If Congress agrees to send another economic stimulus payment to you -- and there's no guarantee -- this is what we're hearing about how much money might actually arrive.
Months into the COVID-19 pandemic, wearing a cloth mask has become a wardrobe staple for most Americans. The CDC recommends them to prevent spread of the virus, especially for those who may be asymptomatic, carrying the virus without realizing it. Many retailers are selling non-medical masks, and many are touting masks with extra protection like insertable filters, which have become more popular — they can help further minimize airborne particulate. And, of course, masks are expanding into various styles, including face masks for kids and an entire universe of handmade face masks on Etsy. Another popular mask trend? Antimicrobial masks. Major retailers like Amazon and Etsy are selling antimicrobial masks — even biotechnology companies have even gotten in on the trend.
In Harris County, a mask order is in place that requires both employees and customers over the age of 10 to wear a face covering inside of businesses. With the new requirement, ABC13 asked Dr. Stacey Rose of Baylor College of Medicine which masks should people be wearing and how should they be worn to ensure effectiveness.
Washington Gov. Jay Inslee announced face coverings will be mandatory in public, both indoors and outdoors when it’s impossible to maintain 6 feet of physical distance from others.
Mask wearing has become a topic of fierce debate in the United States. People opposed to mask mandates have staged protests, and one local health official in Orange County, Calif., quit her job after receiving a death threat for a mask order. Not long after, California Gov. Gavin Newsom ordered Californians to wear face coverings in public.
It appears face masks are here to stay. The New York Times surveyed 511 epidemiologists and more than half of them predicted masks will be necessary for at least the next year, if not longer.
The new coronavirus spreads mainly via airborne transmission and wearing a mask is the most effective way to stop person-to person spread, according to a new study. A team of researchers in Texas and California compared Covid-19 infection rate trends in Italy and New York both before and after face masks were made mandatory. Both locations started to see infection rates flatten only after mandatory face mask measures were put in place, according to the study published Thursday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
The US economy is reopening gradually but America's joblessness crisis continues to roar on.
Americans who have been laid off from their jobs because of the coronavirus pandemic have been able to collect an additional $600 a week in unemployment benefits on top of what they get from their state. That extra relief was part of the $2.2 trillion stimulus package known as the CARES Act.
The Trump administration opposes a Democratic proposal to extend a $600 per week federal unemployment benefit approved in response to the coronavirus pandemic, Labor Secretary Eugene Scalia said Tuesday. The $600 payment, which is in addition to normal unemployment benefits, "was the right thing to do,'' Scalia said, but is no longer needed as the economy begins to recover.
No one wants to see another horrific milestone like the one reached this week. But armed with new knowledge about how coronavirus spreads, scientists say there are ways to help minimize future tragedies.
Since coronavirus lockdowns began in the US, most Americans have drastically changed their patterns: following instructions to stay home, limiting almost all contact with others, and venturing out only for essential trips and exercise.
When states had strict stay-at-home orders and lockdowns in place, many decisions about the risk of getting the coronavirus were simple. People didn’t have to think about whether dining in a restaurant is safe if the restaurant was closed.
In a medical research project nearly unrivaled in its ambition and scope, volunteers worldwide are rolling up their sleeves to receive experimental vaccines against the coronavirus — only months after the virus was identified.
On March 31, 2020, three researchers proposed a big idea to speed up the development of a vaccine for the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus (which causes Covid-19): directly exposing human volunteers to the virus.
Governments around the world are rolling back some of the most severe aspects of quarantine. After months of being cooped up and kept apart, friends and family will eventually begin to socialize again. Some workers will return to the office, and public spaces — from restaurants to movie theaters — will begin to implement strategies to make returning customers feel safe.
There was supposed to be a peak. But the stark turning point, when the number of daily COVID-19 cases in the U.S. finally crested and began descending sharply, never happened. Instead, America spent much of April on a disquieting plateau, with every day bringing about 30,000 new cases and about 2,000 new deaths. The graphs were more mesa than Matterhorn—flat-topped, not sharp-peaked. Only this month has the slope started gently heading downward.
Countries around the world are racing to develop software on mobile phones that could control the spread of coronavirus by alerting people if they have come into contact with anyone who has tested positive.
The discourse around wearing face masks has been confusing, to say the least: Back in February—when COVID-19 was still mainly confined to China, with just a few travel-based US cases—the CDC recommended face masks and respirators only for those in the health care industry who were coming into contact with potential cases. But after that, things changed: The novel coronavirus began sweeping across the US, and in April, the CDC started recommending the general public to wear cloth face masks for when social distancing wasn't an option.
Classes will take place in the fall—but how? There’s still no consensus on what next semester will be like. Not even close. This spring’s university closures have bought school leaders time to figure out how to introduce social distance into spaces designed to bring people together—classrooms, dining facilities, study lounges, and campus housing, to name a few. And although pivoting to online learning has likely helped slow the spread of the coronavirus in college towns, a meaningful solution to the crisis appears far off. Colleges cannot keep students away forever; their bottom lines can’t handle that financial pressure. Residence halls are scheduled to reopen for the fall semester three months from now.