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U.S. CDC reports 255,958 deaths from coronavirus

(Reuters) – The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Monday reported 12,175,921 cases of the new coronavirus, an increase of 147,840 from its previous count, and said that the number of deaths had risen by 882 to 255,958.

The CDC reported its tally of cases of the respiratory illness known as COVID-19, caused by a new coronavirus, as of 4 pm ET on Nov. 22 versus its previous report a day earlier.

The CDC figures do not necessarily reflect cases reported by individual states.

(Reporting by Dania Nadeem in Bengaluru; Editing by Devika Syamnath)

Despite COVID-19 travel warnings, many Americans ‘not living in fear’ ahead of Thanksgiving

By Daniel Trotta and Nathan Layne

(Reuters) – Millions of Americans appear to be defying health warnings and traveling ahead of the Thanksgiving holiday, likely exacerbating a surge in coronavirus infections before a series of promising new vaccines become widely available.

With U.S. COVID-19 infections hitting a record 168,000 per day on average, Americans are flocking to airports against the advice of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the U.S. surgeon general and Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation’s top infectious disease expert.

For Americans, the long holiday weekend, which begins on Thursday, is traditionally the busiest travel period of the year, and 2020 may prove to be no exception.

Some 1 million passengers passed through airport screenings on Sunday, the highest number since March. It was the second time in three days that passengers screened topped 1 million but screenings are down nearly 60% from the same time last year, the U.S. Transportation Security Administration said.

Meanwhile, the seven-day average number of U.S. COVID-19 deaths rose for a 12th straight day, reaching 1,500 as of Monday, according to a Reuters tally of official data.

That has further taxed already exhausted medical professionals, as coronavirus hospitalizations have surged nearly 50% over the past two weeks and the United States has surpassed 255,000 deaths and 12 million infections since the pandemic began.

Pleading with residents to stay home and avoid gatherings during the holiday season, Governor Andrew Cuomo reminded New Yorkers of the grim early days of the pandemic when as many as 800 people died in a single day in the state.

Hospitalizations have spiked 122% in New York state over the last three weeks, Cuomo said, prompting the re-opening of an emergency medical facility on Staten Island.

Help could arrive soon. The head of the U.S. campaign to rapidly deploy a vaccine said the first Americans could start receiving vaccinations as early as mid-December, and another global drug company on Monday unveiled promising trial results on a vaccine candidate.

“NOT LIVING IN FEAR”

Still, many Americans are refusing to follow the health advice that could save their lives.

In Pennsylvania, the number of COVID-19 tests coming back positive was 25% last week, according to data from The COVID Tracking Project. On Monday, Secretary of Health Dr. Rachel Levine warned that the latest models indicated the state could start to run out of intensive care unit beds within a week.

Linda Lafferty, a nurse and the owner of a bed and breakfast in McConnellsburg, said family and friends gathered on the first Sunday in November to celebrate, as they do every year because she and others often have to work on Thanksgiving Day.

But Lafferty said her family would have assembled if they could.

“We are not living in fear and if we were able to get together on Thanksgiving Day we absolutely would,” said Lafferty, 47. “We would still get together and we wouldn’t limit the number of folks because if you are family you are family.”

To be sure, many Americans said they would do their best to conform with health recommendations.

Donnalie Hope, a 78-year-old resident of Petersburg, West Virginia, is planning to make fresh cranberries, mash potatoes and her famous corn pudding for Thanksgiving, which she will spend with her daughter, who will be visiting, and a neighbor.

Hope said they would social distance as much as possible in her home, and that she planned to ready rubber gloves and hand sanitizer. She acknowledged that her guests might eventually take off their masks in the home.

“I’m trying very hard to comply with the regs because I want this country to get back to where it belongs,” she said.

(Reporting by Daniel Trotta and Nathan Layne; Additional reporting by Lisa Lambert, David Shepardson and Susan Heavey in Washington, Barbara Goldberg in Maplewood, New Jersey; Writing by Daniel Trotta and Maria Caspani; Editing by Bernadette Baum and Lisa Shumaker)

U.S. screens highest number of airline passengers since March

By David Shepardson

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. Transportation Security Administration said it screened 1.047 million passengers on Sunday, the highest number since mid-March.

