March 9 coronavirus news

Once the Covid-19 pandemic is over in the United States, the country will have a large number of people disabled from the virus who need help, Dr. Ashish Jha, dean of the Brown University School of Public Health, said Tuesday. 

Speaking to a Senate committee hearing on Covid-19 response, Jha said he found it frustrating that the focus on mortality rates and push for herd immunity did not take into account the chronic effects of Covid-19 in some who were infected. 

“When our President declares the public health emergency over, we are going to find a large number of Americans with substantial disability from this virus, from this infection,” Jha said. “The cost of that, human and financial, is going to be long-term. And we’re going to have to manage that as a country.”

Scotland will ease some lockdown restrictions and limits on outdoor meetings and activities on Friday, First Minister Nicola Sturgeon announced on Tuesday.

Up to four adults from two households will be able to meet in any outdoor space, including private gardens, under the updated rules. 

Changes to outdoor meetings for 12- to 17-year-olds will mean four friends from four different families can meet outdoors, she said.

Outdoor non-contact sports and organized group exercise will be permitted for all adults in groups of up to 15 people as of Friday, Sturgeon said.

She said the changes will mean a return to communal worship for upcoming Jewish, Christian, Muslim and Hindu and Sikh holidays starting on March 26, when the limit on attendance will be increased from 20 to 50, with six feet of physical distancing. 

“This is in time for Passover, Easter, Ramadan and Vaisakhi,” Sturgeon said. "I know that the restrictions on communal worship have been really difficult for many people, despite the exceptional — quite exceptional — efforts made by faith groups to reach out to their communities.”

Current guidance in mainland Scotland is to stay at home, except for essential purposes. Scotland, like Wales and Northern Ireland, sets its coronavirus rules independently from the UK government.

Plans to set out a firm timeline for reopening the economy, including shops, hairdressers, gyms, and parts of the tourism sector, will be announced next week. 

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo just announced that residents ages 60 and up can get vaccinated against coronavirus starting tomorrow morning.

Previously, only residents 65 and up, as well as some essential workers and some people with certain underlying conditions, were eligible for the vaccine.

Watch Gov. Cuomo:

It's just before noon on Tuesday in the US, where more than 29 million cases of coronavirus have been reported since the pandemic began.

If you're just reading in, here's what you need to know about the pandemic to start your day:

The $1.9 trillion Covid-19 relief bill has finally been sent to the House after a lengthy procedural process, according to a Democratic aide familiar with the matter. 

The House will give final passage to the bill Wednesday morning, according to a Democratic leadership aide. The House Rules Committee will take up the rule today, and the House will approve the rule governing floor debate tonight, the aide said.

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer said he expects the rule to be adopted “late this afternoon,” with a vote to consider the package tomorrow at 9 a.m. ET.

House Democratic Caucus Chair Hakeem Jeffries, meanwhile, called the Covid-19 relief bill “transformative.”

When pressed whether Democrats were taking a victory lap too early, and whether he was confident that the bill would clear the House with the Senate’s changes in it, Jeffries was bullish.

“I’m 110% confident,” he said. “And we’ll pass it hopefully with some Republican votes although, you know, that remains to be seen. What’s perplexing to a lot of us is that the American Rescue Plan is bipartisan across the country.”

If the House passes the bill, it is expected to be signed by President Biden shortly after.

What is in the bill: The nearly $2 trillion package includes up to $1,400 stimulus checks to many Americans, and billions of dollars for states and municipalities, schools, small businesses and vaccine distribution.

Roughly 90% of American households will be eligible to receive stimulus checks, according to an estimate from the Penn Wharton Budget Model. Read more about the checks here.

CNN's Kristin Wilson, Ryan Nobles and Clare Foran contributed reporting to this post. 

As the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention worked to prepare guidance for people who are fully vaccinated against Covid-19, the possibility of changing travel recommendations was discussed but there was never a lot of momentum behind adjusting it right now, two federal health officials familiar with the discussion tell CNN.

The CDC announced on Monday that people who are fully vaccinated:

Among the things CDC said hasn’t changed: “You should still delay domestic and international travel. If you do travel, you’ll still need to follow CDC requirements and recommendations.”

“Early data show that the vaccines may help keep people from spreading COVID-19, but we are learning more are more people get vaccinated,” the CDC added.

New York City has administered over 2.4 million vaccinations, with nearly 340,000 having been administered last week alone, Mayor Bill de Blasio said.

The mayor said the city's Vaccine for All Corps "continues to grow,” hiring 2,000 New Yorkers “right away” to work at sites throughout the city.

Recruitment is underway, and 2,500 applications were submitted within the first five days.

The new CDC guidelines for people who have been fully vaccinated against Covid-19 are a “huge, huge emotional release and lift" Dr. Richard Besser, former acting director of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said on NBC’s “Today” show on Tuesday.

He offered the example of elderly people who may be socially isolated, saying that they now know that if they are fully vaccinated, they can get together with friends who are also fully vaccinated, and they can hug their grandchildren.

Besser spoke about his own parents, both in their early 90s, and said that he knew for them that “getting two doses of vaccine, being fully vaccinated, now knowing they can get together with other people, that’s a huge, huge emotional release and lift.”

Houston Police Chief Art Acevedo called Texas governor’s decision to lift statewide mask mandate a “step in the wrong direction” and added that he expects it will lead to an uptick in calls to his department for service and conflict.

“In this state, businesses have property rights. And so you know, ‘no mask, no service’ means you can't be in that business,” he said. “So if a person does not want to wear the mask and refuses to wear the mask and refuses to leave, they’re committing what’s called criminal trespass.”

He added:

He said he hopes Texans will observe voluntary compliance but he can still see some cases of conflict “and the cops will be stuck in the middle like we always are.”

“We've already seen … a glass broken over [an employee’s] head simply for asking someone to wear the mask. We have another restaurant where the owner is calling me where they're talking about calling ICE on their employees because they've chosen to follow the science and keep their customers healthy. And so the conflict is coming. It was avoidable. This was unnecessary and unfortunately, something else that will be on our plate moving forward,” he said Tuesday.

Acevedo also criticized Gov. Greg Abbott for lifting the mandate for “political theatre.”

“He's going to continue to wear his mask, is my understanding because he understands the risk to his own health. If it's good enough for him to wear a mask, I'm not sure why he doesn't care enough about the rest of Texans to continue to follow the science,” he said.

Watch the interview: