Coronavirus pandemic in the US

Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds announced today that 77 of the state's 99 counties can reopen restaurants, fitness centers, retail stores and enclosed malls at 50% capacity beginning May 1.

Reynolds also said that she is lifting the ban on religious gatherings of more than 10 people. 

This approach takes "a targeted approach to loosening restrictions" and focuses on counties "where there is no virus activity or where virus activity has been consistently low and shown a downward trend," Reynolds said.

Counties where Covid-19 activity is higher will have their closures extended through May 15, the governor said.

She added that business and churches approved for reopening "must also adhere to social distancing, hygiene, public health measures, and business guidelines from the department of public health" to reduce the spread of Covid-19.

Reynolds also said that restaurants will have to keep tables at least six feet apart and limit the number of people that can be at a table. 

An additional $130 million in funding will be allocated to Massachusetts' nursing homes and long-term care facilities to implement coronavirus precautions, Gov. Charlie Baker said.

The money will be used for additional staff, personal protective equipment and cleaning and disinfecting of the facilities, he said.

Baker also announced that all residents and staff in the commonwealth’s nursing homes and long-term care facilities will now be tested for coronavirus as part of new mandatory criteria.

Baker also said additional guidelines including procedures for infection control and mandates on personal protective equipment in facilities will be implemented. The facilities will be audited to make sure they are meeting the requirements, Baker said.

New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy said while it’s too early to tell whether reopening will be on a regional or statewide basis, he prefers the latter.

“My bias will be leaning toward making state decisions — statewide decisions," he said, adding “unless we see a real unique reason to do otherwise, or unless we see a really bifurcated reality in terms of the virus and its impact on the state.”

The reopening will begin in work places and venues where the state has a “high degree of confidence” that social distancing and other related norms can be effectively executed.

While Murphy did not have a clear picture of what would come back online first, he mentioned the “food chain” and other essential elements. He added that as much as he loves music, concerts are not going to be coming back “anytime soon.” 

Murphy noted that some decisions will likely be made in harmony with other states, giving the example that he does not imagine that a restaurant in Jersey City, New Jersey, would have a different protocol than one on the lower west side of Manhattan.

Dr. Maria Van Kerkhove, the technical lead for the coronavirus response with the World Health Organization, said there isn’t enough research yet to determine if someone is immune to Covid-19 once they recover from the virus.

"At the present time, four months into this pandemic, we’re not able to say that an antibody response means that someone is immune," Van Kerkhove said.

Van Kerkhove said officials expect that people infected with Covid-19 will have some level of protection. "What we don’t know right now is, how strong that protection is and if that’s seen in everybody that is infected, and for how long that lasts," she said.

Early results from several countries “suggest that a large proportion of the population remains susceptible," Van Kerkhove said. She added that it is "an important feature because that means that there still are people that this virus can infect."

There have been at least 972,969 cases of coronavirus in the US and at least 55,118 people have died, according to a tally from Johns Hopkins University.

On Monday, Johns Hopkins reported 7,184 new cases and 237 reported deaths. 

The totals include cases from all 50 states, the District of Columbia and other US territories, as well as repatriated cases.

The US Food and Drug Administration authorized a coronavirus antibody test from Abbott Laboratories on Sunday, bringing the total number of FDA-authorized antibody tests to eight.

The Abbott test looks for a class of antibodies – called IgG antibodies – that are produced in the later stages of infection. Other tests can detect antibodies produced earlier.

“A negative result may occur if you are tested early in your illness and your body hasn’t had time to produce antibodies to infection,” the FDA wrote in a fact sheet accompanying the Abbott test

Still, the new test could be useful in identifying who has been previously infected with coronavirus, even if they showed little or no symptoms at the time.

The importance of antibodies: Most experts believe that people who have recovered from the virus will have some sort of protection against re-infection, but it’s unclear how strong immunity might be or how long it might last.

“We expect that most people who are infected with #COVID19 will develop an antibody response that will provide some level of protection,” the World Health Organization wrote in a series of tweets Saturday.

“What we don't yet know is the level of protection or how long it will last," another tweet said.

Read the WHO's tweets:

While some states are already allowing certain businesses to reopen, Wisconsin extended its stay-at-home order until May 26.

"Part of the criteria [to reopen] is making sure we have adequate testing so we can get about 80,000 tests per week," Wisconsin Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes said. "We don't have that yet.

With this testing capacity, the state can build contact tracing and find out where the concentration of outbreaks are. This would help get the virus under control, Barnes said.

Barnes said the coronavirus crisis has highlighted the need for Medicare for All as the state remains under stay-at-home orders, forcing businesses to stay closed and pushing more people on unemployment rolls.

"People had health insurance plans they liked and they thought they could keep it. Unfortunately, a lot of people haven't been able to keep their jobs in the middle of this crisis. So health care in America is something we need to be working on as a whole," he added.

Farmers will have to kill tens of thousands of pigs a day because of closed processing facilities across the country, House Agriculture Chairman Collin Peterson said Monday.

Peterson said the nation's pork supply is now at serious risk because of the coronavirus pandemic.

With three of the nation's largest pork processing plants temporarily shut down, Peterson said that farmers now have a massive oversupply of pigs that must be euthanized — estimating that there are roughly 60,000 to 70,000 pigs a day that need to be killed in order to make space at farms. 

This has created a logistical nightmare for farmers to figure out a way to move the pigs from their locations to other facilities, where they can be euthanized and then to find places to dispose of the carcasses, Peterson said.

"It’s just not easy to kill that many pigs and then find out what to do with them," Peterson told CNN.

Peterson predicted this move will have a serious impact on the nation's food supply, saying Americans could experience a significant shortage in pork in grocery stores by next week.

Peterson said that he is having bipartisan talks with leaders of the House and Senate Agriculture panels to authorize more funding for the Agriculture Department's Commodity Credit Corporation, which distributes aid to farmers.

Peterson predicted without aid and if they can't get some of the plants up and running again, "hundreds of farmers could go bankrupt."

Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker said today 56% of the state’s coronavirus deaths have come in nursing homes and long-term care facilities.

Baker said at least 10,031 residents and staff at those facilities have tested positive for coronavirus.