The number of U.S. air travelers is still nearly 60% lower than the same date last year but Sunday was the second time in three days that passengers screened topped 1 million.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Thursday urged Americans not to travel during this week’s Thanksgiving holiday to mitigate the spread of the coronavirus as cases of COVID-19 spike around the United States.

There have been just three days since March 16 that the number of U.S. airline passengers screened topped 1 million, with the first being Oct. 18 when it was 1.031 million.

Delta Air Lines and Southwest Airlines have cautioned that the recent surge in COVID-19 cases may have a negative impact on travel over the winter holidays, a period the sector had hoped would see improved bookings.

U.S. airlines say travel demand remains down 62%, while international travel demand remains down more than 70%. Some officials think U.S. restrictions barring many non-U.S. citizens from arrival could be eliminated or reduced with new testing.

The CDC on Saturday said COVID-19 testing before and after international travel can reduce risk and “make travel safer by reducing spread on planes, in airports, and at destinations.”

On Wednesday, the chief executives of the seven largest U.S. airlines made a fresh plea for more payroll relief in a letter to congressional leaders.

American Airlines and United Airlines last month furloughed 32,000 workers.

The COVID-19 pandemic brought travel to a near halt earlier in the year, forcing airlines to scale back operations and seek government bailouts.

(Reporting by David Shepardson; Editing by Toby Chopra and Andrea Ricci)

U.S. officials worry about holiday spike as coronavirus surges

By Brendan O’Brien and Maria Caspani

CHICAGO (Reuters) – U.S. health authorities braced for further increases in COVID-19 infections, hospitalizations and deaths on Friday, capping a week in which the spread of the novel coronavirus accelerated ahead of next week’s Thanksgiving holiday.

The seven-day rolling average of new COVID-19 cases reached more than 165,000 on Thursday, while the seven-day average for deaths climbed to 1,359, more than any day since late May, according to a Reuters tally of public health data.

With hospitalizations rising across much of the nation, straining already exhausted medical staff, officials in more than 20 states have imposed restrictions to curtail the spread of the virus.

The White House Coronavirus Task Force coordinator, Dr. Deborah Birx, said the virus is spreading at a high rate across more than half the country and that Thanksgiving gatherings should be limited to immediate family members rather than a maximum number of people.

“I don’t like it to be any number… if you say it can be 10, and it’s eight people from four different families, then that probably is not the same degree of safe as 10 people from your immediate household,” Birx told CNN on Friday.

In a positive sign for combating the pandemic, Pfizer Inc. said it will apply to U.S. health regulators on Friday for emergency use authorization of its COVID-19 vaccine, the first such application in a major step toward providing protection against the virus.

Pfizer and German partner BioNTech SE this week reported final trial results that showed the vaccine was 95% effective in preventing COVID-19 with no major safety concerns.

If the data is solid, “we literally could be weeks away from the authorization of a 95% effective vaccine,” U.S. Health Secretary Alex Azar said on CBS’ “This Morning.”

California’s governor on Thursday imposed some of the most stringent restrictions on the vast majority of the state’s population, with a curfew on social gatherings and other non-essential activities that will start on Saturday night and end on the morning of Dec. 21.

“The virus is spreading at a pace we haven’t seen since the start of this pandemic, and the next several days and weeks will be critical to stop the surge,” Governor Gavin Newsom, a Democrat, said in a statement announcing the measure a week before the Thanksgiving holiday.

Similar restrictions took effect in Ohio this week, while Minnesota ordered a shutdown of restaurants, bars, fitness centers and entertainment venues from Friday until Dec. 18 at the earliest, as the state’s hospital intensive care units were stretched to capacity.

In Illinois, where the number of COVID-19 tests coming back positive was at an alarmingly high 20% and new restrictions, including a ban on indoor dining, took effect on Friday, long lines appeared again at testing sites.

In Chicago’s metro area, Emily Randall had no luck finding an opening to get tested after she woke up with a throbbing headache on Thursday.

“It’s very frustrating because I’m trying to be a responsible citizen,” said the 43-year-old research analyst. “My head feels a lot better but I am still worried because I have read stories of people who got better and then, all of a sudden, got worse.”

