science demonstrating that the majority of SARS-CoV-2 transmission occurs early in the course of illness, generally in the 1-2 days prior to onset of symptoms and the 2-3 days after. Therefore, people who test positive should isolate for five days and, if asymptomatic at that time, they may leave isolation if they can continue to mask for five days to minimize the risk of infecting others.”

Some prominent public health officials, including former U.S. Surgeon General Jerome Adams, criticized the new guidelines. The nation’s largest nurses’ union and a major flight attendant union also expressed dissatisfaction with the new guidelines.

“Regardless of what CDC says, you really should try to obtain an antigen test (I know – easier said than done) and confirm it’s negative prior to leaving isolation and quarantine. There’s not a scientist or doctor I’ve met yet who wouldn’t do this for themselves/their family,” Adams tweeted.

The revised guidelines come as the number of COVID-19 cases in the U.S. reaches record levels. The CDC recorded more than 580,000 cases in the U.S. on Thursday, a pandemic record. That number shattered Wednesday’s record of about 488,000.

However, Fauci said Sunday the time has come to focus less on case counts, as “infections become less severe.” Instead, he said, “it is much more relevant to focus on the hospitalizations.”

As cases have skyrocketed, hospitalizations and deaths have not apparently followed the trend. Fauci expressed optimism about emerging evidence that the omicron variant could be less damaging, although he cautioned “hospitalizations are often late, lagging indicators.”

Even with the rising case numbers, Fauci said he believes it’s the correct decision to return children to in-person schooling after the holiday break as “it’s very clear there are really serious effects about” children not having a physical presence — and because most teachers are vaccinated and children 5 and up are eligible for COVID vaccinations.

“I plead with parents to please seriously consider vaccinating your children, wearing masks in the school setting, doing tests to stay,” he added. “I think all those things put together, it’s safe enough to get those kids back to school, balanced against the deleterious effects of keeping them out.”

Despite some promising data on omicron, Fauci warned there remains a heightened potential for stress on the nation’s hospitals and health care workers.

“We’ve got to be careful about that. Because even if you have a less of a percentage of severity, when you have multi, multi, multifold more people getting infected, the net amount is, you’re still gonna get a lot of people that are going to be needing hospitalization. And that’s the reason why we’re concerned about stressing and straining the hospital system,” Fauci told Stephanopoulos.

Still, Fauci expressed hope that what he described as a “severe surge” will peak within a few weeks.

“One of the things that we hope for, George, is that this thing will peak after a period of a few weeks and turn around,” Fauci told Stephanopoulos. “We’ve seen that happen in South Africa with a head of major surge, but as quickly as the surge went up, it turned around.”

Disabled community ‘left behind’ in vaccine rollout one year later

January 3, 2022 by WDNY Radio

(WASHINGTON) — Hundreds to thousands of calls come in to the Disability Information and Access Line (DIAL) each week from disabled people across the country with questions about COVID-19, vaccinations, testing spots and more.

As one of the first call centers to focus specifically on the needs of disabled people, the federally funded hotline continues to pick up speed, filling a service previously unmet, according to the line’s director Sara Clark. The more people know about it, she says, the more calls they’re fielding.

“It’s important for people with disabilities to know that they can turn to a trusted source for accurate information,” Clark said.

DIAL was created in May 2021 and serviced and supported by national disability advocacy groups.

The call center has since been inundated with requests to assist disabled people in getting vaccinated, finding vaccination sites, in-home vaccination availability, educating callers about vaccine information, and overcoming physical or systemic barriers to accessing the vaccine and booster shots.

“Now that the word about us, it’s showing us that there’s a lot more people that have needed this but didn’t necessarily know about it,” Clark said.

The CDC reports that disabled adults were more likely to endorse the vaccine as protection against COVID, but are more likely to report difficulties in getting vaccinated than did adults without a disability.

Some 82.4% of disabled people have at least one dose of the vaccine, compared to 85.3% of non-disabled adults, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Among disabled adults over the age of 65, the gap in vaccination widens to about five percentage points.

“The disability community didn’t have a national call center until DIAL was created,” said Sandy Markwood, the CEO of the national disability and elderly advocacy organization USAging. “It focuses primarily on COVID but people are also calling looking for supportive services, which are needed now more than ever.”

