September 28 coronavirus news

Citing "sufficient progress in the fight against Covid-19," Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot announced the easing of phase four guidelines for businesses starting Oct. 1.  

Restaurants will be allowed to expand indoor capacity to 40%, bars can reopen for indoor service, and may serve until 1 a.m, according to a news release. Class sizes for fitness and after-school programs will be allowed to expand and personal services that require the removal of a mask allowed to resume.  

The city has issued additional guidelines for businesses and customers:

Kenya will extend its nightly Covid-19 curfew for another 60 days with shortened hours from 11 p.m. to 4 a.m. local time, but bars and the sale of alcohol in ordinary eateries will be permitted effective Tuesday, President Uhuru Kenyatta said in a televised address on Monday. 

"The Covid positivity rate has fallen from 13% in June, 7% in August and is now at 4.4% in September," President Kenyatta said. 

The size of public gatherings for weddings and funerals will also be allowed to increase. 

"The possibility of a second wave is real," President Kenyatta said as he urged Kenyans to maintain caution and continue preventative measures in this "new normal."

The nationwide curfew was previously from 9 p.m. — 4 a.m. local time.

“Myrtle Beach Bike Week,” an annual fall motorcycle rally, is underway Sept. 28 through Oct. 4 outside of city limits in Horry County, South Carolina. This year, the event required a special waiver from the state — all events with more than 250 people require such a waiver. 

One of the organizers of the event, Sonny Copeland, is located in North Carolina. Copeland told CNN the event actually spans 70 miles and often sees up to 25,000 people across the entire journey throughout the week.

When asked about special protocols during Covid-19, Copeland said he tells people to “use common sense,” and that mask wearing is up to the individual.

“I think people are smart enough to take care of themselves,” Copeland said.

But Alex Clark, director of marketing and communications for the South Carolina Department of Commerce, said no event would be granted a waiver without including plans for the requirement of face coverings in accordance to local ordinances. The approved event on South Carolina’s website is listed as having social distancing and face mask requirements.

Clark said the application for the South Carolina event waiver shows both indoors and outdoors activity. She told CNN the indoor capacity limit is 300, while the outdoor portion will be hosted on 2.43 acres, holding approximately 2,900 safely, with 6-foot social distancing at all times.

Kelly Moore, director of public information in Horry County, SC, said the county has issued two special event permits to businesses. This is fewer than the five permits issued for the same event last year.

Horry County, SC does have a face covering ordinance, which states that a person who fails to comply shall be guilty of a civil infraction, punishable by a fee of $25.00 for a first offense, $50.00 for a second offense, and $100.00 for a third and subsequent offense.

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New York state is making 200 rapid testing machines immediately available Monday to the top zip codes with the highest percentage positivity for Covid-19, Gov. Andrew Cuomo said.

The public and private schools in those zip codes are strongly encouraged to request a rapid testing machine, which can do four tests per hour, and start testing students.

“The key with these clusters is to jump on them quickly, attack them from all sides, get the testing so you can do contact tracing and you can isolate, get mask compliance up, hand sanitizer, and gathering compliance bars restaurants, et cetera,” he said. 

The state will contact local government and schools but to accelerate this plan the governor is calling on local governments to contact the state. 

The top 20 of the states total 1,769 zip codes in the state have an infection rate of about 10%, the governor said.

The infection rate in the top 10 zip codes is about 15%. Those top 10 zip codes represents 2.9% of the state’s population and 25% of the cases.

Among those referenced by the governor explicitly:

#Hotspots##

United Airlines has agreed to not furlough any of its pilots until at least next June, according to a union email obtained by CNN. United planned to furlough 2,850 of its 13,000 pilots in only three days when CARES Act pandemic payroll support expires.

Some context: CNN analysis finds at least 50,000 airline workers are facing furloughs that start on Thursday. Airline CEOs and labor groups are lobbying Congress for a six-month extension of the Payroll Support Program costing $28 billion.