The number of patients hospitalized with COVID-19 in the United States has jumped nearly 50% in the past two weeks, with more than 80,000 people being treated for the disease in hospitals across the country as of late Thursday, a Reuters tally showed, the most at any time during the pandemic.

Daily COVID-19 deaths surpassed the 2,000 mark for the first time since late June on Thursday.

THANKSGIVING FEARS

U.S. officials have pleaded with the public to avoid unnecessary travel and exercise caution as the winter holidays of Thanksgiving and Christmas approach.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued a “strong recommendation” on Thursday that Americans refrain from traveling for the holiday.

Although COVID-19 restrictions have received more bipartisan support from state leaders in recent weeks, South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem, a Republican and close ally of President Donald Trump, refused to limit gatherings on Thanksgiving.

“In South Dakota, we won’t stop or discourage you from thanking God and spending time together this Thanksgiving,” Noem said in a statement on Friday.

With cases and deaths increasing steadily in most states, the University of Washington’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation updated its widely cited model.

It now projects 471,000 coronavirus deaths by March 1, up from less than 440,000 in its previous forecast.

In hard-hit Wisconsin, the state’s hospital association implored lawmakers to address the growing crisis by providing more resources to health care workers and facilities.

“With few tools available right now to curb spread other than increasingly urgent public appeals, our COVID numbers are growing rapidly and predict, quite accurately so far, a health care crisis in Wisconsin that without significant, swift, and unified action will become a catastrophe,” Wisconsin Hospital Association President and CEO Eric Borgerding wrote in a letter to legislators and the governor on Thursday.

(Reporting by Maria Caspani in New York and Brendan O’Brien in Chicago; additional reporting by Anurag Maan in Bengaluru, Sharon Bernstein in Sacramento and Steve Gorman in Los Angeles, California; Editing by Dan Grebler)

U.S. coronavirus wildfire hitting jobs as broad recovery trudges on

By Howard Schneider

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The most intense U.S. coronavirus outbreak yet appears to have slowed hiring and may have begun to drag on retail spending on the cusp of the holiday shopping season, even as overall economic activity proves more resilient than in the spring.

But that uneasy coexistence – wildfire-like spread of a deadly disease with an economy that remains largely open – may be tested in coming weeks if face mask mandates and lighter-touch restrictions imposed by local governments fail to curb the spread of COVID-19. Infections are growing by more than 1 million a week, according to data from the COVID Tracking Project, and the week-to-week percentage change is rising too.

Some local governments are taking more aggressive steps, with New York City again closing schools, and in a rare federal response from the “lame-duck” administration of President Donald Trump, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention urged Americans not to travel for next week’s Thanksgiving holiday, which typically sees tens of millions on the move.

Most states, though, are moving gingerly, curbing restaurant hours or seating capacity, but not shuttering nonessential businesses like during the early months of the U.S. outbreak in the spring.

Still, the surge in cases appears to have capped the U.S. economic rebound, according to high-frequency data tracked by economists for real-time evidence about the recovery.

Employment at a sample of mostly small businesses from time management firm Homebase declined for a fourth week, and shifts worked across different industries fell, according to time management firm UKG.

“The uncertainty that exists right now and has existed really since mid-summer is making it really hard for business owners to think about growth,” said David Gilbertson, UKG vice president for strategy and operations. “We seem to take one step forward, and then one step back.”

The decline in shifts from mid-October to mid-November likely points to a weakening jobs report in November, he said.

LOOKING ‘GRIM’

Since the spring’s catastrophic drop in employment, the economy has clawed back about half of the more than 20 million lost positions. But momentum is slowing, and last week the number of new claims for unemployment insurance rose for the first time in about a month.

An index of new job postings from analytics firm Chmura as of August had reached a high of 85% of the level predicted in the absence of the pandemic, but is now at 67%.

Workers may be in for a “grim” period, said AnnElizabeth Konkel, economist at Indeed Hiring Lab, whose index of job postings remains 13% below 2019 levels. Holiday hiring is largely complete, and unemployment benefits are expiring for many of those out of work since the spring, a lapse that may finally be weighing on national data.

