Coronavirus

Little Rock’s ABC affiliate reports: Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders has officially signed Senate Bill 189 into law, granting approval for the sale and purchase of ivermectin for human use without a prescription. The new legislation, signed into law on Tuesday, allows ivermectin suitable for human consumption to be sold over-the-counter in Arkansas, making it accessible to individuals without the need …

Politico reports: The Trump administration is shuttering HHS’ long Covid office as part of its reorganization, according to an internal email seen by POLITICO. The email was sent Monday by Ian Simon, the head of the Office of Long Covid Research and Practice. It said the closing is part of the Department of Health and Human Services’ reorganization. One HHS …

NBC News reports: Since the World Health Organization characterized Covid as a pandemic on March 11, 2020, scientists don’t fully understand why some people develop disabling chronic conditions after the initial viral infection. The U.S. may be coming through the first post-pandemic winter without a major surge in cases, but each infection carries a risk of developing long Covid. Some …

Axios reports: The federal government’s free at-home COVID test distribution program has been suspended and is no longer accepting orders. “The free at-home COVID-19 test distribution program is not currently accepting orders,” the COVIDTests.gov website said Monday. “Tests ordered before 8:00 PM EDT, Sunday, March 9, 2025, will be shipped,” the site states. The USPS website for ordering the free …

The Washington Post reports: The CIA said Saturday that it now favors a Chinese laboratory leak as the mostly likely origin of the coronavirus pandemic, the latest development in the still-simmering debate over the virus and the nation’s response. Several other intelligence agencies continue to favor the natural-origin theory, and there is no evidence SARS-CoV-2, the virus behind the pandemic, …

CNN reports: In the week ending December 21, there was nearly three times as much Covid-19 circulating in the US than there was during the week ending December 7, CDC data shows. This surge happened in all regions of the country, but there has been a particularly sharp uptick in the Midwest, where Covid-19 levels are nearly twice as high …

The New York Times reports: A House subcommittee has referred former Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo of New York to the Justice Department for potential prosecution, accusing him of lying to Congress about his involvement in a state Covid report on nursing home deaths. Mr. Cuomo was accused of engaging in a “conscious, calculated effort” to avoid accountability for his handling …

Via press release from the CDC: Today, CDC Director Mandy Cohen endorsed the CDC Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices’ (ACIP) recommendation for people 65 years and older and those who are moderately or severely immunocompromised to receive a second dose of 2024-2025 COVID-19 vaccine six months after their first dose. These updated recommendations also allow for flexibility for additional doses …

NBC News reports: Fresh off of a jam-packed week of Democratic National Convention events, reports of attendees’ testing positive for Covid are rolling in. They include members of Vice President Kamala Harris’ campaign staff, who are now contending with sickness from Covid. There is at least some concern the developments could affect staffing at events this week. Since the convention …

Axios reports: The federal government plans to relaunch its free COVID-19 home testing program at the end of September after suspending the program in March. The Biden administration’s announcement Friday comes as the number of COVID infections grows in a summertime surge. The Food & Drug Administration approved new formulations of both Moderna and the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccines on Thursday. …

NBC News reports: The Food and Drug Administration on Thursday approved the new Covid vaccine from Pfizer and Moderna. It’s the third time the vaccines have been updated to match circulating strains since the original series. The shots should be available within days. The agency hasn’t yet approved a third vaccine, from drugmaker Novavax. The timing of the new vaccines …

From the Justice Department: A United States District Court Judge sentenced a Utah County man Monday, who posed as a fake doctor, to three years’ imprisonment and one year of supervised release after he scammed consumers looking to heal a variety of ailments, including Coronavirus. In March, on the second day of trial, Gordon Hunter Pedersen, 64, of Cedar Hills, …

Axios reports: The summer’s COVID-19 wave is continuing, with the latest wastewater surveillance data detecting “high” virus activity levels across the majority of the U.S. and “very high” levels in 19 states, per Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data. The virus is especially prevalent across the western U.S. and the South, in particular a region that includes New Mexico, …

Ars Technica reports: As a summer wave of COVID-19 infections swells once again, a study published this week in the New England Journal of Medicine offers some positive news about the pandemic disease. Rates of long COVID have declined since the beginning of the health crisis, with rates falling from a high of 10.4 percent before vaccines were available to …

Via press release from the White House: The President presented with upper respiratory symptoms, to include rhinorhea (runny nose) and non-productive cough, with general mailaise. He felt okay for his first event of the day, but given that he was not feeling better, point of care testing for COVID-19 was conducted, and the results were positive for the COVID-19 virus. …

CBS News reports: Rates of COVID-19 have surged in Florida emergency rooms over recent weeks, according to new figures from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and are now near peaks not seen since the worst days of this past winter’s wave of the virus. The weekly average of emergency room patients with COVID-19 has reached 2.64% in Florida, …

“I felt very uncomfortable when he was saying it was going to disappear like magic, it’s just going to go away because he so desperately wanted it to disappear the way flu disappears as you enter the end of the winter and the beginning of the spring. “And that’s when I had to publicly get up, which was very uncomfortable …

Gothamist reports: Gov. Kathy Hochul says she is exploring at least a partial ban on masks in the New York City subway system after images and videos of masked anti-Israel protesters on a train ricocheted around social media earlier this week. Hochul said she has started discussions with Mayor Eric Adams and state lawmakers about what a mask crackdown would …

The New York Times reports: Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, the former government scientist both celebrated and despised for his work on Covid, returned to Capitol Hill on Monday for a reunion with some of his fiercest antagonists: members of a Republican-led House panel who accuse him of helping to set off the worst pandemic in a century. Republicans on the …

USA Today reports: A new set of COVID-19 variants, nicknamed FLiRT, has been detected in wastewater surveillance, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. From April 14 through April 27, the variant, labeled KP.2, makes up about 25% of the cases in the United States, according to the CDC. Megan L. Ranney, dean of the Yale …