The incidence of Covid-19 among adolescents appears to be much higher than what's seen among younger children, according to a new report from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The report, published on Monday, found the average weekly incidence of Covid-19 among adolescents ages 12 to 17 between May and September was about 37 cases per 100,000 children—nearly double the 19 cases per 100,000 children ages 5 to 11.

"Although mortality and hospitalization in school-aged children was low, Hispanic ethnicity, Black race, and underlying conditions were more commonly reported among children who were hospitalized or admitted to an ICU, providing additional evidence that some children might be at increased risk for severe illness associated with COVID-19," the report said.

More on this report: The report included data on 277,285 laboratory-confirmed Covid-19 cases among school-aged children in the United States from March 1 to Sept. 19. Among those cases, 37% were in children ages 5 to 11 and 63% were in adolescents. 

The report also noted that the weekly incidence and percentage of positive Covid-19 tests among the school-aged patients appeared to vary over time and by region.

Overall, 58% of the patients reported at least one Covid-19 symptom, 5% reported no symptoms and information was missing or unknown for the rest of the cases. The data also showed that 1.2% were hospitalized, including 404 patients who required ICU admission and 51 patients who died of Covid-19.

At least one underlying health condition was reported for 3% of all the cases, such as asthma, diabetes, psychological conditions, cardiovascular disease and severe obesity, according to the report.

The data might underestimate the true incidence of disease among school-aged children, as testing was often prioritized for people with symptoms and those without symptoms may not have been tested as often, the researchers noted.

Yet overall, the CDC researchers wrote, "These findings can provide a baseline for monitoring national trends."

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo extended residential tenant eviction protections amid the pandemic through Jan. 1.

The “Safe Harbor Act” protects tenants from Covid-19 related residential evictions and foreclosures. 

Commercial eviction protection had already been extended, he said. 

The World Health Organization announced an agreement to make rapid Covid-19 tests available to lower and middle income countries across the world.

During a Monday news conference, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO director-general said, “a substantial proportion of this rapid tests — 120 million — will be made available to low and middle income countries. These tests provide reliable results in approximately 15 to 30 minutes, rather than hours or days, at a lower price, with less sophisticated equipment.” 

Tedros said these “vital” tests will help expand testing in remote areas, “that do not have lab facilities or enough trained health workers to carry out PCR tests.”  

Peter Sands, executive director of the Global Fund said, “Being able to deploy quality antigen RDTs, rapid diagnostic tests, will be a significant step forward in enabling countries to contain and combat Covid-19.”  

The tests are “not a silver bullet,” Sands said. “But hugely valuable as a complement to PCR tests.”  

“Although they're a bit less accurate — they're much faster, cheaper, and don't require a lab,” he explained. 

Sands said these tests will help low and middle income countries to “close the dramatic gap in testing between rich and poor countries.” 

“Right now, high-income countries are conducting 292 tests per day per 100,000 people. For upper middle income countries, that number is 77. For lower middle income countries, 61, and from low income countries, 14,” Sands said, though he did not expand on where that data originates. 

On the eve of the in-person start date for the remaining majority of New York City school kids, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo said that the state will be receiving daily testing numbers from schools and will act accordingly if the numbers show there is a problem.

“We are going to be getting daily testing numbers, so we’ll be able to tell on a day to day basis what is actually happening with the test in NYC schools both with the teachers and the pupils,” he said. 

“If there’s a problem, there is a problem, and the numbers will show that there’s a problem, and then we’ll act accordingly," Cuomo said.

On Sunday, New York City's principals and school administrators union declared a unanimous vote of "no confidence" in the mayor and schools chancellor and requested the city leaders to ask the New York State Education Department to intervene in the schools reopening plan.

Cuomo was asked if there was any specific scenario wherein the state department of education would take over. 

“We could act below 5% if the circumstances justified it,” he added. “If you saw what we’re seeing now with this Brooklyn cluster, we have to get to the bottom of that. But the data is key and we’ll act on the data.”

He reiterated he understood the concerns of the principals union, adding “look if they are right and there’s a health concern, then yes the state will act.”

“The state has overall jurisdiction over all these things and we’ve exercised it in the past as you know, and we’ll do it again," Cuomo said.