Initially, the flood of government support increased incomes for many families and supported consumer spending. Data on 30 million JPMorgan debit- and credit-card customers, however, showed spending fell “notably” in early November from a level just 2.7% below 2019 to 7.4% below last year, said JPMorgan economist Jesse Edgerton.

Declines were sharper in places where COVID-19 was spreading more rapidly but were still widespread, suggesting “a broader pullback in spending,” Edgerton wrote. U.S. retail sales in October also grew less than expected.

That and other data indicate an outright decline in jobs in November versus October, Edgerton said, evidence that millions left jobless by the pandemic face a long road back to normal.

SOME IMPROVEMENTS

Vaccine prospects, however, “represent a ray of light at the end of the tunnel,” said Gregory Daco, chief U.S. economist at Oxford Economics. Oxford recovery tracker rose slightly last week, snapping a five-week skid, a sign that the scale of economic collapse seen in the spring is not in the offing.

Data from OpenTable showed a slight rise in diners seated at restaurants over the past week even as new limits were imposed.

Some Federal Reserve officials have noted how businesses, particularly in manufacturing, construction and some parts of the retail sector, have adapted to operating during the pandemic. A New York Fed weekly index projecting growth in gross domestic product has risen steadily since the recession began.

But Oxford’s index and other data have also remained largely stalled, well below pre-pandemic levels. Data tracking cellphone movement from Unacast, for example, has shown no upward trend since summer.

That may remain the case until vaccines are rolled out to enough people to make a difference.

Meanwhile, “the recovery is becoming entrenched in a low-growth mode, and we are worried about signs of lasting economic damage,” Daco wrote.

(Reporting by Howard Schneider; Editing by Dan Burns and Paul Simao)

U.S. disease experts: Don’t travel for Thanksgiving

By Rebecca Spalding and Manojna Maddipatla

(Reuters) – The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Thursday urged Americans not to travel during next week’s Thanksgiving holiday to mitigate the spread of the coronavirus as cases of COVID-19 spike around the United States.

The travel advice is a “strong recommendation,” not a requirement, CDC official Henry Walke said on a call with reporters. The federal agency said it was making the recommendation after many states across the country experienced a surge in coronavirus cases in recent weeks.

“We’re alarmed with the exponential increase in cases, hospitalizations, and deaths,” Walke said.

The CDC advised against gathering with anyone who has not lived in the same household for at least 14 days, the incubation period for the coronavirus. Officials said they were also posting recommendations on their website on how to stay safe during the holidays for those Americans who do choose to travel.

“It is the right advice. We are in a major surge in the U.S. with hospitals inundated,” Dr. Amesh Adalja, senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security, said at a Reuters forum. “There are some that will travel nonetheless, but, hopefully, they will put in place some common-sense measures to limit the damage the virus can cause.”

While the CDC recommended virtual gatherings, for those who do gather in person, guests should bring their own food and utensils and celebrate outdoors if possible, it said.

If celebrating indoors, it recommends that Americans open windows and put fans in front of open windows to pull fresh air into the room where guests are sitting. It also suggests limiting the number of people near where food is being prepared.

The Wednesday before Thanksgiving is typically the busiest travel day of the year in the United States, as Americans gather with friends and family around the country. Shares in airlines and hotel companies have plummeted since the outbreak began as government officials have advised against unnecessary travel.

The AAA travel agency has said it anticipates at least a 10 percent drop in the number of travelers this Thanksgiving, the largest single-year drop since 2008. Based on its October models, it forecasts 50 million Americans will travel for the holiday, compared with 55 million in 2019.

With the CDC recommendations, it expects that number now to be even lower.

United Airlines, American Airlines and Southwest Airlines each said on Thursday that bookings were weakening due to the spike in COVID-19 cases, and United said cancellations were rising.

(Reporting by Rebecca Spalding, Tracy Rucinski, David Shepardson and Lisa Pauline Mattackal; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama, Jonathan Oatis and Peter Henderson)

U.S. CDC reports 242,216 deaths from coronavirus

(Reuters) – The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Friday reported 10,508,864 cases of the novel coronavirus, an increase of 194,610 cases from its previous count, and said that the number of deaths had risen by 1,147 to 242,216.

