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COVID-19

Outdoor mask guidance echoes what many Americans already do

In the small Nebraska town of Oxford, the school district dropped its mask mandate last month in what was a fairly straight-forward decision: Cases were down dramatically, and it didn't bother local officials that their move flouted Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidelines. Those federal mask guidelines just didn’t seem to fit local conditions well in the town of about 800 people where hardly anyone wears a mask. “We haven’t paid a whole lot of attention to what is going on at the federal level — mainly what is coming out through the state,” Southern Valley ...

India grieves 200,000 dead with many more probably uncounted

NEW DELHI (AP) — Three days after his coronavirus symptoms appeared, Rajendra Karan struggled to breathe. Instead of waiting for an ambulance, his son drove him to a government hospital in Lucknow, the capital of India’s largest state. But the hospital wouldn’t let him in without a registration slip from the district’s chief medical officer. By the time the son got it, his father had died in the car, just outside the hospital doors. “My father would have been alive today if the hospital had just admitted him instead of waiting for a piece of paper,” Rohitas Karan ...

US health panel urges restarting J&J COVID-19 vaccinations

U.S. health advisers on Friday urged resuming COVID-19 vaccinations with Johnson & Johnson’s single-dose shot, saying its benefits outweigh a rare risk of blood clots — in line with Europe’s rollout. Federal health officials uncovered 15 vaccine recipients who developed a highly unusual kind of blood clot, out of nearly 8 million people given the J&J shot. All were women, most under age 50. Three died, and seven remain hospitalized. Advisers to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said while J&J’s vaccine is important for fighting the pandemic, it’s also critical ...

FDA: N95 masks, now plentiful, should no longer be reused

The Biden administration has taken the first step toward ending an emergency exception that allowed hospitals to ration and reuse N95 medical masks, the first line of defense between frontline workers and the deadly coronavirus. Thousands of medical providers have died in the COVID-19 pandemic, many exposed and infected while caring for patients without adequate protection. Critical shortages of masks, gowns, swabs, and other medical supplies prompted the Trump administration to issue guidelines for providers to ration, clean, and reuse disposable equipment. Thus, throughout the ...

US drop in vaccine demand has some places turning down doses

JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — Louisiana has stopped asking the federal government for its full allotment of COVID-19 vaccine. About three-quarters of Kansas counties have turned down new shipments of the vaccine at least once over the past month. And in Mississippi, officials asked the federal government to ship vials in smaller packages so they don’t go to waste. As the supply of coronavirus vaccine doses in the U.S. outpaces demand, some places around the country are finding there’s such little interest in the shots, they need to turn down shipments. “It is kind of stalling. Some ...

Norwegian climber first to test positive on Mount Everest

KATHMANDU, Nepal (AP) — The coronavirus has conquered the world’s highest mountain. A Norwegian climber became the first to be tested for COVID-19 in Mount Everest base camp and was flown by helicopter to Kathmandu, where he was hospitalized. Erlend Ness told The Associated Press in a message Friday that he tested positive on April 15. He said another test on Thursday was negative and he was now staying with a local family in Nepal. An ace mountain guide, Austrian Lukas Furtenbach, warned that the virus could spread among the hundreds of other climbers, guides and helpers who ...