MONDAY, Aug. 10, 2020 (HealthDay News) With millions of American children soon returning to school, a new study shows that at least 97,000 kids were infected with COVID-19 during the last two weeks of July. According to the new report from the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Children’s Hospital Association, at least 338,000 U.S. children had tested positive through July 30, The New York Times reported. That means that more than a quarter of those cases had come up positive in the second half of July alone. Already, some schools have tried to reopen and then had to order quarantines or close after COVID-19 cases were reported among students and staff, the Times reported. North Paulding High School in Georgia, which gained national attention last week after videos of crowded hallways made their way onto social media, announced Sunday it would switch to online instruction for Monday and Tuesday after at least nine coronavirus cases were reported there. In the new report, states in the South and West accounted for more than 7 of 10 infections. The count could be higher because the report did not include complete data from Texas and parts of New York State outside of New York City. Missouri, Oklahoma, Alaska, Nevada, Idaho and Montana were among the states with the highest percentage increase of child infections during that period,…  read on >

The Trump Administration is weighing a new rule that would temporarily block an American citizen or legal permanent resident from returning to the United States from abroad if authorities believe the person might be infected with the coronavirus. President Donald Trump has already imposed sweeping rules that ban entry by foreigners into the United States, citing the risk of allowing the virus to spread from hot spots around the world. But so far those rules have not applied to American citizens and foreigners who have established legal residence here, The New York Times reported. Now, a draft regulation proposes giving the federal government the power to do so in individual, limited circumstances, the Times reported. Federal agencies have been asked to submit feedback on the proposal to the White House by Tuesday, the newspaper said. The draft of the proposal, parts of which were obtained by the Times, does state that any order blocking citizens and legal permanent residents must “include appropriate protections to ensure that no constitutional rights are infringed.” And it adds that citizens and legal residents cannot be blocked as an entire class of people, the newspaper reported. Whether the Trump administration has the legal authority to block citizens and permanent residents from returning to their own country is unclear, the Washington Post reported. But one official said the administration is contemplating…  read on >

As coronavirus cases continue to surge across America, scientists on Wednesday called for widespread adoption of simpler, less accurate tests, as long as they’re given often and quickly. “Even if you miss somebody on Day 1,” Omai Garner, director of clinical microbiology in the UCLA Health System, told The New York Times. “If you test them repeatedly, the argument is, you’ll catch them the next time around.” The strategy hinges on having an enormous supply of testing kits. But many experts believe more rapid, frequent testing would spot people who need immediate medical care while also identifying those most likely to spread COVID-19, the Times reported. Of the dozens of coronavirus tests that have been granted emergency use authorization by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, most rely on complex laboratory procedures, such as PCR, the Times reported. Only a few tests are quick and simple enough to be run in a doctor’s office or urgent care clinic, without the need for lab equipment. And these tests are still relatively scarce nationwide, though government officials say they plan to ramp up production of such tests by the fall, the newspaper said. “If you had asked me this a couple months ago, I would have said we just need to be doing the PCR tests,” Susan Butler-Wu, a clinical microbiologist at the University of Southern California,…  read on >

The U.S. coronavirus death count climbed past 150,000 on Wednesday, a milestone that none had predicted would come so soon. In April, Dr. Anthony Fauci said he hoped that no more than 60,000 people in the country would die from the coronavirus, The New York Times reported. In May, a renowned research center predicted that number would be just over 70,000 by early August. When the death tally spiked in May, President Donald Trump predicted that between 75,000 and 100,000 people could die from the new coronavirus, the newspaper said. But the daily COVID-19 death tallies have kept piling up: On Wednesday, more than 1,300 new deaths nationwide were reported, with Washington state’s death count not yet recorded, the Washington Post reported. That’s the highest one-day count since the latter half of May. Thirteen states reached their highest seven-day averages for novel coronavirus deaths, the newspaper reported. California, Florida, Idaho and North Carolina broke their records for virus-related deaths reported in a single day on Wednesday. With 217 new deaths on Wednesday, Florida joined Texas as one of eight states that have counted 200 single-day deaths at some point during the pandemic, the Post reported. “The mortality is going to march in lockstep with our transmission,” Dr. Sarah Fortune, chair of immunology and infectious diseases at the T.H. Chan School of Public Health at Harvard,…  read on >

As the number of U.S. coronavirus cases passed 4.5 million on Thursday, some of America’s top public health officials will return to Congress for another round of questioning on the federal government’s handling of the pandemic. Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation’s top infectious disease expert, will testify Friday in front of the House’s special select committee investigating the Trump administration’s response to the pandemic, The New York Times reported. Joining him will be Dr. Robert Redfield, the director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and Adm. Brett Giroir, the administration’s point person on coronavirus testing. The hearing will focus on testing, vaccines and school reopenings. On Thursday, President Donald Trump again stressed his desire for students to return to the classroom, the Times reported. Fauci is expected to offer reassurances that the federal government is moving quickly but safely, while Redfield will almost certainly be questioned about the CDC’s recent shift toward favoring reopening schools. The questions for Giroir will likely center on long delays in test results across the South, the Times reported. On the vaccine front, the final phases of testing for two potential COVID-19 vaccines were launched this week. In one trial, the first of 30,000 volunteers will be given either a vaccine developed by Moderna Inc. and the U.S. National Institutes of Health or a placebo shot, the…  read on >

As Hurricane Isaias moved toward the east coast of Florida on Friday, one expert warns that the coronavirus pandemic could make preparing for an active hurricane season even more challenging. The average hurricane season has about 12 named storms, but up to 20 storms are being predicted this season, according to Marshall Shepherd, director of the Atmospheric Sciences Program at the University of Georgia. “There’s a double whammy here in terms of the most vulnerable regions to both COVID and hurricanes,” Shepherd said in a university news release. “I think it’s probably more important than ever that people are thinking about the duality of the threat here.” He said that “the most useful aspect of these seasonal predictions is to really start to get people to think about what they would actually have to do if they needed to evacuate and perhaps go to a shelter and have to deal with COVID. I think that there is an extra layer of concern and an extra layer of forethought needed in how people prepare.” For one, it’s a good idea to add masks, hand sanitizer and disinfectant products to your emergency supply kit. Those items will be important if you have to evacuate to a shelter. Find out if your usual evacuation area is in a COVID-19 hotspot and, if it is, check for alternative locations,…  read on >

The White House coronavirus task force coordinator warned Americans on Sunday that the pandemic has entered a new stage where infections are far more widespread and face masks are crucial to curbing new COVID-19 cases. “What we are seeing today is different from March and April. It is extraordinarily widespread,” Birx told CNN. “So everybody who lives in a rural area, you are not immune.” She went so far as to advise people living in the growing number of places where cases are increasing to wear a face mask at home if they are living with someone who is vulnerable to severe COVID-19. “If you have an outbreak in your rural area or in your city, you need to really consider wearing a mask at home, assuming that you’re positive if you have individuals in your household with co-morbidities,” Birx told CNN. So far, July has been the worst month, with more than 1.9 million new coronavirus cases recorded. That is nearly 42 percent of the more than 4.6 million reported nationwide since the pandemic began and more than double the number recorded in any other month, data compiled by The New York Times shows. The previous monthly high came in April, when more than 880,000 new cases were recorded. Coronavirus deaths remain high — over 1,000 for six days in a row, the Times…  read on >