The CDC reported its tally of cases of the respiratory illness known as COVID-19 as of 4 p.m. ET on Nov. 12, compared with its previous report released a day earlier.

The CDC figures do not necessarily reflect cases reported by individual states.

(Reporting by Mrinalika Roy in Bengaluru; Editing by Aditya Soni)

Measles surging as COVID-19 curbs disrupt vaccinations

By Kate Kelland

LONDON (Reuters) – Measles surged to infect almost 870,000 people across the world in 2019, the worst figures in almost a quarter of a century as vaccination levels fell below critical levels, a report said on Thursday.

Millions of children are at risk of the disease again this year as restrictions imposed to contain the COVID-19 pandemic further disrupt immunization programs, the report co-led by the World Health Organization (WHO) said.

Measles is one of the most contagious known diseases – more so than COVID-19, Ebola, tuberculosis or flu.

More than 207,000 people died of it last year alone, the report found. With immunization coverage below the critical 95% needed for community protection, infections rose in all WHO regions last year to the worst levels since 1996, it said.

“These data send a clear message that we are failing to protect children from measles in every region of the world,” the WHO’s Director-General, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, said in a statement.

The surge in fatal cases means global measles deaths have risen nearly 50% since 2016.

The report, co-led by the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), cited a collective failure to fully immunize children on time with two doses of measles vaccine as the main driver of the deadly increases.

Looking ahead to 2020, the report warned that disruptions to vaccination due to the COVID-19 pandemic have crippled efforts to curb measles outbreaks.

As of this month, more than 94 million people were at risk of missing measles vaccinations due to paused immunization campaigns in 26 countries, it said.

“COVID-19 has resulted in dangerous declines in immunization coverage,” Seth Berkley, chief executive of the GAVI global vaccine alliance, said.

He described the “alarming” measles report was “a warning that, with the COVID-19 pandemic occupying health systems across the world, we cannot afford to take our eye off the ball.”

After steady downward progress from 2010 to 2016, measles cases began rising again from 2017. The report said there were a total of 869,770 measles cases, with 207,500 deaths, in 2019.

WHO and the UN children’s fund UNICEF urged governments last week to act now to prevent epidemics of measles, polio and other infectious diseases.

(Reporting by Kate Kelland, editing by Andrew Heavens)

Explainer – Shot in the dark: Early COVID-19 vaccine efficacy explained

By John Miller

ZURICH (Reuters) – This week has seen a flurry of good news from COVID-19 vaccine developers, with Pfizer Inc. and BioNTech SE trumpeting early data indicating their mRNA candidate is more than 90% effective.

A Russian project came out a day later, touting 92% efficacy for the Sputnik V candidate, named after the Soviet-era satellite, based on a smaller data set.

HOW DO MANUFACTURERS ARRIVE AT EFFICACY NUMBERS?

In Pfizer’s case, it waited until 94 volunteers in its late-stage clinical trial of more than 43,500 people – half got the vaccine, the other half got a placebo – tested positive after developing symptoms.

For 90%-plus efficacy, no more than eight people among those who tested positive had received the vaccine, with the rest having received the placebo.

“Roughly speaking, it’s probably around eight to 86 cases in the treated and placebo groups,” David Spiegelhalter, a Cambridge professor of risk and an expert in statistics, told Reuters.

“You don’t need a lot of fancy statistical analysis to show that this is deeply impressive. It just hits you between the eyes.”

In Russia, Sputnik V-developer Gamaleya Institute reached its preliminary 92% efficacy figure based on 20 illnesses in 16,000 volunteers as its late-stage trial progresses. It aims to reach 40,000 people.

Of the 16,000 people, about quarter got the placebo.

“It suggests that there is some effect, but it’s insufficient to estimate the magnitude of it,” Spiegelhalter said.

HOW MANY PEOPLE MUST GET SICK IN BIG VACCINE TRIALS?

Some experts say that, ideally, 150 to 160 people in a trial of tens of thousands of participants must get sick before making a reliable assessment of a vaccine’s efficacy. That’s a bit of a rule of thumb, though, open to interpretation.