The effort was funded by the U.S. Administration for Community Living and the CDC but is being run by USAging and other disability advocacy networks such as the National Disability Rights Network, the National Association of Councils on Developmental Disabilities and more.

Some 61 million adults in the United States live with a disability, the CDC reports — that’s about 1 in 4 adults who have some type of disability.

Curt Decker, the executive director of the National Disability Rights Network, said the COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted some of the ways that ableism in policies and procedures has impacted access to healthcare and safety for disabled people.

He said that the disabled community is often “left behind” in disasters and the COVID-19 pandemic is just the latest example of this.

“You’ve really got to think through all the different populations, different needs and design your programs to meet that whole range of people,” said Decker. “Surprise, surprise — here comes a pandemic and we didn’t initially plan how our response is going to impact these very vulnerable populations.”

Disabled people have been disproportionately impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic: “the increased risk of poor outcomes from the disease itself, reduced access to routine health care and rehabilitation, and the adverse social impacts of efforts to mitigate the pandemic,” the CDC reports.

The pandemic has exacerbated pre-existing oppression on the disabled community. The World Health Organization notes that disabled people are more likely to be older, poorer, and have comorbidities — all of which increase the risk of severe consequences from the virus.

“The disability community is very diverse, with all kinds of disabilities,” Decker said. “Unfortunately, we’ve discovered that there are some people that are just not thinking about the population and what their needs are.”

Markwood says that the lack of access to reliable information and vaccination sites has hampered vaccination efforts among this demographic.

“There was a lot of misinformation about what the impact of vaccines would be on people who had disabilities,” Markwood said.

For people with intellectual disabilities and for people who are immunocompromised to some degree, advocates say that the fear of vaccination, lack of understanding of medical jargon, and lack of communication from doctors on individual health impacts was greatly unaddressed.

Many of the people calling DIAL’s hotline, Clark says, are just looking for information and insight.

“Maybe the initial question would be: ‘where can I get vaccinated?'” Clark said. “Then, it’s the ‘how’ of getting there, getting the transportation. In some cases, people need assistance with getting into the appointment, waiting there, knowing what to expect next, and the peer support that our Centers for Independent Living offer.”

Then come the issue of physically accessing the vaccine.

“If a person is using a wheelchair, will they be able to get to the vaccination site?” Clark said. “If it’s a person who has sensory issues, they might get overwhelmed with a lot of people or a lot of noises or a situation they’re not used to.”

She added, “If they’re trying to get into a spot that you know, wasn’t wheelchair accessible or they they’re a person who needs American Sign Language, but they’re not able to communicate with people there — they could also call us. We’ve trained and prepare people for that.”

Some people with disabilities live in group homes or detention facilities, some cannot verbally communicate, some need transportation or communication assistance, Decker and Markwood said.

Some people are homebound or are under the guardianship of someone who may be against vaccines, they added.

Many factors create hostile or challenging scenarios for the vaccination rollout among disabled patients: if vaccination spots are difficult to travel to or navigate; if at-home vaccine administration is hard to come across; if a care provider or guardian is not adequately relaying accurate information or if medical information is not being understood or if websites and call centers are not disability-friendly.

“We actually went into a group home in one state where the residents wanted to be vaccinated, and the provider wouldn’t do it — so we had to get a mobile unit out there from the local health department could give them access to the vaccine,” Decker said.

CDC states that reducing these barriers to vaccine scheduling and making vaccination sites more accessible “might improve vaccination rates among persons with disabilities.”

The CDC has started acting on this by funding the Administration on Community Living’s efforts to connect with the aging and disabled — which includes backing DIAL.

Considering the ever-increasing demand for DIAL’s services, there is still a clear need for resources to address the needs that are holding disabled people back from vaccination access.

“[Call center users] are so happy that there’s someone to answer the phone because so often they call places and it’s just an automated message,” Clark said. “They are really just happy and grateful that there is someone at the other end of the line that can listen to them and hear their needs and not only hear their needs, but also point them in the right direction.”

COVID-19 live updates: Israel approves fourth vaccine dose