“There is no such regulatory standard requiring X number of events for making a reliable decision,” the government-funded Swiss Clinical Trial Organization said. “The amount of (infections) has to be seen in relation to the disease and its risk profile. It’s rather a case-by-case evaluation.”

Typically, regulators strive to have at least 95% certainty that the trial read-out is not the result of random variations with nothing to do with the tested compound.

For trial sponsors there is safety in numbers as a large enough trial can ensure that 95% reliability hurdle is cleared. But the larger the underlying clinical benefit, the fewer trial participants needed to create that clarity.

In Pfizer and BioNTech’s trial, they planned a final analysis when 164 people had become sick, with multiple, pre-planned interim analyses along the way. They skipped an analysis at 32 patients, and once they were ready to release a look at the 62-person mark, 94 had come down sick.

Details from the Russian trial are unclear, without access to its protocol.

HOW DO THESE RESULTS STACK UP TO OTHER DRUGS, OR VACCINES FOR OTHER ILLNESSES?

In normal drug trials, for diseases like terminal cancer, benefits of new medicines may be less apparent, with survival benefits of just a few months sometimes revolutionary for patients at death’s door.

For vaccines, however, marginal protection is inadequate, and the World Health Organization ideally wants to see at least 70% efficacy in trials, while the U.S. Food and Drug Administration wants at least 50%.

The 90% efficacy reported in the Pfizer and Russian trials beats those, and appears to exceed that of typical flu vaccines, which the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimate reduce the risk of sickness by 40%-60%.

For other shots, the CDC estimates the efficacy of a two-shot measles vaccine at 97%, and a two-dose chicken pox vaccine at 90%. Two doses of polio vaccine are 90% effective, rising to nearly 100% with a third.

CAN WE EXPECT EFFICACY RATES TO HOLD UP AS TRIALS ADVANCE?

Pfizer acknowledged on Monday that its final vaccine efficacy percentage may vary. Still, Spiegelhalter said the study’s design seems likely to generally hold up, based on the 94 sick participants.

“In this case, the effect is so huge, even if there is a little bit of fallback – if the effects become slightly smaller over time – that is very unlikely to be significant.”

WHAT ABOUT REAL-WORLD EFFICACY, SHOULD THE VACCINES BE APPROVED?

The interim data is promising, since it appears to demonstrate that a vaccine can be effective in preventing COVID-19.

The jump to mass vaccinations, however, presents new hurdles, in particular for an mRNA vaccine like Pfizer and BioNTech’s that must be stored and shipped at minus 70 degrees Celsius (-94°F).

Moreover, the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine requires two doses, ideally 21 days apart. If people do not stick to the timetable, it may affect the vaccine’s efficacy.

Protection against the mumps, for instance, drops from nearly 90% to 78%, if people don’t get a follow-up shot.

Swiss epidemiologist Marcel Tanner, president of Switzerland’s Academies of Arts and Sciences and one of the government’s top COVID-19 science advisers, expects possible variations in efficacy among older people, whose immune systems wane with time, or those with immune disorders.

“Efficacy says, ‘Does it work?’ Effectiveness says, ‘Can it be applied? Can you carry the efficacy to the people?'” Tanner said. “But no question: 90% efficacy, at that stage, is a pretty good result.”

(Reporting by John Miller in Zurich, Kate Kelland in London, Ankur Banerjee in Bengaluru, Julie Steenhuysen in Chicago and Polina Ivanova in Moscow; Editing by Josephine Mason and Nick Macfie)

U.S. CDC reports 234,264 deaths from coronavirus

(Reuters) – The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Friday reported 9,581,770 cases of the new coronavirus, an increase of 117,988 cases from its previous count, and said that the number of deaths had risen by 1,135 to 234,264.

The CDC reported its tally of cases of the respiratory illness known as COVID-19, caused by a new coronavirus, as of 4 pm ET on Nov. 5 versus its previous report a day earlier.

The CDC figures do not necessarily reflect cases reported by individual states.

(Reporting by Dania Nadeem in Bengaluru; Editing by Aditya Soni)